The kidneys of males were the most affected, experiencing 43.5 percent of all the changes. The livers of females followed at more than 30 percent. Other organs may have been affected too, including the heart and spleen, and blood cells.

According to the Institute for Responsible Technology:

“The GM soybean and corn varieties used in the feeding trials ‘constitute 83 percent of the commercialized GMOs’ that are currently consumed by billions of people. While the findings may have serious ramifications for the human population, the authors demonstrate how a multitude of GMO-related health problems could easily pass undetected through the superficial and largely incompetent safety assessments that are used around the world.”

Further, the biotechnology firm Monsanto is only an FDA approval away from its latest monstrosity — soybeans that have been genetically modified to produce omega-3 fats. That FDA approval is expected this year.

Monsanto plans to include GM soybean oil in every product it can — baked goods, baking mixes, breakfast cereals, cheeses, frozen dairy desserts, pasta, gravies and sauces, fruit juices, snack foods, candy, soups, and more.

According to Forbes:

“Monsanto is so despised by environmentalists that Google’s first suggested search term for the St. Louis company is ‘Monsanto evil.’ Readers … voted Monsanto the world’s most evil corporation in a January poll, giving the corporation a whopping 51 percent of the vote.”

Scientists have also introduced human genes into 300 dairy cows in a process that they say will cause the cows to produce milk with the same properties as human breast milk. They believe that this could provide an alternative to formula milk for babies.

Critics of GM technology questioned the safety of milk from genetically modified animals, and also its potential effect on the cattle’s health.

According to the Telegraph:

“The researchers used cloning technology to introduce human genes into the DNA of Holstein dairy cows before the genetically modified embryos were implanted into surrogate cows … [T]he researchers said they were able to create cows that produced milk containing a human protein called lysozyme.”

Source: http://www.mercola.com

CAP THE GENE SPILL from NO GMO on Vimeo.

It’s been a year since we started watching BP’s oil spew into the Gulf day after day. Although that’s been plugged and cleanup is underway, a more insidious form of pollution continues without containment, with much longer term consequences. You might think I’m talking about Fukushima’s nuclear catastrophe. Actually, the pollution I’m referring to about can outlast even thousands of years of active nuclear waste.

Watch this two-minute video Cap the Gene Spill, directed by Alex Bogusky, to find out how genes from genetically modified crops self-propagate and permanently alter the gene pool—for all future generations.

Alex is described by Fast Company as “the Elvis of advertising,” a “pop-culture Houdini,” and the “daddy of 21st-century advertising.” He designed the Truth Campaign for tobacco, brought the king to Burger King, was crowned “Creative Director of the Decade” by Adweek, and was a partner at a $1.5 billion company that Advertising Age named “Agency of the Decade,”…and then he walked away. Alex realized he could no longer speak his truth.

Now, under his own banner of The Fearless Revolution, he’s harnessing the power of truth to create “an educated and empowered consumer,” who will act as “a sudden and powerful counterbalance to corporate power.”

Alex and I would like you to know the truth about genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Enjoy this first in a series of videos, appropriately released on Earth Day.

After viewing, please consider making a donation to our Institute for Responsible Technology, which works everyday to help cap the gene spill. Your donation will be doubled this month by a generous matching grant from Nutiva.

Safe eating,

Jeffrey Smith

The following links provide examples of the runaway GMO contamination taking place around the world.

GM Contamination Register This site records incidents of contamination arising from intentional or accidental release of GMOs.

Experts: Contamination From GM Alfalfa Certain

Genetically Modified DNA Contaminates Ancient Mexican Maize

New study shows GM contamination of maize in Uruguay

Western Australia records country’s first GM contamination

Australia: Another case of GM contamination, this time caused by flooding

Genetically Modified Cotton Contamination Caused More By Mishandling Than Cross-Pollination

EU Succumbs to U.S. Pressure on GM Contamination
Bayer Admits GMO Contamination is Out of Control

Source: Geoff Wilson, Aquaponics Journal #39- Greenhouse Aquaponics Proves Superior to Inorganic Hydroponics

On April 1^st I’m giving a presentation at the Progressive Gardening Trade Association annual conference titled “Secrets to Selling Aquaponics”.  The audience will be primarily owners and managers of hydroponic stores.

When I started thinking about the notion of “selling” aquaponics, the first thoughts in my business school-trained brain were about target markets.  How is the typical buyer of aquaponics different than the typical market for these hydroponic businesses?

That thought, however, was immediately crowded out by a second, more basic thought.  In order to sell aquaponics to a hydroponics customer, you really need to understand how aquaponics differs from hydroponics … which leads me to the point of this article.  How does aquaponics differ from hydroponics?  Let me count the ways…

