Monsanto has developed a new wheat. F2-sterile wheat (this means seed cannot be used to plant the next crop, as it is sterile). - Millet (919-)

Do wheat growers usually use the seed of the previous crop?

Yes, many farmers keep some of their wheat crop, clean it to remove any weed seeds, and then plant it the following year. Every so often when his fields become infested with Rye, or if a better wheat variety has been developed a farmer will purchase new seed. - Millet (919-)

Monsanto pretty much has a monopoly on the seed market now right?

They have a monopoly on seeds with roundup resistance I believe. I worked on a 10,000 acre(1/2 fallow each year) dry land wheat farm near Walla Walla, Wa two summers while in college circa 1978. They could make their own seed if they wanted to but thought it too much trouble so they bought seed. According to them it took quite a bit of extra effort to minimize weeds in the seed.

It's almost impossible to get rid of rye once it's in a wheat field I thought except for fumigating the whole field?

Millet wrote:

Yes, many farmers keep some of their wheat crop, clean it to remove any weed seeds, and then plant it the following year. Every so often when his fields become infested with Rye, or if a better wheat variety has been developed a farmer will purchase new seed. - Millet (919-)

In our area most farmers get rid of rye with a machine called a wicker. Rye grows taller then wheat by 4 to 8 inches. A wicker has a long soaker hose filled with a herbicide. The soaker hose is attached to an adjustable bar that can be raised or lowered. The bar is raised above the height of the wheat, but lower that the rye. As the machine goes through the field the soaker hose drags against the rye and kills it.

One of Monsanto's products with the largest profit is their Round-Up ready seed line. The genetically engineered Round-Up ready seed, produces a genetically altered plant that is resistant to Monsanto's herbicide Round-Up. So a field can be sprayed with Round-Up to kill the weeds, but the genetically engineered plant is not harmed. In 2009 Argentine growers planted about 43 million acres of soybeans containing Monsanto’s Roundup Ready trait last year, making the country Monsanto's second-biggest soybean market after the U.S. About 95% of soybeans grown in Argentina and the USA contain Monsanto’s Roundup Ready trait. The draw for farmers is the reduced cost, and increased yield and thus extra profit over traditional systems. Round-Up ready No-till soybeans grown in narrow rows add $16 per acre more to a grower's bottom line than conventional soybeans.... On a 1,000 acre farm, no-till can save as much as 450 hours of time and 3,500 gallons of diesel fuel each year. That's 11, 40-hour weeks in time savings and $4,000 less for diesel at $1.15 per gallon" . Some people would rather not eat food grown by Round-up ready culture, but like it or not, almost all wheat, soy beens, corn and on and on is becoming the standard on almost all farms in the US and most other countries. - Millet (918-)

Interesting. At the Eastern Washington farm I worked at they pulled the rye by hand. Certain fields had a lot and they never got rid of it. One of the hired hands told me that wheat with rye in it was quite a bargain for whoever bought it as the amount of wild rye was very small and the discount quite large.

Millet wrote:

In our area most farmers get rid of rye with a machine called a wicker. Rye grows taller then wheat by 4 to 8 inches. A wicker has a long soaker hose filled with a herbicide. The soaker hose is attached to an adjustable bar that can be raised or lowered. The bar is raised above the height of the wheat, but lower that the rye. As the machine goes through the field the soaker hose drags against the rye and kills it.

Something about the fact that 95% of all soy grown in the US being round up ready seeds really scares me. The reason that percentage is so high is because Monsanto has a team of folks that go around to all of the farms in the States that do NOT grow round up ready soy an sue them for patent violations. If you are not growing round up ready soy chances are one of the nearby farms is and your soy will almost always test as partially positive because of cross pollination. Monsantos folks come in, illegally obtain samples of your crop and when it does test positive as being round up ready soy they sue you. Monsanto knows they will eventually loose legally because the samples are generally obtained illegally but they know they can bankrupt ANY farmer out there by filling motion after motion in court. Monopolies are great for capitalism... Never mind the fact that genetically modified foods are still new enough that no one really knows the long term health effects of consuming them. Research by one of Monsantos ex-employees has shown some correlations between consuming round up ready soy and increased levels of protein prions (which are the precursors for the human equivilant of mad cow disease). Just something to consider.

Joe

One hears all types of rumors, usually negative and always by city people, concerning Monsanto. As one that has long been involved with Colorado wheat farming I, and no other farmer that I have ever known, has ever known a single farmer that has been sued "illegally" by Monsanto --- not one. There have been some farmers that were sued by Monsanto, but for just reasons. Monsanto sells untold multi-millions of dollars of their products to farmers, farmers are their customers. Monsanto is not in the business of bankrupting their customer base. In fact Monsanto as a company, is thought of very highly by the farming community. Just the last two weeks this farm has purchased, and used, many many gallons of glycophosphate. It is an excellent product, saving time and money. Lastly, Joe, I see you now list your address as Jamestown, Colorado ( in the mountains up above Boulder) instead of Chicago. Have you now started at the University of Denver? If so welcome to Colorado. Colorado is still looking for a few good men. Take care. - Millet (866-)

Now if we could just get roundup ready bluegrass and fescue for our lawns. It would be nice to be able to get rid of quack grass and all other undesirable grasses out of our lawns by spraying roundup on them.

Now if that Monsanto wheat is sterile, how can they produce it themselves?

You have to use a John Deere in vitro planter to get wheat fertilization. - Millet (865-)

Roundup is an excellent product and all though it is now available in generic form -the original formulation from Monsanto is still better to me. It is more water resistant to rain and generally seems more consistent in their formulation meaning others come in different concentrations so you need to double check to make sure you are comparing the same formulations. However Monsanto or maybe more Dupont [same company, different division] has worked on "Terminator seed" technology. I think they stopped work on this a long time ago but they have shown signs of bringing back the program. As mentioned their seeds can sometimes cross pollinate with the plants of neighbors but Dupont was working on trying to make the neighbor crops sterile. That maybe exactly what the earlier post was saying but I think the intent was not a law suit but an effort to render all other seeds sterile except their own seed [Dupont's] so the farmer's seed are useless but Dupont seed is still viable b/c they have an extra gene that is their own technology and their seeds stay viable . This would make an unbreakable monopoly in the seed business and they would not need any lawsuits. They could render "heirloom" type seed of any crop, say tomatoes maybe, sterile and useless. It scares me ....Bayer is part of the same big parent company and has a dark past, doing nasty experiments in Germany for hitler. Bayer also has many excellent products....

Bayer, Monsanto, DuPont and four or five other large organizations, all have a common membership in a trade organization called the Council for Biotechnology Information. However, Bayer, Monsanto and DuPont are in no way business related. Each are completely separate companies, aggressively competing as hard as they can against each other for the agricultural seed market. It is not at all uncommon for corporations in the same line of business to belong to the same trade organizations, but that does not mean that they are necessarily friendly. Monsanto and DuPont are currently squaring off in a federal court in what started out as an effort by Monsanto to block DuPont from combining Monsanto’s Roundup Ready gene with a similar trait for herbicide tolerance. DuPont counter sued, claiming Monsanto is unlawfully using its market power to stifle innovation and extend its monopoly on Roundup Ready soy to Roundup Ready 2 before patents on the original expire in 2014. The allegations are being probed by the Justice Department. Lastly, Bayer is also not business related in any manner with either Monsanto or DuPont. - Millet (864-)