RR Alfalfa gets non reg status

[jensend]

you're right grassfarmer. farming is no longer about food production; it's just another industrial process. pretty soon it will be a mcjob.

[tmyrfield]

It would be nice if the alfalfa fields around the area could be sprayed to remove the trillions of dandelions that have infested them in these last couple of wet years. Or maybe my neighbors are such poor farmers they couldn't get all their haying done in the one 7 day stretch this summer when it didn't rain.

[grassfarmer]

A perfect case of mindless use of chemicals. Nature abhors mono-cultures and vacuums. Dandelions are a symptom of previous poor management that led to gaps in the sward - they are nature's way of filling the vacuum and a sign the sward is healing. Spraying to kill them merely simplifies the plant community and ensures there are more spaces that nature will try to fill in next year with another "weed". Why are dandelions such a terrible thing in an alfalfa crop anyway? they have about the same feed value and the seed is free. We have grazed very healthy dandelions with leaves a foot long and four inches across. I guess we should use Grazon to kill these plants and hurt the soil a bit more - then we may get some thistles coming in place of the dandelions....of course then we would need to use Grazon to kill the thistles....

[wd9]

Posts like Parsely's are the kind of drivel that perpetuates the 'facts' like canola is genetically engineered from ****seed in the 70's.

Biotech corn, soybeans, and canola have been and are successful crops. No problem with marketing, are easy to grow, and yield well. Reduced tillage, reduced fuel, reduced chem load, and weed load are huge benefits. They are as safe as their non biotech cousins and are extremely successful and important to farmers in Canada.

How many farmers want to go back to spraying muster and a graminicide and some Lontrel and maybe put some edge down too to eek out a canola crop? How quickly the pain of the old way is quickly forgotten.

Its been 22 years since the last new chemistry has been made for crops. There is nothing new on the horizon either. I for one want investment in agriculture or it is going to get extremely difficult in a hurry.

[parsley]

The links I posted that shows young 30ish prairie men with no cancer but men a decade older showing the same prairie area riddled with prostate cancer is starkly damning. And scarey. And real.

Stick your head in the sand, wd. But my non-peer reviewed fact is that cancer is an epidemic. I see it. And it's raging in the farm community. And my friends and your friends are among those increasingly diagnosed with cancer.

I have watched cancer become a business, filled with research and scientists, and experiments, while out of control numbers of farmer cancer patients become vital statistics.

I can count.

Patient after patient undergoes suggested regimes of treatment.

'Eating the right food' has become the pillar treatment, with nutritionists working hand in hand with oncologists.

Food.

Most young men and women 'grow up' when they have children.(You think you know it all until you have kids, and that's fair.LOL) Or when someone they are close to gets cancer. Or their kids get cancer.

Farmers have a serious role to play when it comes to food. You are first line of defense.

Too many professional people lack ethics.

Govrnments are, well, governments; that's the most insulting word I can think of.

Global food corporations will grind up every last ounce of road kill growing in petrie dishes and trademark it as 'Chicken Little Crosses the Road."

But the bottom line is this: Farmers are no good to others to provide good food if you get sick yourself.

Look at the red.

<p></p>
<p><strong>[URL="http://dsol-smed.phac-aspc.gc.ca/dsol-smed/cancer/m_prov-eng.phtml?minx=-2593089&miny=-697455&maxx=3420404&maxy=3840000&CAUSE=761&AGEGROU P=0&YEAR=am&SEX=1&DATATYPE=r&reClassifyMap=Update Map&ecumenes=on"](Contrary to what wd says, the color red is not drivel. )[/URL]</strong></p>

[jensend]

if you just leave a piece of land sit for a year what you'll have growing there is the plants that are best adapted to the condition of the soil. if you let natural succession take place all the crops that are commonly grown in canadian farming will be overtaken by other species. that's why modern farming is so dependent on 'crop protection' products. the annual crops being produced are weaklings that cannot survive without elimination of all threats. they are less able to survive than most of the species in nature. it's not unfair to say that every kernel of wheat grown conventionally comes out of an oil barrel.

[wd9]

That would be true if i was growing unhealthy food. But i am not. I am, as well as just about all the rest of the posters on this site grow healthy, approved and safe food. We do not grow your fear mongering examples of alledgedly cancer inducing products but rather ones that feed the world and our own families.

Your religious views on organics, which are only a marketing method and have nothing to do with food safety or nutrition or a shred of real proof for that matter, are not what the Canadian science based approval system is about. It only hurts the farmers who do use these systems. About 98% percent of the farmers BTW.

But you are entitled to your opinion. But at the end of the day, it is just your opinion, not fact, not science, not even common sense, the rest of us will continue to move forward in agriculture to feed the world. Keep stoking the loom fires parsely cuz there will be a lot more looms coming. RR alfalfa is just one of them.

[parsley]

As you should know,peer-reviewed climate change science was bunk. Bullshit!

Scientists, some governments and specific corporations huddled in a gorey room to plan the scheme.

Planned, statistical error-riddled bullshit. It's funny! And okay, maybe the oil producers should be slapped. And if we did go to windmills, okay, we won't die. Money making schemes are as common as warts.

But food is another matter.

And frankly, Scientific modifiest bullshit makes climate changers look like kindergarten novices.

Check your knackers. Pars

[wd9]

Are you saying the existing biotech canola we all have been growing since 1997 is bad thing?

[parsley]

Your question is context-vague.

Canola has been profitable for agriculture, for chemical companies, for seed suppliers, etc.

But, my narrow interest,as you well know, is the growing and use of canola, of all agriculktural crops, for FOOD use.

Food. That's when I question.

I know. I know. You are bloated with full faith, much like religious fervor, in all scientific reviews, so be extra patient with bringing all the Inspector Clueso's up to speed LOL

Canola margarine is scientifically peer reviewed, so lather it on your bread wd,you're confident, and rub it into those tired feet. The main scientific reason I have to not eat margarine is my cat won't go near it. LOL <p></p>
<p><strong>[URL="http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Is_margarine_a_pure_substance_or_a_mixture"](If food is stamped Grade AAA by scientists and governments and experts, why should anyone question them for heaven's sakes!)[/URL]</strong></p>

[parsley]

It isn't that professionals 'working for you' (tic) don't understand the issues. But information is sometimes targeted or suppressed.

Is there even one farmer that clicked on the prostate cancer location map I posted who didn't say, "Youch, but why is there so much cancer in the West?"

Are those stats highlighted in farm publications? Not the ones I look at.

Why?

btw, I just leafed through February's "Agriview" that came in the mail wondering what was said about flax seed. Hmmm.

Daphne Cruise has an article on "Clean Seed will Help Manage Risk in 2011." Elaine Moats and Kim Stonehouse wrote on "Seed Quality Considerations for 2011." All agrologists.

Neither article contains the word "flax". Look for yourself. Don't take my word for it. We have a flax fiasco, and flaxseed is a problem and not one word from 'professionals'?

Are they incompetent, targeting info, or suppressed? They don't deserve to get paid.

No one cares more about your land, your bottom line, or your health more than YOU do.

A dose of skepticism is healthy!
... taking into polite consideration, though, the fanaticism of our regular posting science-imam. Pars

[wd9]

Fine. More specific then. Do you believe biotech canola grown in Canada by farmers in Canada to be unsafe for human consumption?