seed companies

[Anonymous]

does anyone know of a seed company that has plain old corn seed without a patent on it. i want to plant a couple acres for feed and hold back some of the seed for next years planting with out getting in trouble with the law. :roll:

 

[Anonymous]

Might try contacting a farmer who grows corn for his own seed crop. He/she might have some in storage you could buy. Just a thought.

 

[eric]

just curious, why would there be legal ramifications for not planting all the seed in one yr?

 

[dd]

If its round-up ready corn or has certain other traits bred into it it's illegal to hold back seed for planting.

 

[eric]

any idea what the reasoning for this would be? the seeds don't go bad or anything do they?

 

[txag]

any idea what be the reasoning for this would be? the seeds don't go bad or anything do they?

it's not that you have to plant it all in one year, it's basically that you can't make more seeds yourself. they want you to continue to buy from them.

 

[Frankie]

any idea what the reasoning for this would be? the seeds don't go bad or anything do they?

They're discussing genetically modified (GM) seeds. Some require less fertilizer, some are resistent to diseases, etc. The companys who produced them have a patent on them. Planting seeds you saved back from the previous crop is an infringment on their patent and they have prosecuted farmers who did that.

 

[Anonymous]

Keeping corn for seed isn't a very good idea. The yield potential for it is well below that if you buy corn from a seed company, so I would be a little leary of using last years corn crop for this years seed. With soybeans and wheat, there seems to be little difference with seed from a seed company or seed from your grain bin. I don't have an answer for your question about where to get it though.

 

[Big Alan]

You can buy open pollinated, non-patented corn seed here http://www.buntonseed.com/shopping/browse.php?cat=49 but unless you just want to do it for a hobby, you'll produce a lot more corn if you just buy hybrid seed.

 

[k bar b ranch]

thanks big al

 

[Anonymous]

Keeping corn for seed isn't a very good idea. The yield potential for it is well below that if you buy corn from a seed company, so I would be a little leary of using last years corn crop for this years seed. With soybeans and wheat, there seems to be little difference with seed from a seed company or seed from your grain bin. I don't have an answer for your question about where to get it though.

He is right. With corn you will take a sizeable yield loss. I wouldn't be surprised it your bin run corn will yield less than 35 bushels per acre. What makes corn so unique is the hybrid vigor that is gained when two totally unrelated varieties are crossed. We talk about hybrid cattle, but we don't come close to the heterosis that is expressed with corn.

You would be much more ahead to buy the cheapest hybrid corn you can find.

 

[k bar b ranch]

so if i pay monsanto 0$ and use my weak yield , i come out ahead?~~~~ wake up i make $95k a year outside of cattle! if i get 35 bushels of grain per acre im getting free grain ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~`planting my fields is a hobby~~~~~~~`monsanto can kiss my back door ...........if you know what i mean

 

[Anonymous]

I'm a different Guest than the one that wrote the excellent comment above, but I think your reasoning is clearly wrong! If you make $95,000 per year doing something you better count your lucky stars that you can and stay in whatever line of work you are in, because your powers of economic analysis regarding agriculture seem to be very poor.

 

[Anonymous]

With fertilizer costs and everything else combined, your looking at corn costing twice as much as you can buy it for. If you make $95,000 a year, then you can afford to pay a little to monsanto. Around here, one bag of seed corn will plant about 3 acres. If you only have a few acres, that's not that much money compared to what you would lose if you kept your own seed.

 

[dd]

Remember too that its only the seed corn that has been genetically enhanced that Monsanto or other companies get royalties on. There is plenty of seed corn avaliable that hasn't been genetically altered.