1. Startup speed – This is perhaps the biggest downside to aquaponics from a hydroponics perspective.  In hydroponics you just add commercially formulated nutrients to your nutrient reservoir and you are off to the races.  With aquaponics it takes about a month to start your system by developing a colony of nitrifying bacteria through a process called “cycling”.  The ammonia from the fish waste will not be converted into the nitrates that the plants are seeking until this process is complete.
2. Relationship with bacteria – Hydroponic systems tend to be fairly sterile.  I’ve visited hydroponic growing facilities where I had to wear coveralls and a hairnet to enter.  Not so with aquaponics.  Bacteria are revered by aquaponic gardeners because, as described above, they are the engine that drives our systems.
3. Flood and Drain cycle – Hydroponic growers using flood and drain techniques generally only fertigate their plants once every four to six hours.  Academic studies and vast, collective experience have shown that this optimizes the water and fertilizer the plants need.  When you move to an aquaponics system, however, the ideal schedule changes to flooding for 15 minutes every 45 minutes.  The reason is that the grow bed now has taken on the additional role of being the filter for the fish waste.   If you only ran the fish water through the filter every four to six hours, fish waste would build to dangerous levels.
4. Grow bed depth – Hydroponic growers tend to use standard 6” deep flood tables and put pots or cubes with plants in them in the flood trays.  Again, because an aquaponics grow bed is serving a dual role of both home for the plants and bio-filter for the fish waste, both need to be considered and optimized.  Most media based aquaponic gardeners use 12” deep grow beds filled with an inert media. Over the years, side by side trials have shown that this depth of grow bed develops the kind of robust bacteria colony needed to not only filter the liquid waste, but also to provide an excellent home for composting red worms and the heterotrophic bacteria needed to break down the solid waste from the fish.
5. Nutrients ( supplementation) – Hydroponic gardeners live and die by their nutrients, and the supplements to those nutrients.  Not so with aquaponic gardeners.  The goal of an aquaponic garden is to achieve a state of balance within it’s eco-system.  Everything that goes into the system must work towards this end goal, and not harm any other element of the system.  Anything added to the system to boost plant growth could, and probably will, harm the fish and possibly the bacteria colony and the compost worms.  There are a few exceptions to this, including the use of liquid seaweed, small amounts of chelated iron, and a few minerals to adjust pH. But beyond those, aquaponic gardeners will think long and hard before adding anything to their systems except of course, fish feed.
6. Nutrients (dumping) – Hydroponic nutrients must be dumped and replaced on a regular basis to address nutrient imbalances that arise over time.  This concept mystifies an aquaponic gardener.  We only top up the fish tank with water and never dump and replace it unless there is a severe, unexpected problem.  “Why on earth would you get rid of all that beautiful fish waste?”, the aquaponic gardener would query.  The notion of nutrient imbalance is as foreign to an aquaponic gardener as it is to an organic soil gardener.  Just as with healthy soil, a healthy aquaponics system just keeps getting better and better the longer it operates.
7. Plant disease – When I oversaw the plant grow lab at AeroGrow, we were constantly worried about disease.  We sterilized anything that ever came into contact with the plants, their roots or the nutrient solution.  The disease we feared the most was a fungus called pythium, or “root rot”, which is widely considered the scourge of hydroponics.  Fortunately, pythium is almost non-existent in aquaponics.  Researchers in Australia are currently studying why this is so, but my money is on all the bacteria and other living organisms in an aquaponics system.  Logically they would help boost immunity; just as bacteria helps boost our own body’s immunity.  Hydroponics is more of a “boy in the bubble” by comparison.  In addition, the very high oxygen levels in an aquaponics system and the activity of the composting worms to clean up dead plant matter probably both help mitigate disease outbreaks.
8. Temperature – An important part of an effective program to prevent pythium outbreaks in hydroponics is to make sure that the nutrient solution doesn’t get above 70°F.  Warm water is a perfect breeding ground for fungus, so keeping the water temperature below optimal breeding conditions for pythium makes sense.  In aquaponics, however, the primary drivers of temperature are the requirements of the fish.  The most widely used fish in North American aquaponics, after goldfish, are tilapia, and tilapia does best in water that is between 82° and 86°.  The bacterium that drives the system is also happiest in that temperature range.  Fortunately, because pythium is so rare in aquaponics this isn’t an issue. The plants don’t seem to mind either, as a 2005 report by Dr. Nick Savidov at the Crop Diversification Center in Alberta, Canada showed, aquaponics is every bit as effective at growing plants as hydroponics.
9. pH – Optimal pH in a hydroponics system is 5.5 to 6.0.  In aquaponics, pH is another factor that is compromised between the plants, fish and bacteria.  Optimal pH is 6.8 – 7.0, which is again more closely related to what an organic soil gardener would target.
10. EC – Along with pH and water temperature, EC is the other measure that is closely tracked in hydroponics.  EC, or Electrical Conductivity, is a measurement of the salts in the nutrient reservoir, which tells the hydroponic gardener how concentrated the nutrient solution is.  This works because hydroponic nutrients are generally delivered in mineral salt form.  Aquaponic plants, on the other hand, are fed by the organic waste from the fish, which has very little salts.  EC is therefore not a useful measurement for the concentration of nutrients in an aquaponics system.  Aquaponics requires confidence in Mother Nature, rather than a managed system requiring intense control.  Once a system has been constructed using a set of generally accepted “Rules of Thumb” and has been fully cycled (ammonia and nitrite levels have dropped to zero), the only measures an aquaponic gardener monitors are temperature, pH, and nitrates.  If nitrates are low (close to zero), more fish should be added to the system.  If nitrates are high (above 50) more grow beds and/or plants should be added.  It’s as simple as that.
11. Insect control– You’ve probably guessed by now that because aquaponics is an organic system that uses fish, special care needs to be taken with regard to insect control.  Even commonly used organic sprays such as insecticidal soap or neem oil could be harmful if over-sprayed into the fish tank.  On the plus side, however, you can engage your fish in your insect control efforts.  If I have an insect problem on a small plant, such as young peppers or salad greens, I’ll remove them from the grow bed and let them soak in the fish tank for up to an hour.  The bugs eventually loosen their grip on the plant and become fish food.  And if you are lucky, the fish may even accelerate the process by nibbling the bugs directly off your plants.  I also know of people who have even hung Bug Zappers over their fish tank as an additional form of feed for their fish.
12. Eco-system!! – Hydroponics is a system for growing plants under highly optimized conditions. Aquaponics creates a complete eco-system in which various living creatures all interact to create a symbiotic whole.  We use worms, liquid seaweed and beneficial insects as “team members” , each with jobs to perform rather than trying to isolate the plants and nutrients into single, definable, segregated components.  Aquaponics is, above all else, an ecosystem where plants, fish, bacteria, and worms all live together in a beautifully balanced symbiotic relationship.

