toxicity - pesticides, herbicides and insecticides - Blackherbals.com

Continued from page 8 – As Biotech Seed Falters,Insecticide Use Surges In Corn Belt\David Wangila points to a tiny rootworm larva in the soilsurrounding the roots of a corn plant in his laboratory.Dan Charles/NPRkind of steel container. If the larvae are still alive, abright light will drive them into little glass jars filledwith alcohol. "They try to escape from the heat," saysDavid Wangila, a graduate student who is managingthis experiment.If the rootworm-fighting genes in the corn are workingwell, no larvae should emerge.But some have. Wangila points to one of the little glassjars. Inside, there are three nice plump corn rootwormlarvae.This is not good. Those insects, originally collectedfrom a cornfield in Nebraska, were feeding on cornthat contained the first rootworm-fighting gene thatMonsanto introduced ten years ago. Technically, it'sknown as the Cry 3Bb gene.Meinke and Wangila will compare the survival rate ofthese rootworms with others that have never beenexposed to Bt. They're looking for signs thatrootworms in the corn fields of Nebraska have evolvedresistance to genetically engineered crops.An identical experiment in Iowa, carried out more than ayear ago, found corn rootworms resistant to the Cry 3Bbgene.Nobody knows how widely those insects have spread, butfarmers aren't waiting to find out. Some are switching toother versions of biotech corn, containing anti-rootwormgenes that do still work. Others are going back topesticides.Steiner, the Nebraska crop consultant, usually argues foranother strategy: Starve the rootworms, he tells his clients.Just switch that field to another crop. "One rotation can doa lot of good," he says. "Go to beans, wheat, and oats. It'sthe No. 1 right thing to do."Insect experts say it's also likely to work better in the longrun.Meinke, who's been studying the corn rootworm fordecades, tells farmers that if they plant just corn, year afteryear, rootworms are likely to overwhelm any weaponsomeday.The problem, Meinke says, is that farmers are thinkingabout the money they can make today. "I think economicsare driving everything," he says. "Corn prices have been sohigh the last three years; everybody is trying to protectevery kernel. People are just really going for it right now, tobe as profitable as they can."As a result, they may just keep growing corn, fightingrootworms with insecticides — and there's a possibility thatthose chemicals will eventually stop working, too.http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2013/07/09/198051447/asbiotech-seed-falters-insecticide-use-surges-in-corn-belt☻☻☻☻☻☻Continued on page 7- Insecticides Modified in GMCorn Polluting U.S. Watersbeing detected in streams up to 500 meters away from cornfarms, and quite possibly further.The corn rootworm larvae in this glass jar survived on theroots of genetically engineered corn plants that weresupposed to kill these insects. Dan Charles/NPRThe research was conducted in the states of Iowa, Illinois,and Indiana, where corn fields are abundant. Scientistsfound the bacterial protein washed off the corn and directlyinto the streams. While they won’t say for certain what thismeans for human health, the consensus is that it can’t begood. Continued on page 109-- Traditional African Clinic July 2013