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Trailer for Blood Into Wine . . . all about Maynard James Keenan's winery . . . Awesomeness . . .http://www.apple.com/trailers/independent/bloodintowine/
Yep, thanks to Monsanto Roundup, American agriculture is in quite a fix now. See, Monsanto sells genetically modified seed that's supposed to survive spraying with their weedkiller. Unfortunately, the weeds learned to resist it - and now their GMO seed is struggling against the pesticide-resistant weeds that evolved as a result of their own product.Wouldn't it be nice if companies thought that far ahead before they pushed their products into the mainstream? And wouldn't it be nice if we had government agencies that didn't rubber stamp them? DYERSBURG, Tenn. — For 15 years, Eddie Anderson, a farmer, has been a strict adherent of no-till agriculture, an environmentally friendly technique that all but eliminates plowing to curb erosion and the harmful runoff of fertilizers and pesticides. On a recent afternoon here, Mr. Anderson watched as tractors crisscrossed a rolling field — plowing and mixing herbicides into the soil to kill weeds where soybeans will soon be planted. Just as the heavy use of antibiotics contributed to the rise of drug-resistant supergerms, American farmers’ near-ubiquitous use of the weedkiller Roundup has led to the rapid growth of tenacious new superweeds. To fight them, Mr. Anderson and farmers throughout the East, Midwest and South are being forced to spray fields with more toxic herbicides, pull weeds by hand and return to more labor-intensive methods like regular plowing. “We’re back to where we were 20 years ago,” said Mr. Anderson, who will plow about one-third of his 3,000 acres of soybean fields this spring, more than he has in years. “We’re trying to find out what works.” Farm experts say that such efforts could lead to higher food prices, lower crop yields, rising farm costs and more pollution of land and water. [...] Pigweed can grow three inches a day and reach seven feet or more, choking out crops; it is so sturdy that it can damage harvesting equipment. In an attempt to kill the pest before it becomes that big, Mr. Anderson and his neighbors are plowing their fields and mixing herbicides into the soil. That threatens to reverse one of the agricultural advances bolstered by the Roundup revolution: minimum-till farming. By combining Roundup and Roundup Ready crops, farmers did not have to plow under the weeds to control them. That reduced erosion, the runoff of chemicals into waterways and the use of fuel for tractors. If frequent plowing becomes necessary again, “that is certainly a major concern for our environment,” Ken Smith, a weed scientist at the University of Arkansas, said. In addition, some critics of genetically engineered crops say that the use of extra herbicides, including some old ones that are less environmentally tolerable than Roundup, belies the claims made by the biotechnology industry that its crops would be better for the environment.
Man Swims 3,274-Mile Amazon River in 66 Days Next month, the film "Big River Man" will open in the UK, which follows Martin Strel as he swims all 3,274 miles of the Amazon River, ten hours a day for 66 days. Even more impressive is his hard drinking and 250-lb. stature (206 lbs. afterwards).The 55-year-old says he stays in shape by consuming two bottles of wine daily. Back in his home country of Slovenia, he's become a hit with the women. He endured gnawing piranhas, epic floods, natives with machetes, and murderous bandits.Strel even had an armed team of guards to keep river pirates away. He says the wine is of his own making that's "very healthy and gives me energy, without making me drunk. I would drink whisky as well, to wash my mouth out before I eat food."