Words: Sylvia Bernstein, www.theaquaponicsource.com

How do you measure the price of oil?

Many of us here in Internet land have developed an entirely different perspective regarding Middle Eastern events.  It is an understanding not aired by BBC or CNN.  Here are a few pieces to the larger puzzle.

Start by Google searching for John Perkins interview titled “Confessions of an Economic Hit-man”
http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/1036.html
or here:  http://naturalnews.tv/v.asp?v=83B1AF93091799E7CEB88C5C459A530B

Here is an interview with an American muslim minister, who basically says the same thing as former economic hit-man John Perkins has described.  Egypt’s dictator, Mubarak, was already sold out to British/American corporate interests (buying off the next leader won’t be too difficult in their eyes)…..so the West stayed out of the revolution to some degree.  On the other hand, in order to overtake Libyan resources, the corporate Western leaders had to paint Gadhaffi as an enemy of the state, instigate a revolution,  and then justify bringing in the military/airforce.
The interview is titled: Farrakhan warns Obama
http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?read=199710

Chossudovsky on Battle For Libyan Oil:  He says basically the same thing as John Perkins and Farrakhan:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjMDO9qWeTw&feature=relmfu

Under Gadhaffi a 25 billion dollar man-made river system has been completed.  This is a prize that the British/American/European oligarchy would also love to control.
http://twelfthbough.blogspot.com/2011/03/virtually-unknown-in-west-libyas-water.html

Or here is a present day look at US Middle Eastern foreign policy…through the eyes of Noam Chomsky:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTGf4X_Qjew&feature=related

As far as Egypt goes, covert control of the Egyptian government and the strategic Suez Canal…despite the appearance of a successful ousting of President Mubarak… will continue by “corporate” British/American/Israeli influence. The common people, both Egyptian Christian and Egyptian Muslim, are beginning to understand that a counter revolution is being instigated by Government Intelligence operations to foment strife and thus justify a military intervention (in other words to quell dissent once and for all).
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2011/mar2011/egyp-m14.shtml

Regarding Libya, this is a completely different revolution which has been fomented by corporate interests to take back control of the Libyan nationalized oil fields. It may look like a drive for democracy and freedom, but how can we call Gadhaffi a terrible leader when he overthrew a corrupt monarchy, modernized the country, won the highest HD (Human Development Index) in Africa, and applied a direct democracy system of government?”  And let’s not forget Gadhaffi reinvested oil profits into the completion of the 25 billion dollar Libyan, man-made river system….thus bringing  farming and agriculture to a level never seen before.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article27727.htm

This was reported leading up to British/American bombing of Libya:
“What we can confirm, is that the entire Libyan rebel movement has been backed by the US and UK for nearly 3o years. We can confirm that the initial calls for a Libyan “Day of Rage” came not from the streets of Benghazi, but from the London based National Conference for Libyan Opposition (NCLO). We can confirm that NCLO leader Ibrahim Sahad was literally sitting in front of the White House giving an interview to the Western media in the opening stages of the Libyan unrest, parroting verbatim the West’s desire to militarily intervene with a no-fly zone.”
http://www.activistpost.com/2011/03/libya-another-war-another-pack-of-lies.html

Here is an article which gives some of the history of the drive by Western corporatists to overtake and privatize Libyan oil fields in the past….and how Gadhaffi took back control and nationalized those oil fields.
http://www.globalresearch.can/index.php?context=va&aid=23414

This was posted three weeks before British/American bombing of Libya started up.
US military advisers were seen in Cyrenaica, Libya weeks prior to the US air strikes:
http://www.debka.com/article/20708/
“What is brewing in Libya is not a “protest” or “demonstration” that has spread across the country, but an attempt to overthrow the government, militarily. We hear already about “rebel soldiers” and see images of men shaking their powerful guns, waving flags from the pre-Gadhaffi period, which appear out of nowhere, en masse. The question is who is behind this force and what is its aim? This question is not being addressed in any way in our media and by our political representatives, and any real information and analysis has been replaced by sentimentalizing about “people power.”

“We are facing soon another illegal war, an invasion to dismantle yet another country in “western” i.e. ”Corporate” interests. Libya is the target nation this time, and already has “military advisers” from U.S., Britain and France, and perhaps also from Israel, on its soil. Although
genuine internal opposition to the regime exists, the Libyan “protesters” we see supported by a Western media frenzy are by and large a military force, now being trained and equipped by foreign powers who are intent on getting hold of Libyan oil to have it “privatized, i.e. to become foreign owned instead as it was nationalized by Gadhaffi 40 years ago. The eastern part of Libya is where the oil fields by and large are.”

