GMO Rant

Every now and then, when reading on the main forum, I see mention of GMO; usually it's couched in terms that indicate GMO crops are BAD!!! Then, in other posts, the same person may say that they feed some sort of supplement like Omolene or Triple-Crown or beet pellets or sweet feed drenched in molasses derived from sugar beets..., etc.

This really cranks me.

I don't know if GMO crops are BAD. I don't think anyone knows. There have been some studies, many of which have been biased and/or unscientific. Personally I think, special interests "support" our law makers and get what they want.

But if you are feeding anything other than your own pasture grass -- and maybe hay, there is a huge probability you are feeding GMO-derived product to your animals (and/or your people.)

For example, Triple Crown 30% Equine Supplement lists soybean meal as 1st ingredient and then some relatively minor ingredients/vitamins/etc. According to USDA, 93% of US soybean crop is GMO; perhaps Triple Crown is magically stuffing the remaining 7% that isn't GMO into their product; I doubt it.

I don't know about Omolene--ingredients are not listed online. And our goobers are perfectly capable of making themselves too fat without any kind of 'ration balancer' so I can't look at a label to see if they list ingredients on the actual package.

Beet pellets, anyone? 95% of the US sugar beet crop is GMO.

I was reading an article at the Kentucky Equine Research website and most of the proteins they listed as approved for horse feed were derived from crops that are 90% or greater GMO. (When I cite percentages, I mean percent of that crop grown in the US that is GMO.)

The only laggard is alfalfa at 30%.

SOOO. I don't know if GMO is BAD! What I find much more disturbing is that our seed supply is in the hands of corporations that are trying to concoct ways to corner the market. Each spring I receive a huge pile of seed catalogs and each one sells the very same thing. ...with the exception of a few. I sadly watch each seedsman disappear and only order from the ones that have trial gardens and aren't selling the same old crap.

One last thought... Instead of worrying about GMO, I'd be thinking about hormones injected into our meat supply. Back in the day, I had to wait until I was like 15 to grow boobs. Now it seems like you can get 'em at 8 or 10 or?

I just saw a post yesterday on another site about this subject. They placed two boxes in the woods in each one were two ears of corn, one treated and one organic. Seems the wild animals, squirrels, rabbits, etc. prefered to eat the organic corn not the modified corn.

Well I won't comment on the good or bad as folk must decide this for themselves which I always welcome after exhaustive and objective research. This research WILL lead you to the Truth about it. There is no doubt and people DO know as it CAN be known.

Alfalfa has been on a rapid rise towards GMO for some time now. The 30% figure is suspect to me. I read a story the other day speaking of GMO grass, as in lawn......

I'll give you a hint as to where I stand though...... I COMPLETELY trust the makers of agent orange to make NOTHING but wholesome and good products......

Bb

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US alfalfa crop at 30% came from the most recent USDA numbers. I suspect alfalfa's lagging, because it wasn't approved until much later (end of 2012, I believe.)

My opinion is that the 'agent orange' thingie is sensationalist commentary from organizations that try to shock people by playing loose with the facts.

The US government contracted for the manufacture of agent orange with primarily Monsanto and Dow, but also several other companies. One ingredient: 2,4,5-T was contaminated with dioxin (as an accidental side-effect during manufacture.) Dioxin was the big-bad-guy; and was known of in the early 1950s. 2, 4-D the other ingredient in agent orange is still used in many "lawn" chemicals; I've read of people here using it to whack their weeds in their horse pastures. Is it safe? ...beats me. I wouldn't use it on pasture intended for future horse grazing.

Monsanto was winning the race with their round-up ready GMO crops. Now Dow's looking like it's moving up on the rail and might beat out Monsanto with it's Enlist and Enlist-ready GMO crops [primary ingredients 2, 4-D and glyphosate (generic round-up)] because weeds are becoming resistant to round-up. Is that a good thing? I don't know. There is a huge lack of data. In the US, I think we have 2 major newsfeeds. Everything on any television or internet news filters downhill from there, with a whole bunch of opinions inserted by non-impartial people, depending on their agenda or whim.

