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<blockquote data-quote="fargus" data-source="post: 740864" data-attributes="member: 13480"><p>I'm going to step into this discussion.</p><p></p><p>First topic was the GMO feed. If the issue with GMO's is the chemical "unnatural" tinkering done in a laboratory than you need to discard any conventional seed variety and return to using landraces. Some of the conventional plant breeding methods used would make most people shudder. Consider that conventional plant breeding uses mutagens (basically cancer-causing agents) to CAUSE random point mutations, and then breed from the resulting progeny. This is accepted around the world as conventional, not transgenic. Tell me how putting a batch of seed in a "big bubbling pot of nasty" (the technical term used by the Master's student who developed group 2-tolerant lentils in Western Canada) is safe, predicatable and natural? Doubled-haploid breeding is likewise conventional breeding, and speeds the development of inbred parent lines enormously. Do you know how that is done? Isolating germs cells during meiosis and treating them with a chemical called colchizine, which inhibits cell division. It forces the haploid cells to reproduce their chromosomes, and then inhibits the cell split, so the chromosomes double back up as homologous pairs. Homozygous at every loci! They then treat with further chemicals to "tissue culture" the resulting diploid cells, grow them out and insert those genetics into a conventional breeding program. So my question is simple. How "natural" is all that? I am obviously not opposed to these things (I work as a salesman for a crop inputs supplier and seed dealer as well as running a cattle farm.) The line between GMO and conventional is VERY blurry.</p><p></p><p>Second, the topic has evolved into a discussion of the nutritional benefits of GMO vs conventional. One of the posts cited lower protein and riboflavin levels, and blamed it on GM crops. Horse manure. Plant breeding has done a fantastic job of increasing the efficiency of nutrient use in all of our crops. It used to take 1.2 lbs of nitrogen to grow 1 bushell of corn. Now it takes about 0.9 lbs. Of course the protein levels are going to be lower, we've been selecting for nitrogen use efficiency, and protein is approximately 16% nitrogen by mass. Similarly, by continuing to select for higher yields without pushing fertility correspondingly higher we are seeing a dilution effect. It isn't that the corn or wheat plant is producing less protein, or riboflavin, or whatver we are measuring per unit land area. It is actually producing more, but it is diluted by a higher overall yield of plant material. That is plant breeding, not transgenics at work.</p><p></p><p>I'm not knocking organic or natural production systems, but which leg are you standing on?</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="fargus, post: 740864, member: 13480"] I'm going to step into this discussion. First topic was the GMO feed. If the issue with GMO's is the chemical "unnatural" tinkering done in a laboratory than you need to discard any conventional seed variety and return to using landraces. Some of the conventional plant breeding methods used would make most people shudder. Consider that conventional plant breeding uses mutagens (basically cancer-causing agents) to CAUSE random point mutations, and then breed from the resulting progeny. This is accepted around the world as conventional, not transgenic. Tell me how putting a batch of seed in a "big bubbling pot of nasty" (the technical term used by the Master's student who developed group 2-tolerant lentils in Western Canada) is safe, predicatable and natural? Doubled-haploid breeding is likewise conventional breeding, and speeds the development of inbred parent lines enormously. Do you know how that is done? Isolating germs cells during meiosis and treating them with a chemical called colchizine, which inhibits cell division. It forces the haploid cells to reproduce their chromosomes, and then inhibits the cell split, so the chromosomes double back up as homologous pairs. Homozygous at every loci! They then treat with further chemicals to "tissue culture" the resulting diploid cells, grow them out and insert those genetics into a conventional breeding program. So my question is simple. How "natural" is all that? I am obviously not opposed to these things (I work as a salesman for a crop inputs supplier and seed dealer as well as running a cattle farm.) The line between GMO and conventional is VERY blurry. Second, the topic has evolved into a discussion of the nutritional benefits of GMO vs conventional. One of the posts cited lower protein and riboflavin levels, and blamed it on GM crops. Horse manure. Plant breeding has done a fantastic job of increasing the efficiency of nutrient use in all of our crops. It used to take 1.2 lbs of nitrogen to grow 1 bushell of corn. Now it takes about 0.9 lbs. Of course the protein levels are going to be lower, we've been selecting for nitrogen use efficiency, and protein is approximately 16% nitrogen by mass. Similarly, by continuing to select for higher yields without pushing fertility correspondingly higher we are seeing a dilution effect. It isn't that the corn or wheat plant is producing less protein, or riboflavin, or whatver we are measuring per unit land area. It is actually producing more, but it is diluted by a higher overall yield of plant material. That is plant breeding, not transgenics at work. I'm not knocking organic or natural production systems, but which leg are you standing on? [/QUOTE]
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