I would ask the reader:  “Does instigating war and proceeding to pillage, plunder, and overtake the resources of weaker foreign nations sound like ‘establishing democracy and freedom’ to you?”

Or, are these oil-bearing nations that are purported to be ‘enemies of the state’, in actuality, nothing more than  prizes to be won by the corporate oligarchy who pull the strings of government in the Western world today?

Author: Bill Woollam

Article source: http://www.blissful-wisdom.com/the-battle-for-libyan-oil-fields.html

Vandana Shiva

Industrial globalized agriculture is heavily implicated in climate change. It contributes to the three major greenhouse gases: carbon dioxide (CO₂) from the use of fossil fuels, nitrogen oxide (N₂O) from the use of chemical fertilizers and methane (CH₄) from factory farming. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate change (IPCC), atmospheric concentration of CO₂ has increased from a pre–industrial concentration of about 280 parts per million to 379 parts per million in 2005. The global atmospheric concentration of CH₄ has increased from pre–industrial concentration of 715 parts per billion to 1774 parts per billion in 2005. The global atmospheric concentration of N₂O, largely due to use of chemical fertilizers in agriculture, increased from about 270 parts per billion to 319 parts per billion in 2005.

Industrial agriculture is also more vulnerable to climate change which is intensifying droughts and floods. Monocultures lead to more frequent crop failure when rainfall does not come in time, or is too much or too little. Chemically fertilized soils have no capacity to withstand a drought. And cyclones and hurricanes make a food system dependent on long distance transport highly vulnerable to disruption.

Genetic engineering is embedded in an industrial model of agriculture based on fossil fuels. It is falsely being offered as a magic bullet for dealing with climate change.

Monsanto claims that Genetically Modified Organisms are a cure for both food insecurity and climate change and has been putting the following advertisement across the world in recent months.

9 billion people to feed.
A changing climate
Now what?
Producing more
Conserving more
Improving farmers lives
That’s sustainable agriculture
And that’s what Monsanto is all about.

All the claims this advertisement makes are false.

GM crops do not produce more. While Monsanto claims its GMO Bt cotton gives 1500 Kg/acre, the average is 300–400 Kg/acre.

The claim to increased yield is false because yield, like climate resilience is a multi–genetic trait. Introducing toxins into a plant through herbicide resistance or Bt. Toxin increases the “yield” of toxins, not of food or nutrition.

Even the nutrition argument is manipulated. Golden rice genetically engineered to increase Vitamin A produces 70 times less Vitamin A than available alternatives such as coriander leaves and curry leaves.

The false claim of higher food production has been dislodged by a recent study titled, Failure to Yield by Dr. Doug Gurian Sherman of the Union of Concerned Scientists, who was former biotech specialist for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and former adviser on GM to the U.S Food and Drug Administration. Sherman states, “Let us be clear. There are no commercialized GM crops that inherently increase yield. Similarly there are no GM crops on the market that were engineered to resist drought, reduce fertilizer pollution or save soil. Not one.”

There are currently two predominant applications of genetic engineering: one is herbicide resistance, the other is crops with Bt. toxin. Herbicides kill plants. Therefore they reduce return of organic matter to the soil. Herbicide resistant crops, like Round Up Ready Soya and Corn reduce soil carbon, they do not conserve it. This is why Monsanto’s attempt to use the climate negotiations to introduce Round Up and Round Up resistant crops as a climate solution is scientifically and ecologically wrong.

Monsanto’s GMOs, which are either Round Up Ready crops or Bt toxin crops do not conserve resources. They demand more water, they destroy biodiversity and they increase toxics in farming. Pesticide use has increased 13 times as a result of the use Bt cotton seeds in the region of Vidharbha, India.

Monsanto’s GMOs do not improve farmers’ lives. They have pushed farmers to suicide. 200,000 Indian farmers have committed suicide in the last decade. 84% of the suicides in Vidharbha, the region with highest suicides are linked to debt created by Bt–cotton. GMOs are non–renewable, while the open pollinated varieties that farmers have bred are renewable and can be saved year to year. The price of cotton seed was Rs 7/kg. Bt cotton seed price jumped to Rs 1,700/kg.

This is neither ecological nor economic or social sustainability. It is eco–cide and genocide.

Genetic engineering does not “create” climate resilience. In a recent article titled, “GM: Food for Thought” (Deccan Chronicle, August 26, 2009), Dr. M.S. Swaminathan wrote “we can isolate a gene responsible for conferring drought tolerance, introduce that gene into a plant, and make it drought tolerant.”

Drought tolerance is a polygenetic trait. It is therefore scientifically flawed to talk of “isolating a gene for drought tolerance.“ Genetic engineering tools are so far only able to transfer single gene traits. That is why in twenty years only two single gene traits for herbicide resistance and Bt. toxin have been commercialized through genetic engineering.

