"Charles Hawtrey" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 01 Apr 2003 13:00:33 +0100, wrote:


rather makes a mess of the claims that GM crops were a threat to all
those
butterflies doesn't it

Certainly not. It seems that Bt protein acts on different species in
different ways.

Wow, what a surprise. No one would have guessed such a thing.

/sarcasm off

If you want to know about Bt, a good place to start is
http://helios.bto.ed.ac.uk/bto/microbes/bt.htm

There are hundreds of Bt natural BT proteins and hundreds more we can take a
nasty racial on to make them more effective to meet the needs of killing
worms for a long time. As verities develop rotation of BT strains so less
resistance is likely to happen is a real likelihood.

While the rest of the word debates the benefits of BM crops We have punt in
125 acre of drip irrigation for drip irrigated no till cotton in west Texas
and as soon as we get the water quality reports we will start planing our
actions in south west Oklahoma. In Oklahoma we may no be able to get enough
water to obtain maximum production so we will be clanged to find a program
to get the most from the water with cotton, alfalfa and possibly another
crop the could stager the use of water so they could all benefit some while
cotton was using the most in the summer. Out farmer in Texas is making bale
or better cotton with 20 inches of rain and 150 GPM on 170 acres under low
evapratortoion center pivot. We put in enough water for the drip it should
make 5 bales on a good year with the right weather. That way simulate
amounts of water did this year did this year.

We have a boll worm control program that works, Gm Cotton make the worm
problem acceptable it you have to spray for a pest and kill te beneficial in
mid season and not be committed to spraying all the rest of the season and
the spry pilot getting the crop.

And better yet it allows no till farming that almost totally stops erosion
and pollution of nutrients of fertilizer, herbicide and pesticide and
builds organic mater in the soil at a rate of 1 % a year. Over a period of
25 year the soils should go form less than 1/3 to over 2/3 the organic mater
of virgin prairie.

Over those thirty years it provides a substantial carbon sink until it
reaches steady state in 30 of forty years. a much bigger contribution to
reducing global warming that the Kyoto treaty would ever do if it continues
to be adapted at the cut rate.

There will be weeds that find a way to make it in no till by we have
technology to handle them. Faming is a dynamic system and anyone that tries
to do it the same way for 30 years has an auctioneer in his near future
unless he has a nice stand of oilwells or stash of moldy money to support
his hobby.

--
Gordon

Gordon Couger
Stillwater, OK
www.couger.com/gcouger