Canada approves production of GM salmon eggs on commercial scale

[tb4me]

Sicilian saucer is one of the ugliest, yet tastiest tomatoes around. For a totally different flavour try some of the old Siberian variants. Black Krim for slicing or black plum as a salad or sauce tomato. On the peppers, try a company known as West Coast Seed. Pretty reliable firm specializing in organic and heirloom seed strains

yes we love it but dont dare judge a tomato by its cover...lol

Im going to check out some of those pepper varieties. We grew the black plum one year but they weren't very blight resistant.. Lost them before the fruit was ripe.

[bigugli]

Despite certain physical limitations, I still farm part time, as much as my body will allow. ( I wish I had gone back to it full time 20 years back when I still had better control over my legs) I also share my knowledge of crop management with friends who farm. I used to assess crops and inspect for pest and disease management and quality control. My family farmed and fished and timbered, so I'm used to having dirt under my fingernails. I find it both satisfying and fulfilling.

 

As for eating well... You could say it is one reason I look like Santa

[dave524]

The scariest thing I see daily is the 10% cream I use in my coffee. I grew up with a milk man and you put some change in the empty bottles put them on the front porch and magically he would replace them with full bottles in the early hours of the morning. Back then, 3 day old milk was suspect and any older was a forgone conclusion it would be sour without even a sniff. The cream I opened today and bought a couple of days ago says best before January 20th, just what are they doing to the stuff to make it last that long, it always was pasteurized and homogenized even in my youth

[Rich]

Look up 'suphites'.. they are the preservatives you speak of

[blarg]

Virtually everything you eat has been already modified by humans. We have been selectively growing and hybridizing plants and animals for thousands of years, but i bet that most of the people here who are bothered by this would consider someone who isn't bothered to be uninformed and anti science. In fact the opposite is true.

[bigugli]

Virtually everything you eat has been already modified by humans. We have been selectively growing and hybridizing plants and animals for thousands of years,

Quite correct. Cross pollination and selective breeding. Processes that occur in nature over thousands of years, but which man has accelerated. We breed together the biggest hogs and sows, bulls and cows, to sire stronger, heavier, more profitable herds. However, the only difference from nature is that instead of the biggest male in the local herd getting first dibs, we bring in males from other herds in other locales to blend with the females in another herd.

Then you have the accidents of nature, that prove viable and successful. I've had some wonderful crosspollinations in my pepper patch done by the bees. Mutant sized jalapenos, 3x normal size due to crossing with sweet bells, but after 3-4 seasons they revert back to original properties.

In horticulture, there is lot of tissue splicing of plants and trees, but the seed is either sterile or it reverts back to it's parent species for the most part. Hence most propagation is through taking rooted cuttings.

Gene splicing and tampering with DNA sequencing may prove one day to have benefit. However in the drive to push profit, industry, and government,always looks for the short gain while ignoring the possible long term consequence. No one wants to wait while long term effects and potentials are studied. Imagine what harm could have been avoided if they had performed long term usage studies on such wonderful inventions as DDT or Thalidomide. What really happens is that a new product gets fast tracked for public consumption, after 5 years of testing, and gets pulled after the long term consequences have already reared their ugly heads.

[misfish]

I remember an old Italian nieghbour taking branches from a peach tree and slitting a few selected branches of a plum tree and inserting the peach branch and wrapping it.

 

 

I wasnt around long enough to see what transpired.

Edited November 27, 2013 by Misfish

[Rich]

There's a difference between cross breeding plants that can be naturally cross bred and chemically altering their DNA to be 'better'... That's science.

[DRIFTER_016]

Bigugli, your posts of food knowledge alone make me wish to head your way for supper! Im assuming you eat very well, please done tell me otherwise

 

Actually his favorite food is Fritos and spray cheese!!!! :rofl2:

[manitoubass2]

 

Actually his favorite food is Fritos and spray cheese!!!! :rofl2:

ill ignore this and stick to my ignorant presumption. Lol

[misfish]

There's a difference between cross breeding plants that can be naturally cross bred and chemically altering their DNA to be 'better'... That's science.

 

I was just saying Rich. Ya I know the dif.

[tb4me]

Heres the deal with Gene manipulation as opposed to selective breeding within north America,particularly within Canada. Hoprfully no one is sorry I post this but here`s my thoughts

The Canadian government's oversight of the health implications of GMO foods is based on an outdated and refuted view of gene function.

When you insert a gene - when you randomly throw this thing in there, they don't know ahead of time where it's going to land. The researchers don't know how many copies will be inserted, or what other genes it will affect, or will affect it. We now know that the position of a gene is critical to how it functions, and side effects of this are unpredictable and could be drastic

Canada's regulatory system relies on companies to provide their own experiments and risk assessment. To determine safety of a product, Health Canada uses a concept called substantial equivalence. No Canadian GM submissions have ever been rejected. Neither is Canadian regulation transparent to the public. The Canadian public has no say in approval of GMOs. Independent scientists can't evaluate feeding studies the Ag Biotech companies submit because they are deemed confidential. The Canadian regulatory system is supporting the biotechnology industry ahead of the health and welfare of Canadian consumers and farmers. It is no different than in the US