Navdanya’s recent report titled, “Biopiracy of Climate Resilient Crops: Gene Giants are Stealing farmers’ innovation of drought resistant, flood resistant and salt resistant varieties,” shows that farmers have bred corps that are resistant to climate extremes. And it is these traits which are the result of millennia of farmers’ breeding which are now being patented and pirated by the genetic engineering industry. Using farmers’ varieties as “genetic material,” the biotechnology industry is playing genetic roulette to gamble on which gene complexes are responsible for which trait. This is not done through genetic engineering; it is done through software programs like athlete. As the report states, “Athlete uses vast amounts of available genomic data (mostly public) to rapidly reach a reliable limited list of candidate key genes with high relevance to a target trait of choice. Allegorically, the Athlete platform could be viewed as a ‘machine’ that is able to choose 50–100 lottery tickets from amongst hundreds of thousands of tickets, with the high likelihood that the winning ticket will be included among them.”

Breeding is being replaced by gambling, innovation is giving way to biopiracy, and science is being substituted by propaganda. This cannot be the basis of food security in times of climate vulnerability.

While genetic engineering is a false solution, over the past 20 years, we have built Navdanya, India’s biodiversity and organic farming movement. We are increasingly realizing there is a convergence between objectives of conservation of biodiversity, reduction of climate change impact and alleviation of poverty. Biodiverse, local, organic systems produce more food and higher farm incomes, while they also reduce water use and risks of crop failure due to climate change.

Biodiversity offers resilience to recover from climate disasters. After the Orissa Super Cyclone of 1998, and the Tsunami of 2004, Navdanya distributed seeds of saline resistant rice varieties as “Seeds of Hope” to rejuvenate agriculture in lands reentered saline by the sea. We are now creating seed banks of drought resistant, flood resistant and saline resistant seed varieties to respond to climate extremities.

Navdanya’s work over the past twenty years has shown that we can grow more food and provide higher incomes to farmers without destroying the environment and killing our peasants. Our study on “Biodiversity based organic farming: A new paradigm for Food Security and Food Safety” has established that small biodiverse organic farms produce more food and provide higher incomes to farmers.

Biodiverse organic and local food systems contribute both to mitigation of and adaptation to climate change. Small, biodiverse, organic farms especially in Third World countries are totally fossil fuel free. Energy for farming operations comes from animal energy. Soil fertility is built by feeding soil organisms by recycling organic matter. This reduces greenhouse gas emissions. Biodiverse systems are also more resilient to draughts and floods because they have higher water holding capacity and hence contribute to adaption to climate change. Navdanya’s study on climate change and organic farming has indicated that organic farming increases carbon absorption by upto 55% and water holding capacity by 10% thus contributing to both mitigation and adaptation to climate change.

Biodiverse organic farms produce more food and higher incomes than industrial monocultures. Mitigating climate change, conserving biodiversity and increasing food security can thus go hand in hand.

Words: Vandana Shiva

Wake up North America! Demand proper labeling for your food!

Westwood, CA  – A growing number of consumer activists are staging demonstrations all over the US, with the largest so far at the White House on March 26, 2011.

They demand labeling of genetically modified foods and they’re urging activists around the country to “Rally for the Right to Know” locally. The idea has spread like wildfire with other grassroots rallies already being planned in Colorado, Wisconsin, Indiana, Tennessee, Florida and Oregon to coincide with the rally in Washington DC.

Their demands are simple:

1.We have the right to know and want genetically modified foods labeled.

2.We want factory farmed animal and genetically modified animal products labeled.

3.We want independent, transparent, long-term studies done on the safety of GMOs for animals, plants  and humans.

4.We want the organic industry protected from cross-contamination and law suits to organic farmers.

The FDA currently considers GM foods “substantially equivalent” and therefore doesn’t require labeling.

There is a growing body of evidence that shows:

•        Health risks and environmental dangers,

•        Corporate control of world food and seed supplies,

•        Monopolization through patents,

•        Government lobbying and corporate interest over human interest in all levels of government.

Monsanto owns 90% of all GM seeds and is the leader in GM patents.

Rally Organizer, Trish Wright “We will not stop in our efforts to accomplish our goals. If the FDA won’t tell people, we will. Our freedom of choice is being violated by the FDA not requiring these products to be labeled.”

To date, the majority of commodity crops are genetically engineered. (Soy, corn, canola, cotton). Many deregulated crops such as GE Alfalfa and GE Sugar Beet, being planted in 2011, have the ability to destroy the organic industry.

People are asked to participate in or organize a rally in their area.

MAIN EVENT: Washington, D.C., 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, The White House Sidewalk (The White House Sidewalk is the sidewalk between East and West Executive Avenues on the South side of Pennsylvania Avenue NW) 11am- 3pm

Dates for ALL locations is Saturday March 26, 2011 and include (alphabetically):

