If it is labeled organic, it is as GMO free as you can get. Organic certification requires no GMO where ever possible.

Even this is tricky, because our organic corn chips are often cooked with soybean oil! GMO ingredients can also be included as 'off label' ingredients. For instance, nearly all commercially available chicken (even organic) is fed soy and corn. Our most common organic food suppliers have been secretly bought by huge corporations (in favor of GMO) like Dean, Hain, P&G, etc, and Whole Foods Market itself has decided that they will not avoid GMO and have an estimated stock of up to 80% GMO. :Bawling: It's going to take a HUGE, vocal push from consumers to change this, which is tricky when so many people don't even know what a GMO is, or have only heard of it in a Monsanto funded ad claiming that they are 1. totally natural and 2. labeling them (for elitist foodies) will cause the food prices to skyrocket for everyone.

It's taken me 5 years of effort, and I still screw up, but we finally got to the point where we just don't buy anything that comes in a package or has an ingredient list. :Bawling:

I'm so happy that I finally (just yesterday) found a GMO free, organic feed for my goats. I'm relieved and also really put out because I'm now feeding $30/40# bags of feed to my poultry and goats while our alfalfa bales and grass hay bales still cost $16 each. Ouch.

With our goats (and other farm animals, especially our dogs and cats) it is getting ---- tricky. We're talking about their food being grown in open fields when the GMO crops are also being grown in open fields. The cross contamination issue is very real and began decades ago. Organic farmers are being sued by Monsanto because Monsanto's crops cross-pollinated with the farmer's fields and Monsanto sues for patent infringement.

With a time sensitive issue like this it's so important for those of us who even just want the time to make up our minds about it to call for a halt to the GMO progress.

There is GMO free corn and soy products used in the organic.

another good clip

http://samuel-warde.com/2013/02/the-...nt-you-to-see/

I feel overwhelmed....I gave up wheat at the begininng of the year and now this. Plus I have to worry about what I'm feeding to my animals to boot. It's getting harder and harder and a heck of lot more expensive. :(

We just got back from grocery shopping and was pleased to find the organic section of the store fairly well stocked. The cereal isn't much different on price than the stuff on the main isle. They even have one that is like fruit loops but taste oh so much better. The youngest was so pleased. Found organic doritos made with organic corn corn chips and salsa and even some soda. The kids were relieved to find they don't have to give up everything that they like. We are pleased. We have found non GMO chicken food that is less than I pay now and so far oats and BOSS are safe. So is the chaffehay.

The organic corn chips we found are fried in sunflower oil, so that is nice.

Some things were more expensive, but it was worth it. The kids were reading labels off and looking through the groceries with far more interest than I have ever seen in them. I still need to find a source of organic corn meal and I need to find some organic chocolate chips for when I make cookies.

Oh and the sodas, made with pure cane sugar is so good. Soda will still be a treat around here, but at least when we do have it, it won't have a bunch of high fructose corn syrup or GMO beet sugar in it.

Edited to add: We did buy the ingredients to make our own home made Ranch salad dressing, miracle whip, and steak sauce, and chocolate syrup for milk. Can't find anything that doesn't have a bunch of soybean oil in it. Well we did find some in the organic isle, but it was a tiny bottle and we are family of seven.

Do you have Hy-Vee grocery stores in Kansas? If you do..they usually sell Bob's Red Mill organic cornmeal. I believe Amazon.com carries Bob's Red Mill and possibly King Arthur's organic flours and such.

Hy-Vee and Amazon both carry Gharabaldi organic chocolate chips too.

I'm going to put in one of these systems this summer. I've already got a 300 gallon stock tank, pump, greenhouse panels, and motivation!

I plan on incorporating a fodder system with it.

No, we don't have a Hy-Vee here. Or at least no where near me. I will check Amazon. Thanks!

Am I crazy? As we walked through the store today, avoiding 99% of the stuff in there, I looked at people walking around with their kids. Their carts were piled full of GMO products and deep inside I wanted to walk up and shake them and ask, "Do you have any idea what is in that stuff? Do you have any idea what it could do you and your kids?"

Of course, they probably don't and I didn't do it. But still I look at the isles in the grocery store in a whole new way and grocery shopping took longer because nothing went into the cart without having its label read first.

