Monsanto VS Percy

[rodb]

Maltboy

There are no absolutes in this world. There was an article on cleaning a combine. After it was supposedly clean, the research team went through and found 220 kernels. Not a big deal but if you plant 220 kernels it does not take long to produce bushels. The question to ask is what is a tolerable limit? Is it 1%, .1% or 1 seed per trillion. We have the ability to find infintesmal quantiies in today's society, but what constitutes a perceived danger? The seed system and for that matter nothing is perfect but has standards that are generally regarded as the best that the system can guarantee. If you can't live with that then you either find a way to make it better or do something else. For interest sake go on the internet and look up the amount of foreign material and mouse turds that are allowed in Malt Barley or peanut butter. If something like a few off type canola's bothers you that much you definitely won't like beer, peanut butter or for that matter any processed food for they all have tolerances that are not zero.

[maltboy]

How owns this crop? A farmer buys certified conventional canola with 1% gmo seed in it, right at harvest the crop is lost due to hail,On a 30 bushel crop with 1% gmo seed there should be about 13 lbs of gmo seed on the ground if half of is germinates in the spring 6-7 lbs and the farmer decides to keep the volunteer crop who legally owns this crop?

[rodb]

First of all you would not be buying a Certified Canola of anykind with 1% contamination. The standard for inspection is 1.5 off type plants per 100 square meters. If you got hailed out and left it to regrow (? management practice) it would be still the same percentage as the parent crop everything being equal. The crops that
Monsanto is going after are not in this ball park. So to answer your question, you would own the volunteer crop. Now if you had brown bagged some RR canola and had the same scenario and you get caught by Monsanto's inspectors then you don't own the crop and may end up like Percy.

[frustrated1]

We had a RR canola wreck this summer. We made the mistake of spraying it with glyphosate. The company gave us the full lecture of off types and this wasn't possible, cutworms, wind, your socks were'nt blue, too many days in the week, etc. etc......... Turns out the independant lab's analysis showed only a small majority of the seeds in that lot were RR tolerant, with or without the helix. The company was happy to settle. Point to be taken: just because the tolerances are supposed to be there doesn't mean they are. There are wrecks happening and will continue to be.

[frustrated1]

Forgot to add that CFIA reports these varieties were de registered at company request. Maybe all is not roses?

[rodb]

Frustrated 1

You weren't the only one to have that problem. I know of more people who had the same problem. Someone screwed up big time or the construct that they used to implant the gene was not stable. We'll leave that one for the plant breeders to figure out