Ann Arbor MI, Southeast corner of Catherine Street and N. 4th Avenue, just south of the A2 Farmers Market and Kerrytown Shops 12pm – 3pm
Albuquerque NM, UNM 12pm – 3pm
Atlanta GA, Around Centennial Olympic Park across from the CNN Bldg. 11am – 4pm
Austin TX, at The Capitol 12pm – 3pm
New York City, City Hall steps, between Broadway and Park Row 12pm – 1pm
Colorado Springs CO, Acacia Park 11am – 1:30pm
Hollywood FL, Open Air Bandshell Theatre on Hollywood Beach Boardwalk, 100 Johnson Street and North Ocean Drive/A1A 11am – 2pm
Indianapolis IN, 200 W. Washington Street #220 12pm – 2pm
Kansas City MO, The Plaza Downtown Kansas City 11am – 3pm
LA CA, Los Angeles (Westwood) Federal Bldg, 11000 Wilshire Blvd. 11am – 2pm
Maui HI, in front of Long’s streetside on Ka’ahumanu Ave in Kahului  8am – 11am
Milwaukee WI, Water and Wisconsin 11am – 2pm
Montpelier VT, Outside CITY HALL 11am – 3pm
Nashville TN, Nashville Farmers Market, 900 Rosa Parks Boulevard (Eighth Avenue North) 10am – 1pm
Queen Creek AZ, Safeway Food Store, Queen Creek, Arizona East valley Power and Queen Creek road 12pm – 1pm
Saint Paul MN, Minnesota State Capitol Building – South Mall, 75 Rev Dr. Martin Luther King Jr Blvd 12pm – 2pm
Salem OR, 900 Court St. NE, Salem, Oregon 97301 12pm – 3pm
Seattle WA, Westlake Park 12pm – 2pm
Tampa Bay FL, Downtown 11am – 2pm

Visit: www.facebook.com/rallyfortherighttoknow2011 for more information.

USDA senior scientist sends “emergency” warning to US Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack on a new plant pathogen in Roundup Ready GM soybean and corn that may be responsible for high rates of infertility and spontaneous abortions in livestock Dr. Mae-Wan Ho

An open letter appeared on the Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance founded and run by Judith McGeary to save family farms in the US [1, 2]. The letter, written by Don Huber, professor emeritus at Purdue University, to Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, warns of a pathogen “new to science” discovered by “a team of senior plant and animal scientists”. Huber says it should be treated as an “emergency’’, as it could result in “a collapse of US soy and corn export markets and significant disruption of domestic food and feed supplies.”

The letter appeared to have been written before Vilsack announced his decision to authorize unrestricted commercial planting of GM alfalfa on 1 February, in the hope of convincing the Secretary of Agriculture to impose a moratorium instead on deregulation of Roundup Ready (RR) crops.

The new pathogen appears associated with serious pervasive diseases in plants – sudden death syndrome in soybean and Goss’ wilt in corn – but its suspected effects on livestock is alarming. Huber refers to “recent reports of infertility rates in dairy heifers of over 20%, and spontaneous abortions in cattle as high as 45%.”

This could be the worst nightmare of genetic engineering that some scientists including me have been warning for years [3] (see Genetic Engineering Dream or Nightmare, ISIS publication): the unintended creation of new pathogens through assisted horizontal gene transfer and recombination.

Huber writes in closing: “I have studied plant pathogens for more than 50 years. We are now seeing an unprecedented trend of increasing plant and animal diseases and disorders. This pathogen may be instrumental to understanding and solving this problem. It deserves immediate attention with significant resources to avoid a general collapse of our critical agricultural infrastructure.”

The complete letter is reproduced below:

Dear Secretary Vilsack:

A team of senior plant and animal scientists have recently brought to my attention the discovery of an electron microscopic pathogen that appears to significantly impact the health of plants, animals, and probably human beings. Based on a review of the data, it is widespread, very serious, and is in much higher concentrations in Roundup Ready (RR) soybeans and corn-suggesting a link with the RR gene or more likely the presence of Roundup. This organism appears NEW to science!

This is highly sensitive information that could result in a collapse of US soy and corn export markets and significant disruption of domestic food and feed supplies. On the other hand, this new organism may already be responsible for significant harm (see below). My colleagues and I are therefore moving our investigation forward with speed and discretion, and seek assistance from the USDA and other entities to identify the pathogen’s source, prevalence, implications, and remedies.

We are informing the USDA of our findings at this early stage, specifically due to your pending decision regarding approval of RR alfalfa. Naturally, if either the RR gene or Roundup itself is a promoter or co-factor of this pathogen, then such approval could be a calamity. Based on the current evidence, the only reasonable action at this time would be to delay deregulation at least until sufficient data has exonerated the RR system, if it does.

For the past 40 years, I have been a scientist in the professional and military agencies that evaluate and prepare for natural and manmade biological threats, including germ warfare and disease outbreaks. Based on this experience, I believe the threat we are facing from this pathogen is unique and of a high risk status. In layman’s terms, it should be treated as an emergency.

A diverse set of researchers working on this problem have contributed various pieces of the puzzle, which together presents the following disturbing scenario:

Unique Physical Properties
This previously unknown organism is only visible under an electron microscope (36,000X), with an approximate size range equal to a medium size virus. It is able to reproduce and appears to be a micro-fungal-like organism. If so, it would be the first such micro-fungus ever identified. There is strong evidence that this infectious agent promotes diseases of both plants and mammals, which is very rare.

Pathogen Location and Concentration
It is found in high concentrations in Roundup Ready soybean meal and corn, distillers meal, fermentation feed products, pig stomach contents, and pig and cattle placentas.

Linked with Outbreaks of Plant Disease
The organism is prolific in plants infected with two pervasive diseases that are driving down yields and farmer income-sudden death syndrome (SDS) in soy, and Goss’ wilt in corn. The pathogen is also found in the fungal causative agent of SDS (Fusarium solani fsp glycines).

Implicated in Animal Reproductive Failure
Laboratory tests have confirmed the presence of this organism in a wide variety of livestock that have experienced spontaneous abortions and infertility. Preliminary results from ongoing research have also been able to reproduce abortions in a clinical setting.