My gut call is that developing more chemicals might not be the answer, but I suspect I'll be dead long before anyone ever knows for sure. One thing I never see much of is what the farmers think. People want cheap food and seem to want to dictate to the farmers, but how's it all working out for the farmer who's trying to pay his mortgage or debt on farm equipment?

Regardless, I still think a more troubling trend is the desire of companies (that used to be primarily involved in chemicals) of trying to corner the market on the seed supply. Perhaps they could next corner the market on soil?

2,4-D--is it safe? Well, I buy hay that has been sprayed with it. Without spraying, our hay here would be full of leafy spurge--and I know that spurge is poisonous to horses. Spurge can make a horse very ill in less than a matter of months....hay that has been sprayed has no ill effects after years of use. I would spray my pastures if I had a sprayer...because without spraying I have a lot of spurge and a little but of grass.

I know someone who sprays his pastures with 2,4-D (aerial application) with his cattle still out on those pastures...cows have not keeled over dead yet and he hasn't had any deformed calves born. I would not try THAT on my horses,

I wrote a super long reply from a farmers point of view and then deleted it because I so often think that nobody really sees anything from a farmers point of view.

Thank you AngC for saying that. I am back but with a shorter post this time.

We have a small dairy farm. We average an 18 hour day of work pretty much year round.

Yes, nobody really sees it from a farmers point of view. Farmers that do not owe mortgage and work without outdated equipment and break their backs to just break even are not trying to poison folks. Anybody that goes to the grocery store and picks out the best and most perfect looking produce or wants perfect weed free hay for their horses even to the point of returning bales that are not perfect, these folks do not understand the price of perfection.

My neighbors farm some organic corn. They till between the rows for weeds. They use no chemicals. They plant early and pray in the fall when hurricane season comes that their entire crop does not blow over before they can harvest it because this corn does not have as strong a stalk as wind resistant variety of corn. This neighbor has 11 siblings to work the farm with him and it still takes all of them to plant and work and deliver this organic certified corn. It pays big bucks, but it costs so much time and it is back breaking work hand tilling fields of corn.

Anybody who has seen their entire crop of corn that is grown to feed their dairy cows all winter blow over and flatten into the mud and find themselves grossly short of feed in the dead of winter and having to purchase high dollar corn from somebody else might be tempted to plant a wind resistant variety the next year.

Folks say "farmers" but do not realize there is a vast difference between crop farmers and dairy farmers.

Dairy farmers are doing slightly better right now, but have been through heck for the last number of years ...

Folks don't see that it is a cascade effect. Mandated ethanol in the tank has created an unnatural balance for a number of years.

Scare folks about their milk so they want to purchase soy milk... there are no antibiotics in the milk that is not organic. A cow treated for mastitis with antibiotics is long rid of those antibiotics before the milk goes in the tank and every milking is tossed out until she is rid of those antibiotics. many folks do not know this. Every tank of milk you send is tested individually for antibiotics and bacteria.

Folks will pay more for bottled water than for milk and then complain about $4 a gallon milk. Most of that money does not go directly to the farmer.

Raw milk is a good thing. We can purchase raw eggs, raw meat, but any farmer that sells raw milk without permit will go to jail.

Dairy fat is good for you. Taking out the fat makes the milk a sugar. Whole milk is only 4% fat so taking whole milk out of the schools and chocolate milk out of the schools under the Michele O plan of crappy so called healthy lunches just makes me nuts.

We have fed our cows genetically modified feed. They live a LONG time. We do not cull our cows at a high rate like the big farms do. I have had 17 year old cows walking around and looking good and milking and they were not covered in tumors like that photo of that mouse or rat that was supposedly fed the genetically modified diet.