If you don't have an organic market, things like this can be found online. Many of them are even on Amazon.com. If you have a farmers market there may be corn flour and corn meal available there.

Another option is to invest in a grain mill, because you can grind your own wheat, corn, coffee, etc. and save a ton of cash, and it's even healthier for you to use freshly ground grains.

You're not crazy. It's one of those things, once you learn about it the world around you looks shockingly different. It used to take us an hour and a half to get through the grocery store, reading labels, getting lost on how to make our favorite dishes, not knowing what replace things with. It gets easier though. I can pick up 7 days worth of groceries (with three young kids in tow) in 20 minutes. I still want to hand out info pamphlets every time I venture into the conventional grocery store though. That's one thing that doesn't seem to go away.

My biggest mistake over the years was information overload. I would learn about something and delve head first into it. All of it led to knew information until I was so overwhelmed that I either got depressed or so freaked out that I didn't feel like I could do anything. I'm a big believer in Baby Steps :o

Audra I had the same experience at the store! I felt like I was just staring at people's carts filled with garbage. It's like all of a sudden there is a skull and cross bones on everything.

The only organic animal food I can find is WAY more expensive like $30/bag for chicken feed compared to the $13 I'm used to paying. I am still going to buy regular oats though to cut my bill a little. Goat food is the same way price wise.

I switched the girls to Timothy pellets instead of Alfalfa pellets because I couldn't find anything so far saying that Timothy is a problem. Being a dollar cheaper then alfalfa doesn't hurt either.

Yes it's more expensive but I look at it this way, my family drinks the milk and eats the eggs. So what they eat we are too. Not to mention if they got sick or got cancer because of my negligence I would never forgive myself.

I use this one quite a bit...vita cost. If you buy over 49 dollars worth..I believe the shipping is free. You can't believe how much I have ordered from them at a time. I pretty much like them and Amazon both.

VITA COST

OBF, Lots of Hy-Vee stores in KC - didn't know about your area..... Hope you can find one...


Thanks to you & Prairiedog for posting the video! It has made me sit up and take notice....

A friend of mine uses Azure Standard. They sell many organically grown items... .You can find it online. Until tonight, I am afraid I was not interested enough to buy much from them.... Will look into it more this week...

I know Azure Standard sells organically grown wheat, etc. at a reasonable price. They have order deadlines and drop off points. I can ask my friend more about it if anyone is interested. Now that dd's all-consuming scholarship competition is over, I can have a life again....

The things you have to worry about are corn and alfalfa. There is no GMO wheat currently released for market (although they are working on it. ~sigh~).

Even at that, the corn is more dangerous than the alfalfa. So far, they have only made Round-up Ready alfalfa. The modification is simply to resist a certain, common herbicide.

The corn, however.....much of the corn is Bt corn. Bt is a pesticide...so that is a corn that MAKES its own pesticide....inside the plant itself. This is not something you can wash off, as it is inside the cells.

So, if you wish to go in baby steps to eliminate feed, go for getting rid of the corn first. You can substitute oats, barley, wheat...lots of stuff.

I dunno if it is still on their FB page or not, but I asked them about this..... On another forum, a hay grower that lives in their neck of the woods mentioned that from time to time, Standlee buys up hay if they are short. They don't ask questions about whether it's GMO or not, just get it tested for protein and such....

After hearing that, I went back to my post on their FB wall and asked if they knew the GMO status of any hay they purchase and I got a somewhat snarky reply. Have no clue if it's still on their FB wall or not.... If not, go ask them and be very specific in your wording as the snarky reply to me was worded in an evasive way that didn't truly answer my question....

So the farmers, or wherever the 'organic' producers buy their ingredients, have to disclose whether their products are GMO or not or were grown anywhere near enough GMO crops to be contaminated?!?! So some 'labeling' or disclosure is required somewhere upstream?? Really?

'no GMO where ever possible' sounds like a huge loophole.

My brother was certified organic many years ago, it was a huge, lengthy process and expensive. He said that when 'organic' label became a more mainstream fad the organic laws became a bit more lax and enforcement even more lax. He quit being offically certified but his customers knew his practices.

I'm not attacking any messengers here, just have a huge problem with accountability of disclosure and what real information is available to the consumer...and the marketing just makes me grind my teeth! 'GMO free' is going to become, if it isn't already, just another marketing word with no accountability behind it....like 'natural', 'cage free', etc etc

Sorry, rant over.