The pathogen may explain the escalating frequency of infertility and spontaneous abortions over the past few years in US cattle, dairy, swine, and horse operations. These include recent reports of infertility rates in dairy heifers of over 20%, and spontaneous abortions in cattle as high as 45%.

For example, 450 of 1,000 pregnant heifers fed wheatlege experienced spontaneous abortions. Over the same period, another 1,000 heifers from the same herd that were raised on hay had no abortions. High concentrations of the pathogen were confirmed on the wheatlege, which likely had been under weed management using glyphosate.

Recommendations
In summary, because of the high titer of this new animal pathogen in Roundup Ready crops, and its association with plant and animal diseases that are reaching epidemic proportions, we request USDA’s participation in a multi-agency investigation, and an immediate moratorium on the deregulation of RR crops until the causal/predisposing relationship with glyphosate and/or RR plants can be ruled out as a threat to crop and animal production and human health.

It is urgent to examine whether the side-effects of glyphosate use may have facilitated the growth of this pathogen, or allowed it to cause greater harm to weakened plant and animal hosts. It is well-documented that glyphosate promotes soil pathogens and is already implicated with the increase of more than 40 plant diseases; it dismantles plant defenses by chelating vital nutrients; and it reduces the bioavailability of nutrients in feed, which in turn can cause animal disorders. To properly evaluate these factors, we request access to the relevant USDA data.

I have studied plant pathogens for more than 50 years. We are now seeing an unprecedented trend of increasing plant and animal diseases and disorders. This pathogen may be instrumental to understanding and solving this problem. It deserves immediate attention with significant resources to avoid a general collapse of our critical agricultural infrastructure.

Sincerely,

COL (Ret.) Don M. Huber
Emeritus Professor, Purdue University
APS Coordinator, USDA National Plant Disease Recovery System (NPDRS)
References

1. “Researcher: Glyphosate (Roundup) or Roundup Ready Crops May Cause Animal Miscarriages”, Jill Richardson, La Vida Locavore, 18 February 2011
http://www.lavidalocavore.org/diary/4523

2. “Researcher: Glyphosate (Roundup) or Roundup Ready Crops May Cause Animal Miscarriages”, 18 February 2011, http://farmandranchfreedom.org/gmo-miscarriages

3. Ho MW. Genetic Engineering Dream of Nightmare? The Brave New World of Bad Science and Big Business, Third World Network, Gateway Books, MacMillan, Continuum, Penang, Malaysia, Bath, UK, Dublin, Ireland, New York, USA, 1998, 1999, 2007 (reprint with extended Introduction). http://www.i-sis.org.uk/genet.php

In this article I will take you through how often to feed your fish, using auto-feeders, selecting the commercially produced feeds while accounting for feed composition, and some options for supplementing with home grown feed sources.

When and how often?

Fish tolerate a wide range of feeding schedules very well.  They actually adjust their metabolism to match food availability.  If you want your fish to grow quickly, or you have fewer than the recommended fish and need to produce more food for your plants, go ahead and feed them often.  Commercial aquaculture operations feed their fish as often as once an hour.  If, however, you are in an overstocked situation, or had an insect outbreak in one of your planting beds so you need to replant but only have small seedlings available, or for any number of other reasons, you need to “dial down” the amount of fertilizer your fish are producing, simply feed them less.  I often only feed my fish once a day, in the morning when I go to check on everything.  Sometimes, however, I’ll feed them again in the evening if I need to go to the greenhouse to pick some produce for dinner.

The best fish feeding rule of thumb is only feed your fish as much as they will eat within five minutes.  After five minutes, remove the remaining food from the tank with a fish net.  Soon, you will be able to judge just how much food to toss in, depending on your fish’s behavior at that moment, and you will no longer need to wait five minutes to see how much they eat.

The time you spend observing your fish when you feed them is very valuable.  Thus, you should avoid automatic feeders unless you are going on a short vacation and have no one to take care of your fish.  Automatic feeders aren’t inherently bad, but if your fish stop eating, something has likely gone wrong with your system and you will not receive this critical signal if you aren’t there at feeding time.  Fish may stop eating for a wide variety of reasons including water temperature being outside of “thriving” range, pH being outside tolerable range, too much ammonia and/or nitrites (a fish may have died in the tank giving off excess ammonia), too little oxygen, stress or a disease.  All of these are easily corrected if caught early, and potentially fatal if not.

Commercial feed

Tilapia Pellet

Commercially prepared fish feed is an excellent source of nutrition for your fish.  There are typically two types of fish feed sold in the U.S. – omnivorous and carnivorous – and they vary mostly in their protein content.  Within these types, you can select feed according to the stage of growth your fish are in.  Again, the formulation difference will largely be the amount of protein in the feed, although you will also notice a difference in pellet size.  Not surprisingly, as the fish get older, the size of the feed pellets gets larger.

Fish feed is comprised of proteins, fats, minerals, carbohydrates, and other nutrients that a fish in the wild would have in their normal diet, but that they cannot get in what is essentially a wet desert in captivity.   The sources for these nutrients are usually from fish meal, corn, soy, and other animal bi-products.