That modified corn often has a coating on the outside that protects it in the ground until it germinates. Probably why critters wont eat it when offered both, just a thought.

Be careful of what you are reading... part of propaganda... scare folks... farmers are bad... all the while, they are bringing in stuff from other countries without our excellent testing and putting it in our food without labels. Cheese product crappo is being imported cheaply from other countries. It is cheap cheese additive that is now making its way into big name brand cheese companies to keep the prices down. It comes in pasteurized so it eliminates inspection. Pasteurization does not detect melamine.

In my opinion foreign ingredients without labeling is a bigger deal than feeding folks wind or drought resistant varieties of corn, which they now label all GMO. Much of the US has been in drought for quite some time. Without drought resistant corn we would have less feed available. We are using our US feed reserves at an alarming rate as more and more farmers just can't stand it and quit.

Wait until you see the price of meat? And for the non meat eaters, less meat and all grain veggie diet tips the balance too.

There was a virus killing baby pigs... there is a shortage of beef animals due to massive droughts all over the country. Bull calves that once sold for $5 now bring $200 to $400 bucks at auction, that was a short time ago the price of a feeder sized animal.

Right now the feed farmers are crying. Corn prices are down. This helps the dairy farmer afford his corn, but kills the feed farmers.

Anyway... I quit now. Government kind of reminds me of the "let them eat cake" comment from long ago. Folks that do not have a clue about farming should not be making the rules.

Anybody that does not farm cannot possibly understand how very deep it all goes.

Our farm has been in our family for 200 years. It is what we do, its a farming thing and most folks would never understand.

Paul Harvey says it better than me.

http://www.farms.com/ExpertsCommentary/tribute-to-farmers-god-made-a-farmer-video-39092.aspx

hug a farmer, there are few left and average age world wide is over 60. Who is going to feed the world when the farmers can't do it any more?

PS, anybody who has baled a bumper crop of thistle with their hay is tempted to do one round of round up resistant hay to clean up their alfalfa. Folks don't do a second thought feeding the cute birds thistle seed in their feeders. that's a thought

Awwww, crap, it got long again. Read quick before I delete again.

Don't delete that post again. It's a very good answer, and you're right--most people do NOT look at things from a farmer's point of view.

Shorthorsemom :yeah Well said. People that live in town just don't get it, many think that food just shows up at the grocery store all packaged and ready to go. We raise beef cattle, we have rising costs of production and little say in what we sell calves for (you could try to hold out for higher prices, but in doing so you are adding more costs to those calves in feed and care, so you gain little or nothing).

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With both foods and the use of antibiotics and such, the answer is transparency.

Let it be known what is used and why. Using antibiotics to treat disease is for the good of everyone. Using them as a matter of course on entire herds is a problem. The same is true in human medicine -- unnecessary and excessive usage create more problems than are solved.

Those who object to GMO foods are, for the most part, not blaming the farmers themselves, but the likes of Monsanto, Dow and their secrecy and heavy-handed tactics.

Scare tactics have been used on both sides of the issue. When Michael Pollan got together with a group of farmers, they all learned that they had more in common than not. The problem was with those seeking to divide and conquer.

Painting either farmers or "city dwellers" with a broad brush does no one any good. Not all city dwellers are ignorant, and not all rural folks are wise. As I've mentioned, our city neighbors welcomed our horses when we lived smack in the middle of Portland, OR, but when we moved out to a rural area, our neighbors sent nasty notes about our rooster.

Thank you, shorthorsemom, for your informative post. The more we all know, the more we can work together rather than fighting battles of rumors and misinformation.

Shorthorsemom - rock on! I'm a dairyman too 575 in milk in upstate New York.

Antibiotics are never ever entered into the food chain. Ever. Farmers are fined huge amounts if they do, and as a professor of mine put it 'I would rather be caught in bed, with another woman, by my wife, than have the FDA knocking on my door about a residue.' EVERY carcass is tested! EVERY load of milk is too!

