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GMO Grass is Creeping Across Oregon

posted by martyb on Monday July 02 2018, @11:17AM   Printer-friendly
from the just-wait-until-the-Ents-get-loose dept.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

High Country News reports:

[...] Scotts got permission from the USDA to plant larger fields for seed production. Farmers sowed 80 acres of bentgrass in Canyon County, Idaho, and 420 acres in Jefferson County, Oregon, north of Bend. The Oregon Department of Agriculture picked the site - an irrigated island in the sagebrush sea - to keep the plant far from the Willamette Valley. There, on the western side of the mountains, farmers grow forage and turf grass for a $1 billion-a-year seed industry.

Then two windstorms swept through the eastern Oregon fields in August of 2013, scattering flea-sized seeds well beyond the designated control area. Roundup-resistant pollen fertilized conventional bentgrass plants as far as 13 miles away.

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  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 02 2018, @01:44PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 02 2018, @01:44PM (#701336)

    Wasn't one of the GMO trait to be a one time crop and it wouldn't grow up again?
    If so, then the regenerating crop isn't the same that was sold. No need to pay any "IP license".

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  • (Score: 2) by HiThere on Monday July 02 2018, @10:42PM

    by HiThere (866) Subscriber Badge on Monday July 02 2018, @10:42PM (#701606) Journal

    There is no single GMO trait. Let me say that again to emphasize it. There is no single GMO trait.

    Some GMO varieties are, indeed, supposed to kill off the second generation. I do worry that there will be some varieties that kill off the 10th or 20th generation, so I really support non-GMO varieties. But that's not why I'm against GMO varieties. The reason I'm against GMO varieties breaks down into two major sections:
    1) Legal liabilities and limitations, and
    2) They weren't developed to be safe, but rather to be profitable for their corporate sponsor.

    --
    Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.

  • (Score: 2) by EETech1 on Monday July 02 2018, @11:49PM

    by EETech1 (957) on Monday July 02 2018, @11:49PM (#701640)

    You are correct! It was called the Terminator Gene.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_use_restriction_technology [wikipedia.org]

    DRM for seeds!