Interesting questions being asked, both small and large. Am I "afraid" of Roundup? No. I use it several times a year to control weeds in various areas, around driveways, perimeters of beds, and to sometimes kill otherwise hard to control, invasive weeds. Would I eat something that had been sprayed. No, sorry, I draw the line there. I liked Dave's question the best -- why would you consider doing such a thing -- I guess its a calculated risk, like riding a motorcycle or smoking or drinking -- what are the odds I might get a benefit from the action/behavior versus the odds of suffering a detriment. You can buy a bunch of mint at the local grocery store for about $.79. I wonder what's in THAT mint?

Yep, GMO sugar beets are being cultivated in the US. Their approval was revoked in 2010 but that has since been overturned in 2012. Via wikipedia: "On August 13, 2010, Judge White revoked the deregulation of glyphosate-resistant sugar beets and declared it unlawful for growers to plant glyphosate-resistant sugar beets in the spring of 2011. As a result of this ruling, growers were permitted to harvest and process their crop at the end of the 2010 growing season, yet a ban on new plantings was enacted...On February 4, 2011, the USDA-APHIS announced glyphosate-resistant sugar beets had been partially deregulated and growers would be allowed to plant seed from spring 2011 until an EIS (environmental impact statement) is completed...In July 2012, after completing an environmental impact assessment and a plant pest risk assessment the USDA deregulated Monsanto's Roundup Ready sugar beets." Jill- At the risk of taking this thread further off topic, if you're wanting to grow grains I suggest reading Small-Scale Grain Raising by Gene Logsdon. It's a very interesting book. I could hardly put it down even though I haven't got the space to grow grains. Rodney Here is a link that might be useful: Sugar Beet- Genetic Modification

paulinct, I guess that the best place to start is with the statement that "nothing happens until someone buys something." Commercial agriculture is intensive (the greatest yield from the smallest acreage) and the demand for an agriculture (by)product will drive many diverse industries like plant breeding, chemicals manufacture and labor saving machinery- each with its own, and sometimes unexpected consequences. Sometimes we come a full circle and are back to the same point from which we were trying to get away. Take pyrethrum, an insecticide derived from a plant and having the three great benefits ie deadly to insects in small doses, with little residual and not harmful to mammalian life. The product is in heavy demand and has been 'tweaked' into pyrethroids - stronger, longer-lasting and consequently more harmful to mammals (the danger is in the dosage). Demand has brought on the development of products that exhibit the same undesirable properties for which others were banned. I have no doubt that the same fate is in store for the 'organic' concept in horticulture. Florida has committed to a facility for producing ethanol from corn but as far as I know the state does not produce the crop significantly. The demand will encourage more production, more fertilizer use and yes, more glyphosate use. Or there will be competition for the product and organic lawn care might be severely stressed. Has the price of corn and its by products gone up again recently? I am quite sure that I will not be putting down dried cow pats as fertilizer on my front lawn and I am equally confident that I do not have to apply synthetic fertilizers or combination products every eight weeks to have a presentable and acceptable 'front lawn'. But I do find myself redefining terms which I thought I had mastered long ago. What is a weed? What is organic? What is the difference between mutation and genetic engineering? Thank you very much for a thought stimulating post.

Seedmama, "I've forwarded it to my brother so he can share in my discomfort". Oh, that is too funny for words, even if you didn't mean for it to be funny. Seriously, I am sure once the two of you face those kinds of decisions, you'll make the right choices. We try to dig out the thistles while they'll small. Otherwise, we just mow them repeatedly to try to keep them from flowering and setting seed. We only have a few acres though. I cannot imagine trying to deal with them in a farm-type setting because they are relentlessly aggressive. Jay, Well, at least I don't have to worry about cotton plants because our place (formerly a cotton farm in, I think, the 1950s) has cotton root rot in the soil making it impossible to grow certain kinds of plants. No cotton will grow here! (I LIKE cotton plants, think they are pretty and would grow some if I could, just for fun.) We have neighbors (ranchers) who sometimes spray their fencelines with glyphosate products or their hay pastures with broadleaf weedkillers. Herbicide drift can be a problem here at our place but most years I see relatively little plant damage or death from it, and that's a good thing. Glenda, I know. I feel guilty when I use glphyosate here, and I only use it once every 3 or 4 or 5 years. I've pretty much given up on controlling bermuda non-chemically with any degree of success. I dig it out of the garden beds when it invades, and otherwise am just trying to shade it out by planting tons of shrubs and trees around the house. Robert, For years and years you could buy little packets of kochia seeds on the seedracks in the stores. I always wondered why anyone would plant it on purpose! (I guess my perspective on it comes from having relatives who farmed and considered it a weed.) I agree that, as a specimen plant, Easter red cedar is gorgeous, but it sure becomes weedy fast. I always liked them until we moved here and I learned how quickly they grow, spread and outcompete everything around them. Seeing them burn and literally explode in wildfires has made me like them even less. They can send a burning resinous sap flying through the air and it spreads fire with it wherever it lands. Paula, I was chuckling to myself yesterday pulling pigweed seedlings from my veggie garden. Lots of folks let it grow wild in their pastures here, and we're downstream, so I'll undoubtedly being pulling those seedlings every spring for the rest of my life. This is a great forum....and a really active one compared to some of the other state and regional ones here at GW. There are so many folks here with knowledge, experience and expertise in so many different areas. Dawn