I'm pro GMO. Very pro GMO. We have a cow who's 12 yrs old, pregnant, and has given over 175,000 lbs of milk in her lifetime and is heading to have her 9th calf here in a few weeks. She's not riddled with tumors, her udder isn't "blown out," she's not oozing with sickness, she's shiny, sassy (too mean to die! Lol), and other than the bit of roaming around her eyes you'd never guess her age. Know what she's eaten her whole life? GMOs.

It's not the small farmer or the large farmer. My cows stay a longgggggg time. A dead cow doesn't make me any money, nor does a stall without a cow in it. I'd say we have a solid 50-55 animals over 4th lactation. Big farms care about their animals just as much as small farms.

I'm probably going to start a war but I think organic animal agriculture in a lot of cases is actually cruel. Would you give your horse antibiotics if the vet said they needed it? Easy answer right? Organic farmers can't use antibiotics ever. Animals that could easily be cured have to leave the farm if they receive any antibiotics, and frequently it's for beef. I'll give my ladies some penicillin for a few days, get her feeling right, and sacrifice a weeks worth of milk to keep her around another few years. The other option for an organic animal is just to 'ride out' the illness with only supportive therapy.

Sorry, a lot of the holistic crap just doesn't work. A uterine infection isn't going to clear up with garlic. All far,a work hard to keep animals healthy, so there's not like there's less sick animals on organic farms. Number wise that might be true. For example if something happens 1% of the time at my farm, I see 5 to 6 cases a year. Someone milking 50 cows will only see it once every 2 years. Still the same rate of incidence, just different volume. There is always and exception to the rule, and no, not all organic farmers are monsters, al farmers do what they think is right for their animals, but I personally refuse to support any kind of organic animal agriculture. Kind of like different parenting styles. Some leave me scratching my head,and I won't use on my future kids, but that parent knows that's what their kid needs so more power to them.

I digress. I think people need to remember - farmers eat it too. I've never met a conventional farmer that buys organic food for his own family. We care because it's OUR food too! The biggest issue with today's food system is WHO people ask questions too, not the farmer who's done it 50 yrs or has an ag degree, they go to the guy with a kinda big garden in the middle of the city that has 4 chickens and reads on the internet a lot. There are far bigger evils in our food system than Monsanto, shorthorsemom already hit the nail on the head about the imports and pretty much said everything I was going to! It boggles my mind how people blame farmers and go produce instead of all the processed crap on the shelves stuffed with chemicals.

Yeah Furstplaceminiatures! Dairy farmers rock.

My vet hates to go to an organic dairy farm. He says it is so sad culling cows that can be cured with a round of antibiotics. I have known of farmers who would go to auction to buy up some of those organic cull cows, treat them for mastitis, get them cleaned up and milking and continue to milk those cows for quite some time. Well actually that was before beef prices soared and cull cows are worth big bucks now for meat due to the heartbreaking drought out west.

Is anybody nervous about the drought in California? That will impact our food sources hugely. I think when faced with starvation folks will be glad to have some of that gmo technology corn.

We take every cow loss personally. We are only milking 55 cows, but that is without a parlor in an old fashioned stall barn, one by one, deep knee bends for each cow. People say "cows are milked automatically", well that is true, we are not pulling teats except in rare cases where a cow with mastitis must be milked out round the clock, but we work with only 5 milkers at a time and clean each cows teats and pre and post dip them so there is tremendous hand labor involved. There are robotic milkers out there, but small farms like us cannot afford them. I did go to an auction once that was selling cows used to robotic milking, and they were spooky around humans. Our girls are born on our farm and raised from calves.

