permaculture

["Jeff Hall" <JRHALL@gwgate.lib.iastate.edu>]

Much scarier to me is reports that bt is exuded from the roots at a fairly 
high concentration, and doesn't break down as it would above ground. I first 
heard it third-hand, the graduate student who found it wouldn't publish for 
fear of being blacklisted. I have since seen it mentioned elsewhere.
If anyone doesn't get a chance to see the British magazine The Ecologist, 
they are a great source if you're skeptical of the so-called science of GMOs.

Also, I heard a talk by the Monarch Watch guy and their studies show 75% of 
Mexican monarchs come from the cornbelt. Many of the milkweeds are 
immediately against the cornfields or below them in the ditches. He is fairly 
concerned, but the pressure on the central Mexican mountaintop microclimates 
they need is also severe.
http://www.monarchwatch.org/ 
http://www.purefood.org/ge/cornsoil.cfm
-Jeff Hall, Ames IA

>>> Toby Hemenway <hemenway@jeffnet.org> 05/02/00 02:06PM >>>
Ava wrote:

>Speaking of corn, watch the butterfly's in the corn fields.  Suddenly, they
>are dying from the corn pollen (which they feed upon).

Is this actually happening in the wild? Last I knew, scientists had taken
leaves dusted with Bt-engineered pollen and force-fed them to monarch
larvae in controlled experiments, but larval deaths hadn't actually been
seen outside the lab. If it has, that's big news.

As a former scientist, I'm a bit of a stickler at getting facts right. And
as an enviro, I know that if we make claims we can't support, we lose
credibility. So I just wanted to be sure this info is correct (and I'm no
fan of Bt-GMOs).

Toby



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