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Tuesday, October 30, 2012

GE chicken sh*t

What next?!?
Now we hear claims that our farmland is being polluted by chicken manure containing genetically engineered material. Farmers are buying the chook manure from commercial poultry broiler sheds where imported ge-feed is being eaten by hens, then spreading it across their farms as fertilizer. Tests have shown that the ge material survives digestion from chickens and is still intact when it gets onto the pasture.
When will it end?
How much of our countryside has been contaminated with genetically engineered material now, given the recent news about ge-cottonseed feed that's being fed directly to dairy cows up and down the country?
This story featured over the whole of the front page of the latest Straight Furrow, (Read, valued, trusted, since 1941) 
Should be regard this story as alarming? Will farmers respond to the charge that they are carelessly contaminating the countryside?

I'll ask some questions of my farming councillor peers on Wednesday. They're bound to have a view.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Is GE material a contaminant?
Mr E

robertguyton said...

Yes.
And it is a health risk, reputedly.

Anonymous said...

Is water a contaminant? It can be a health risk.
Mr E

robertguyton said...

Water can certainly be contaminated.
I was rung last night by a farm worker who claims that some dairy farmers release the effluent from their ponds into the creeks and rivers during flood events, as it won't be detected. He said he witnessed this happening just recently.
What would you say to that person, Mr E?

Anonymous said...

Report it straight to the council immediately, here is the phone number. What would you say to that person?

I dont believe you read my question correctly, if that was an attempt at answering it.
Mr E

Anonymous said...

Do all dairy farmers a favour and follow that allegation through please Robert. It is these people that give the rest of us a bad name. Thanks.

D farmer

robertguyton said...

I asked the question today, to see if there had been any other reports of that kind of thing and am now seeking more detail.

robertguyton said...

Is water a contaminant?
If it's in petrol it can be. If it's in stored wheat it can be, and so on.
I hope that's what you were thinking, Mr E.

Anonymous said...

I think you will find that plenty of farmers are finding water a problem at the moment.
Mr E

robertguyton said...

Not this one (I farm fruit). Conditions are ideal for the young trees I've already planted, the perennials I'm dividing and transplanting and the seeds I'm sowing. With some heat in the coming days, there'll be an explosion of growth and for me, that's good. Honey bees are everywhere and pollination is the most successful I've ever seen. It does mean though, that my trousers get saturated as I get about the place, so jungley is it, but that's no problem - I have a wicker basket on the veranda with a score of gardening trousers stuffed into it, and I just change when the originals begin to chaff.

JayWontdart said...

Lovely to see you Robert, the Jagger photo looks AWESOME, lovely pose!!!

http://www.invsoc.org.nz/wvd2012/