All of our tools have risks and balances with them.
A hand saw is safer than a table saw with the guard removed, but a whole lot of folk have a guard less table saw in their garage.
A row cultivator and a sprayer full of 24D or Roundup are both tools, and both have risks.
We need to be sure we are clear on understanding the relative risks vs rewards.
One of the worst things used on my farm, looking back, was the row crop cultivator. On these hills and fine clay, we would cultivate 3-4 times a year, generally after it dried out every rain.
Along came the next rain, and would wash away that 1-2 inches of soil down each row.
Come cultivate again, and repeat the washing.
I don't mind plowing my ground in the fall with a moldboard plow; it doesn't wash the clods very much at all, over winter it freezes under the snow.
But jeez, the soil that moved from the frequent cultivation a. That sure was damaging.
Now, which tool is worse - the cultivator, or the sprayer?
I donno, really.
We do have a whole lot of research on the herbicides, and the ones used seem pretty safe. Been used over 25 years, some over 50 years, and the dangers seem fairly low - safer than that table saw without a guard anyhow!
Doesn't mean it has no risk at all.
But we do need to look at the risks, and understand how and what we are comparing.
I never met my aunt, she died of stomach cancer in the 1940s. Was not that old, had a under 10 year old kid. No herbicides were used by my moms grandparents. Don't know that any was actually available back then.... So, if antidotal evidence is allowed, as you told us - then how do you explain my aunt's cancer? Was pretty devastating, my mom would talk about it a lot.
I do believe big business is motivated by profit.
I also think Whole Foods, as well as the organic dairy 10 miles from me with a couple cows are also motivated by profit. That sorta all washes even out.....
So we need to listen to both sides, understand how things are really done, and then follow a bit of common sense.
And realize all our tools have some risk and danger, but also have some benefits.
Then find our way from there.
Oh, when I switched to a narrow row planter last year, I bought some good old row crop cultivators from a relative to match. Someday I might want to cultivate some crops too especially when they are a little bigger, not just spray. Like I say, we need to look at all the tools, and evaluate what works best. I'm not really sold on one way or the other as the only way.
I don't think Roundup is absorbed through the roots.
I don't think noticing 20-100 cancer cases in a totally uncontrolled, unstudied area really proves anything. How many of then were smokers, or worked with used oil or metal cutting fumes and were soaked in non-pesticide chemicals from these other sources 5-10 hours a day, just as a random thought?
I think we should keep examining our tools, and keep making better choices, and finding new tools.
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Today's Featured Article - Third Brush Generators - by Chris Pratt. While I love straightening sheet metal, cleaning, and painting old tractors, I use every excuse to avoid working on the on the electrics. I find the whole process sheer mystery. I have picked up and attempted to read every auto and farm electrics book with no improvement in the situation. They all seem to start with a chapter entitled "Theory of Electricity". After a few paragraphs I usually close the book and go back to banging out dents. A good friend and I were recently discussing our tractor electrical systems when he stated "I figure it all comes back to applying Ohms Law". At this point
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