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The milk product imports are really scary. Read your labels on that one. BIG name cheese companies are using it. Some of the generic store brand cheeses are actually healthier. We are importing milk product from countries that do not have dairies, what is up with that? We are sending tremendous volumes of dairy cows over seas to other countries on boats. A neighbor who lost his family farm a few years ago due to milk prices plummeting right after he made expansions and the bank came in and sold off his farm and land to pay the debt.. this farm is now raising dairy animals for export.

Do you all know that china is buying up US farms? Smithfield farms purchased by china, farms in Wisconsin? yep. China is buying up land in new York too.

There is so many layers involved with farming and gmo debate is a tiny fraction of distraction from the big picture. You wonder if it is a distraction to keep folks focused on something other than the truth. Kind of like oz... pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.

Ps I would encourage folks to learn how to garden, tier and pot garden in your back yard if you do not have the space. It is an education and heathy for you. best wishes folks..

Oh well...so much for trying to look at both sides of an issue...

I am a farmer, I see it from a farmers point of view. Anyone is welcome to post from another point of view. This is the back yard after all.

Guess I should have left it at one posting, just loved reading that post from furstplace that shared my passion and love of farming and got excited enough to step in again and post some more.

Farmers are happier at their work than any other profession..

I worked off the farm for 32 years to bring in a steady paycheck and health insurance for my family and came home each night from my full time job and worked the farm evenings and weekends. 550 of us lost our jobs to this stinking economy. I farm full time with my husband now. I was a scientist for those 32 years.. I do hear both sides, but only agree with one.. I strongly believe in the constitutional right to free speech. Who wants a bunch of zombies who all say the same thing?

Without strong opinions at both ends of the spectrum, there would be no middle ground. I enjoyed your post Susanne

bye.

susanne said:

Oh well...so much for trying to look at both sides of an issue...

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hmmm... not sure what you mean by that Susanne. I'm glad that the people involved in dairy farming commented. Be they right or wrong, it's not something you see on the news very often. I would argue with your comment about urban vice rural residents. I think there's a huge divide. Neither one are smarter than the other, but I believe people who live in urban settings face different problems than people who live in rural areas. And although I haven't checked numbers recently, it seems like there's more people that live in cities, suburbs, and non-rural areas. Their priorities are different, and when they have the bulk of the vote, they can inflict ignorant policies on rural dwellers.

Anyway, anecdotal evidence (such as our horses have been eating 2,4-D for years and they're not dead or crippled; or we've been eating GMO for years and we're fine) is just that. People's observations. I smoked cigarettes for years; I'm not dead yet. Does that mean cigarettes are o.k.? Probably not. I would wish that our USDA which is supposed to be a regulatory agency didn't appear to serve special interests with big pocket-books. I find it especially disturbing that there is such a conflict on the GMO issue. (Personally, I don't think it's that bad if you consider that plants have been hybridized for a really, long time. This is a modern variation on hybridizing. But where are the government studies?)

Regarding the comment on hating organic. I try to do things in an organic fashion--for example gardening. How's that working out for me? Well, one of these days, I need to go out there and wade through the three-foot tall weeds and rescue the rest of the onions. They're perfectly fine onions, but the garden got out of hand, again this year. It works for me and puts some fresh veggies on the table. If I were trying to make a living at it, I'd be dead-broke.

[i wonder if you can get "real" milk anymore. When I was a kid we used to walk to the dairy carrying our glass bottles; they had sort of a storefront--actually a room with coolers--and trade in our bottles for filled gallon bottles of whole, unpasteurized milk, pretty much straight from the cow. Mom would pour out the top part with the milk fat and use it for whipped cream or for their coffee. That milk was so good. Sometimes our food supply was a bit short, but she always found money to buy the milk--3 meals a day. It's been so long, plus that milk was so rich, I wonder if it would taste odd to me now.]

I think this is a great topic - Its usually "The political Porch"

I Think you could classify where I live as rural but I am very close to "the City"

I was only thinking the other day how very lucky I am that I can get the horse feeds I need without too much problem.

