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market-farming - Re: [Market-farming] Bt Sweet Corn

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Chronological Thread  
  • From: Etienne Goyer <etienne.goyer AT outlands.ca>
  • To: Market Farming <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Market-farming] Bt Sweet Corn
  • Date: Tue, 26 Jan 2010 01:24:27 -0500

Bill Shoemaker wrote:
> Regarding pollen drift, it really doesn't drift very far. Corn pollen is
> large compared to other pollens. It tends to stay within a 50' zone. I'm
> pretty clear on this because of a student project I supervised to test the
> hypothesis of pollen drift. When yellow corn pollen falls on the silks of
> white corn varieties, it will turn the white corn kernels yellow. Each silk
> goes to an individual kernel. It is only pollinated by one pollen grain. So
> we planted 4 rows of yellow corn then planted a bunch of white corn in rows
> to either side of the yellow rows. We let the corn pollinate openly. When
> we harvested, we found that the level of yellow kernels in the white corn
> dropped dramatically as the rows got further from the yellow corn rows. By
> the time you got to row 6 (about 20'), the incidence of yellow kernels was
> almost negligible (<1%). Now, the problem is the scale of production of Bt
> corn. Phil and I live in the leading corn production states, IL and IA,
> with over 20 million
!
> ac!
> res between the two of us. A big percentage of it is Bt corn. And
> unfortunately, any Bt pollen contamination of organic corn is a violation
> of certification. Plus, the seed from that corn is legally controlled by
> Monsanto. You can't legally plant it. I suspect it would be a violation of
> law to sell it if you hadn't paid for Bt seed. Its not moral, but it's the
> law.

Thanks Bill for the correction, it's a good there is always someone to
set fact straight on the list! That did motivate me to look up on
Google the recommended isolation distance for corn, and I found this
excellent article:

http://ohioline.osu.edu/agf-fact/0153.html






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