So the BT reproduces inside the cells of the corn plant as it grows from the lab produced GMO corn seed?

It remains viable in the corn grown on that plant?

It survives the animals eating it and ends up viable in that animals feces on the ground?

It survives in the soil said feces was dropped on?

Does any of the Bt remain in the products that animals body produces, meat, milk?

Curious as to all the details and the true biological/chemical trail from lab to land and wonders if all the aspects of said trail have been quantitatively tested by objective authorities to come to unquestionable conclusions that might be readily available to any consumer.

There is SO much subjective misinformation out there that folks are reacting to, generating more subjective misinformation that generates more....and on and on and on and on.

Sorry ranting again...Caliann I am not attacking you personally, just quoted your concise statement as I think you might have the most concise answer-if there is one.

Yes the BT replicates itself inside the plant. The corn is eaten say by mice, the BT is found in all the blood and organs of the mouse, it replicates itself like a virus does. However there is some new studies "suggesting" that once off the GMOs the body can basically fight some of it off. This has not been proven yet but it looks promising.

In pregnant women they have found the GMOs in their blood streams, organs and lymph nodes as well as their breast milk. So our babies while not eating food yet are getting the GMOs directly from us.

Corn, soy, cottonseed meal and alfalfa, those are the big 4 but it is also in sugar beets, and some zucchini and squashes. After my trip to the store I found that corn and soy are in EVERYTHING. Corn syrup, corn starch, corn gluten meal etc. some things I read the entire ingredient list and nothing was listed until I got to the bottom and it states "contains soy".
Regular grains like wheat, oats and barley are still safe but we all know that will change eventually.

In the health food section many things were labeled " No GMOs". However most were not labeled. I did call companies right from my cell phone while in the store just to ask if it wasn't labeled. I figure calling companies lets them know what is important to their customers.

I kind of relate it ti radiation. one x-ray now and then won't cause much damage however if I load my body with it every day several times a day the effects would certainly be there. I might not be able to eliminate all bad thing in my diet but if I can lesson the exposure to me my animals and my grand kids it has to be a good thing.

Thanks to Prariedog for presenting this video in a non controversial way. It is good to have it presented as a "here it is, watch it if you want" video instead of a "I am going to cram this down your throat" Perhaps that is why we are all commenting and not fighting.

While every presentation naturally tends to slant things in the direction of their view, I must admit that it has made me more interested in pursuing the subject further.

One thing to mention, is that BT is a commonly used by many organic farmers to control cabbage worms, corn worms, and similar pests. It is not in itself dangerous to humans in any way. It is the splicing of the organisms DNA into another organism that is (potentially) causing the problem.

I made the time to watch this. It is scarry and most people really have no idea.
To me, this is an issue that the government intities looking out for the heath of the public, should error on the side of caution.
It realy is a shame how money rules our world. (Glad we are a civilized creature! LOL)

By the nature of how I live, I avoid a lot of the harm the general public is exposed to. I raise a lot of my meat and almost all my vegetables. But, we still have to purchase some items and corn in some form is in almost everything. I guess I will have to give up my sweet corn. It is one of the few hybrid type plants I grow.

I stopped feeding my AGHs corn, but did not think about problems with the beet pulp! It is a by-product of sugar beet processing. I can eleminate that also.

What about pelletized animal feeds? Where do the processed grain by-products, roughage products, forage products, plant protien products, and items like this come from?

For a creature that has great potiential, humans really are ..............

SPIKE

OOPPs, I forgot about my chickens! Scratch grain is mostly corn, 80 to 85 percent probably. GRRRRR
I like my eggs.
What is a good cheap alternative to chicken scratch grain?

SPIKE

We found a mill close that will bag GMO free milo and linseed for us for the chickens for less than I was paying for my layer pellets. If production goes down a little I will live with it.

Wish we were in a place where we could grow more of our own meat. Only have room for chickens. Want room to add a pig or two and a few meat goats.

If you lived close enough to me...we would trade you some beef for something you have. We don't claim to have ORGANIC..but they are grass/hay fed only. No grain..ever..Dexter steers.

I'd look around your area for someone that you could trade with. I think it's gonna get down to that eventually.