While we might find some of the ingredients in commercially available fish feed distasteful, one fish feed producer once described them to me as follows:

“For healthy fish, and in turn healthy food for people, these missing nutrients must be supplemented. Poultry meal provides about 65% protein and 6% calcium by weight. It also supplies about 4% phosphorus by weight and 19 important amino acids that tilapia and most other fish require for proper growth and reproductive functions. Poultry meal is poultry bone and meat that is cooked at extremely high temperatures before being added to the food mix. It is basically the equivalent of a ground chicken patty. Dried animal blood cells are just another way of saying hemoglobin. It is a highly nutritious, non-bovine ingredient that provides iron, phosphorus and many micronutrients that aid in oxygen absorption and gill health for the fish. Porcine Animal Fat is simply cooking lard (what makes pastries so “puffy” and flaky). It serves as a binder, a source of important fatty acids and aids in digestion.

Without these nutrients, the fish would have higher “bad” omega fatty acids and lower “good” omega fatty acids. A diet consisting primarily of soy, corn, rice and/or wheat will produce a fish that has significantly diminished health benefits for human consumption. This is actually a big reason why the nutritional value of store bought tilapia from overseas has been questioned so much recently by the media. Properly fed tilapias are a very healthy protein source.”

Kellen Weissenbach
Premium Fish Food

The protein in fish feed comes mainly from fish meal.  Fish meal can come from fishery wastes associated with the processing of fish for human consumption or from specific fish (herring, menhaden and pollack) which are harvested solely for the purpose of producing fish meal.

There is currently intense debate within the aquaponic and aquaculture communities about the wisdom of adding to the serious problem of over-fishing our oceans by feeding our farm-raised fish – fish from the ocean.  Thankfully, many experts are conducting ground breaking research to develop protein substitutes for fish meal.  An article in the Aquaponics Journal (issue #56, Q1 2010) highlighted three companies creating protein sources. At Ohio State University, aquaculturalists are exploring the feasibility of using soybeans to replace fish meal and plan to soon test the product on yellow perch. Scientists at the Agricultural Research Services and Montana Microbial Products have teamed up to produce a barley protein concentrate that can be fed to trout, salmon and other commercially produced fish. Finally, in Idaho Springs, Colorado, Oberon FMR has signed a deal with Miller-Coors to use 5,000 tons of beer sludge in combination with other ingredients to produce 6,000 tons of fish food flakes.

All fish feed, especially brands that use more natural ingredients and fewer preservatives, have a limited shelf life and are best stored in a cool, dry location.

Home grown feed

Duckweed Pool (image credit: David Hart)

Supplementing, or even entirely substituting your own, home-grown fish food can be personally satisfying, save money, and further decrease the environmental footprint of your aquaponics system by further closing the input loop.  The following is a list of some of the feed that can be easily cultivated for most omnivorous fish:

Duckweed –This fast growing aquatic plant doubles in mass every day when in its ideal environment.  In addition, duckweed is over 40% protein (more than soybeans) and efficiently removes contaminants from and adds oxygen to the water.  Duckweed grows best in dappled sunlight in relatively stagnant water with some fish waste.  The key is to keep it in a separate tank from your fish or they will just eat it all!

Worms - Earthworms, sludge worms, bloodworms, and composting red worms (AKA red wrigglers) all make excellent fish food.  The challenge is to grow enough of them to be more than an occasional, although probably very appreciated, treat for your fish.

Black Soldier Fly (BSF) Larvae – The Black Soldier Fly is considered a native of North America, and can be found in many parts of the United States. It is exceptionally active in the southeastern U.S. from April to November. Their grubs are considered beneficial scavengers in nature, and help to digest and recycle decomposing organic material including carrion, manure, fruits, and decaying plant waste. Their association to humanity is limited to compost piles, facilities producing manure, and poorly serviced toilets. Unlike the common house and fruit flies, they are not commonly found in association with humanity (picnics, kitchens, residential buildings, etc.).  While the mature fly has a short lifespan of only 5 – 8 days, the female can lay over 900 eggs.  Those eggs hatch in about 100 hours and, if conditions are right, will mature in 2 – 4 weeks.  During this stage, the larvae make excellent fish food, as well as robust compost consumers.  A product called the BioPod is specifically designed for BSF food composting and through clever design, has the added benefit of self-harvesting the larvae.

Other kitchen and garden scraps – Omnivorous fish like most bland-tasting, non-flowering plants and even some fruit.  I’ve found that my tilapia especially appreciate lettuce that is getting slimy and no longer fit for human consumption.  I’ve been told that they will eat untreated grass clippings (no weed killer or pesticides!).  They get very excited about the uneaten tops of strawberries.  Experiment!  If they don’t eat what you have given them in five minutes, and it is their normal feeding time, remove it from the tank and chalk it up to experience.  What have you got to lose?

I recommend that you consider any one, or a combination, of the feeds above as a supplement to a commercial fish feed.  Nutrition for living beings is a complex subject, especially in captivity. Just as we wouldn’t feed our dogs or cats exclusively a single, or even a couple foodstuffs, please consider feeding your aquaponic fish a varied diet that includes a reputable commercial feed.  Consider it a vitamin tablet for your fish to ensure that both they, and ultimately your plants, are getting all the nutrients they need.

Next months’ Aquaponics Explained article will be about Hydroponics vs. Aquaponics, and how they differ.

Words: Sylvia Bernstein, www.theaquaponicsource.com