I was following Chandab thread in the marestare section , reading how not only does she find it difficult to get the feeds/hay needed to feed in general, then needing to find enough to get thru a whole winter. "I am very lucky"

Ill agree Dairy farmers "do rock" they should be paid more for the product they sell. I know here they are poorly paid for Milk considering what its sold for in the shops.

AngC- A friend said that to me the other day "have you ever tried real milk" ?? sad thing is thought I always had...............

I grew my first totally organic garden this year. I grew a lot of weeds and I felt proud of my non perfect organic veggies. I watched bugs eat the broccoli, I picked stink bugs off the tomatoes, but it was a super cool garden and I had pride as I waded through all the high grass. I mourned my corn when the raccoons had a corn massacre one night.... Without my friend to help me, we would not have been able to do it. Gardening takes much more time than I ever thought. My friends just go to the produce auction, buy cheap organic veggies and can them and do not do gardens any more.

I work a 19 hour day.. just got home from the barn a few minutes ago.. crazy enough to be on here and posting... haha. Gotta unwind after all that physical work or you just can't sleep so I poke around here for mental stimulation.

It is not organic that I oppose... It is the regulation behind "certified organic" and it doesn't always mean what the consumer thinks it means.

crap... I posted again. haha.

You can still get "real milk" from farms that have permit from government to sell raw milk. It tastes real good and you can make cheese and yogurt and other cool stuff from it.

shorthorsemom said:

The milk product imports are really scary. Read your labels on that one. BIG name cheese companies are using it. Some of the generic store brand cheeses are actually healthier. We are importing milk product from countries that do not have dairies, what is up with that? We are sending tremendous volumes of dairy cows over seas to other countries on boats. A neighbor who lost his family farm a few years ago due to milk prices plummeting right after he made expansions and the bank came in and sold off his farm and land to pay the debt.. this farm is now raising dairy animals for export.

Do you all know that china is buying up US farms? Smithfield farms purchased by china, farms in Wisconsin? yep. China is buying up land in new York too.

Click to expand...

China is footing a whole bunch of our national debt too. Perhaps we/our government should stop spending so much. (I vote we keep the highways, parks, space program--what's left of it-- and whack out entitlement programs.) I didn't know about the Smithfield acquisition. ...disturbing.

I haven't noticed cheese tasting funny yet. I had to learn how to make salad dressing a while ago. We used to use bottled salad dressing. Not the pricey refrigerated stuff; just the plain old dressing in the plastic bottles, Kraft, Hidden Valley, etc. Then it just started tasting foul. At first I thought we had a bad bottle; tried another; tossed it; bought another brand; tossed that too. I don't know what they did to it; and it wasn't just me being silly; husband agreed with me.

Read about milk protein concentrates... Look for MPC's on the labels. Or whey and casein protein.. You will be shocked at how much of this is sneaking into our "all American cheese slices" and other things we eat.

Look for the ingredient "milk" instead

http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/food/foodsafety/questionable-technologoies/milk-protein-concentrates/

Sorry. I will admit I won't really side with 'the other team' in the least bit in this one.

I spent 50k on a 4 year degree in dairy farming. I've worked as a manager for 3 yrs now on a large farm. I've bet my whole life and livelihood on 'my' cows. I'm not really going to appreciate the public whining they want me to make more food, cheaper, but then use practices far more inefficient and say I'm trying to kill them all while explaining it doesn't work that way. Ugh. Have had that conversation thousands of time in real life. I wouldn't tell you how to raise your kids, I'm not a parent. Why are they tryin to tell me how to take care of my cows and what's best for them? They've never touched one! I feel about my cows with the same passion I and the rest of us feel about our horses.

'Real milk' is illegal in a lot of states because a lot of people do not know how to handle t and wind up sick. I suggest looking for 'Creamline' milk. It's pasteurized but not homogenized, and the cream still floats to the top. It tastes like the real deal but has the benefits of pasteurization. Plus it's freakin delicious!