We are lucky because we live within spitting distance of a locally owned organic feed mill. You can also buy "transitional" grains. It's basically the grain that's grown organically during the period that they have to wait before they can be certified.

We are also working with a small farmer that grows spelt and popcorn for select markets. He's small enough that he'll come out and help us combine any organic grains we grow. We won't likely plant corn though, due to cross contamination. Looking at growing field peas (I avoid soy, GMO or not), and then wheat or spelt. We may try to get barley at some point to sell locally for people using fodder systems.

Judy I bred 2 of my girls to a Boer buck this year to put some meat in the freezer without having own yet another breed. Maybe when your goats come back that will be an option for you.

You could also get meat rabbits. Easy to raise in a small space.

Spike, chickens will eat any grain: oats, barley, milo, wheat, etcetera. Lots of safe choices out there.

We plan to breed to a Boer buck next fall for meat babies.

From the University of Kentucky:

"Bt Delta Endotoxin
The Bt delta endotoxin was selected because it is highly effective at controlling Lepidoptera larvae, caterpillars. It is during the larval stage when most of the damage by European corn borer occurs. The protein is very selective, generally not harming insects in other orders (such as beetles, flies, bees and wasps). For this reason, GMOs that have the Bt gene are compatible with biological control programs because they harm insect predators and parasitoids much less than broad-spectrum insecticides. The Bt endotoxin is considered safe for humans, other mammals, fish, birds, and the environment because of its selectivity. Bt has been available as a commercial microbial insecticide since the 1960s and is sold under many trade names. These products have an excellent safety record and can be used on many crops until the day of harvest.

To kill a susceptible insect, a part of the plant that contains the Bt protein (not all parts of the plant necessarily contain the protein in equal concentrations) must be ingested. Within minutes, the protein binds to the gut wall and the insect stops feeding. Within hours, the gut wall breaks down and normal gut bacteria invade the body cavity. The insect dies of septicaemia as bacteria multiply in the blood. Even among Lepidoptera larvae, species differ in sensitivity to the Bt protein.

Genetic Modification
Do Bt-corn hybrids differ only in that they possess the genetic code to produce the Bt protein? Not exactly. To add a trait to a crop plant, the gene must be inserted along with some additional genetic material. This additional genetic material includes a promoter sequence that, in part, determines how the new trait is expressed in the plant. For example, the promoter may cause to protein to be expressed in certain parts of the plants or only during a particular period of time. There is a marker gene that allows plant breeders to easily determine which plants have been transformed. Herbicide and antibiotic tolerance promoters are commonly used to identify transformed plants. There may also be a plasmid or vector sequence that allows for rapid multiplication of the gene of interest in a bacterial host prior to insertion in the crop plant."

http://grist.org/industrial-agricult...e-green-light/

Since GMO beets were given the green light in the middle of last summer, you are still able to get beet pulp without worry. Will be interesting how widespread GMO sugar beets will become.
The above web site talks about the soon to be available 2,4D resistant crops and mentions 2.4D overspray going 100 miles! Enjoy.

Knowing what a hot topic GMO could be.. I never mentioned on here that the number one reason we quit feeding the goat ration we'd fed for years... was to feed less GMO feedstuffs.. First thing that went was the alfalfa pellets (price, quality were already making me rethink the pellets.. BUT.. the GMO alfalfa was the final nail for me)... then I realized that my goat ration wasn't any less *GMO-y*.. so that was gone, I started buying whole oats instead.. figured out the blackoil sunflower seeds were *proabably* okay... BUT.. NOT the beet pulp we also top dressed with... so, for over 18 months the herd has eaten nothing but whole oats, limited sunflower seeds, grass hay and what ever browse that's out there (for the doe herd, bucks are always dry lotted).. Vet was here last week to pull blood.. he kept commenting on how good the girls looked..finally asked me if we had switched hay suppliers or something.. told him nope, just went down to single ingredient feed.. he seemed almost pleased that they could do so well on just the oats & boss (asked which place I buy my feed from! made me feel good that he was impressed enough with the herd's condition to ask in-depth questions)...