GM Salmon has just been approved for Canada – it contains DNA from an eel spiced into Salmon for commercial fisheries. It is my understanding that there have not been any GM crops that purposefully contain animal genomes. However there have been numerous studies that show problems with animals who are fed a constant diet of GM feed. In addition, rBST is a genetically synthesized peptide hormone that is usually produced by a cows’ pituitary gland. Milk from rBST-treated cows is chemically similar to traditional milk. Both have very similar levels of protein, fat, and sugar. A study also indicated that both sources of milk had comparable levels of vitamins and minerals. Milk from rBST-treated cows is not, however, chemically identical to traditional milk. Milk from rBST-treated cows contains slightly elevated levels of hormones such as BST, and IGF1. Cows treated with rBST have a substantially higher rate of mastitis and more often require antibiotics. As for assertions that GM crops have reduced pesticide and herbicide use – nothing could be further from the truth! See http://www.nlpwessex.org/docs/benbrook.htm Scientists and government agencies approved a variety of chemicals and drugs and told us they were extensively tested and were safe. They include asbestos, DDT, PCB, Lead, MTBE, Dioxin, Agent Orange, Dalkon shield, and Thalidomide to name a few. Fortunately for us science also ultimately proved these things to be unsafe - Science is proving that GMO’s are not the answer as well - Despite what the chemical companies who are spearheading the GMO revolution are telling you, these GMOs are requiring farmers to buy more of their chemical pesticides, not less.

A 2012 paper concluded that the rise of glyphosate-resistant “superweeds” in the wake of the GMO revolution has actually increased pesticide use in the last 15 years by 183 million kilograms, or 7%. The study estimated that if new strains of GM corn and soybeans are approved for commercial use, herbicide use could increase by a whopping 50%. In his 2012 study, Dr. Charles Benbrook determined over a 16 year period that Herbicide-tolerant crops worked extremely well in the first few years of use, but over-reliance led to shifts in weed communities and the emergence of resistant weeds that have, together, forced farmers to incrementally –

• Increase herbicide application rates (especially glyphosate), • Spray more often, and • Add new herbicides that work through an alternate mode-of-action into their spray programs.

Each of these responses has, and will continue to contribute to the steady rise in the volume of herbicides applied per acre of HT corn, cotton, and soybeans. HT crops have increased herbicide use by 527 million pounds over the 16-year period (1996-2011). In 2011, about 90 million more pounds of herbicides were applied than likely in the absence of HT, or about 24% of total herbicide use on the three crops in 2011.

There are now two-dozen weeds resistant to glyphosate, the major herbicide used on HT crops, and many of these are spreading rapidly. Millions of acres are infested with more than one glyphosate-resistant weed. The presence of resistant weeds drives up herbicide use by 25% to 50%, and increases farmer-weed control costs by at least as much.

The biotechnology-seed-pesticide industry’s primary response to the spread of glyphosate-resistant weeds is development of new HT varieties resistant to multiple herbicides, including 2,4-D and dicamba. These older phenoxy herbicides pose markedly greater human health and environmental risks per acre treated than glyphosate. Approval of corn tolerant of 2,4-D is pending, and could lead to an additional 50% increase in herbicide use per acre on 2,4-D HT corn. In order for Bt corn work the corn borer still has to ingest the crop – I lknow farmers that live in Illinois and I can tell you that Monsanto’s Bt corn did not stop the European Corn Borer there and my farmer friends who did buy Monsanto’s Ht corn found resistant weeds after the 2nd harvest. Bt and Ht crops are not designed to increase more yield – they are designed with defense mechanisms in place – that is all it is. Ht is designed to withstand the application of glyphosate. There is nothing in Ht crops or Bt crops that could possibly increase yields. Does this mean I think that all GM is bad? Absolutely not! I think there can be some amazing things accomplished through responsible technology. Their are some risks to your health regarding Golden Rice that could be minor, or could be major. The absence of animal testing data on genetically modified rice, or “Golden Rice” is worrying because Golden Rice is made to overproduce beta carotene, and studies show that some retinoids made from beta carotene are toxic and can cause birth defects. Ingesting too much Golden Rice could also give you an overdose in vitamin A which could lead to Hypervitaminosis which can lead the body to have toxic symptoms. Some effects of Hypervitaminosis are: birth defects, liver abnormalities, and reduced bone density that could result in Osteoporosis. When pharmaceutical drugs are tested for safety, they are tested on animals first. If no harmful effects occur with animals, then testing on humans may begin. Golden Rice has never been subjected to feeding on animals. It is therefore criminally irresponsible to test it on humans at all. “Golden Rice proven not safe to eat” (“Golden Rice: A dangerous experiment”, 2009) People die every year for lots of reasons but they do not die from eating organic foods. There are not any death certificates that say “death by GMO consumption.” Nor are there certificates that state “death by organic consumption.” Big Agri somehow thinks trying to prove that GMO crops are “safer” than organic, because they were GMO. To insinuate that GMO crops are protected from food-borne disease contamination is ridiculous. There is research to support that farm management practices commonly used by organic farmers or conventional farmers either encourage or discourage food-borne disease outbreaks, none of these findings are absolute. No side can claim they can prevent such outbreaks completely. Using the bean sprout tragedy as a way to convince people that organic is unsafe is absurd. I hope I helped answer your questions, Now you know just how passionate about this I am.

Below is a link for further review if you so choose..

Dr Charles M. Benbrook - Genetically Engineered Crops and Pesticide Use in the United States

www.nlpwessex.org

the study, published in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Sciences Europe, found that the use of herbicides in three GM crops - cotton, soya beans and maize, actually increased in the USA over the past two decades.The research

[Twocoda]

I remember an old Italian nieghbour taking branches from a peach tree and slitting a few selected branches of a plum tree and inserting the peach branch and wrapping it.

 

 

I wasnt around long enough to see what transpired.

Its called a nectarine Brian

 

Good read to this thread thus far...kudos !

[manitoubass2]

Its called a nectarine Brian

 

Good read to this thread thus far...kudos !

i laughed, i cried...