Also got the pregnancy reports back friday.. ALL does bred (everyone of them *took* on just one breeding.. usually there are at least a couple who cycle back a time or two.. not this year!).. noticing we have bigger baby bellies then we've had in quite a while.. a few does are huge for their due date.... don't know if it was the feed change or not.. but there are a lot of fat, sassy, shinny girls out there.. (and my feed bill has never been lower!) and I had a friend point out that I should advertise the herd as GMO free~!!! LOL, he thinks it would be a selling point...

susie, mo ozarks

On resistance:

"Preventing Bt resistance in pests
By law, farmers in the United States who plant Bt corn must plant non-Bt corn nearby. These unmodified fields are to provide a location to harbor pests. The theory behind these refuges is to slow the evolution of the pests' resistance to the Bt pesticide. Doing so enables an area of the landscape where wild type pests will not be immediately killed.

It is anticipated resistance to Bt will evolve in the form of a recessive allele in the pest. Because of this, a pest that gains resistance will have an incredibly higher fitness than the wild type pest in the Bt corn fields. If the resistant pest is feeding in the non-Bt corn nearby, the resistance is neutral and offers no advantage to the pest over any nonresistant pest. Ensuring there are at least some breeding pests nearby that are not resistant increases the chance the resistant pests will choose to mate with nonresistant ones. Since the gene is recessive, all offspring will be heterozygous, and the offspring from that mating will not be resistant to Bt and therefore no longer a threat. Using this method, scientists and farmers hope to keep the number of resistant genes very low, and use genetic drift to ensure any resistance that does emerge does not spread.

Although mandated by law, compliance data from the EPA for 2008 showed, however, 25% of Bt corn growers were not in compliance. The data showed noncompliance climbed to 13.23 million acres (53,500 km2), or almost 15% of all Bt corn grown, suggesting in some areas ample acreage does not exist to support pests without resistance to mate with any resistant pests that survived the Bt corn.[10]

The European corn borer, one of the primary insects Bt is meant to target, has been shown to be capable of developing resistance to the Bt protein"

From Colorado State University:

"Is the entire Bt corn plant toxic?
A: It depends. Two factors, the event and the promoter, control where delta toxins are produced in the plant and in what amounts. Different seed companies use different events and promoters, so their hybrids will also be different in what plant tissues produce Bt toxins.

The insertion event is the physical act of putting the Bt gene into the corn plant’s genetic material. This is when the physical location of the Bt gene is determined (which chromosome, what part of the chromosome, etc). Gene location affects where in the plant toxins are produced and how much Bt toxin is produced. Currently, we do not have the technology to control Bt gene location, so each event results in plants that differ in where and in how much delta endotoxin is produced.

The promoter is a genetic switch that tells the inserted Bt gene when and where to produce Bt toxins. Several different promoters are available and the choice of promoter also affects where and how much delta endotoxin is produced in the corn plant, leading to differences among hybrids."

"Q: Is it true that the roots of Bt corn plants leak delta endotoxins into the soil?
A: Yes, this has been demonstrated in several laboratory studies. However, the implications for various soil organisms are unclear. Since Bt is a very common soil bacterium, it is likely that exposure of these organisms to Bt toxins is common. The levels of Bt toxins measured in the lab studies were at least 10 times below those that cause observable effects in important soil organisms such as earthworms and springtails."

"Q: I’ve heard that Bt corn is a health threat because it causes allergic responses in some people. Is this true?
A: Some experimental transgenic plants have caused allergic responses. The EPA requires several food allergen tests as part of the registration process for transgenic crops containing pesticidal substances. The first test measures the length of time that the potential allergen survives in an acid environment. Longer survival times indicate more likelihood of surviving the digestion process and being absorbed into the blood stream, which is the first step in food allergenicity."

And yes, it is true that Bt proteins HAVE been found in the blood streams of pregnant women. Supposedly, the current strains of Bt crops have a kind of Bt that is completely broken down in the acidic environment of the stomach, and therefore does not enter the bloodstream. Unfortunately, in practice, this has not been found to be true.

There have also been issues with immunosuppresent people developing allergies to it.

I wish you would have talked about then. We've always fed whole oats and sunflower seeds because that is what Emily fed. But we were feeding beet pulp and alfalfa pellets as well.

Now that we know, we will stick with Chaffhaye for the alfalfa source and we will stop using beet pulp. They will still get some grass hay.

Had we understood sooner, we would have switched sooner. That is why I'm so glad we can have this discussion now. I've learned a lot from it.