Those bugs ‘are going to outsmart us’

It is what scientists and environmentalists regard as one of nature’s great ironies: Fifteen years ago, genetically engineered seeds promised to reduce the amount of poisons used on the land, but today they are forcing farmers to use more — and sometimes more toxic — chemicals to protect their crops.

Why? Because pests have done what nature always does — adapt. Just as some bacteria have become resistant to antibiotic drugs, a growing number of superweeds and superbugs in the nation’s farm fields are proving invulnerable to the tons of pesticides that go hand in hand with genetically modified seeds.

The rising tide of pesticides is alarming many scientists and environmentalists about their effect on what’s left of the North American prairie ecosystem, which survives in and around the vast “green deserts” of row crops that now stretch across the Upper Midwest.

“There are now 80 million acres of treated corn,” said Eric Mader, an ecologist with the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation. “That’s a huge volume of pesticides applied for one crop.”

What’s next, they say, is even worse. To combat the growing wave of resistant weeds and bugs, biotech companies like Monsanto and Dow Chemical Company are poised to launch a whole new arsenal of genetically modified seeds that will accelerate the chemical warfare. Some are designed for use with older, more toxic herbicides that scientists say pose an even greater risk to the environment and human health.

In recent years, scientists have identified an estimated 23 weeds around the world that no longer die when doused with Roundup.

The next generation of genetically modified seeds, designed to combat the new resistant pests, will work for a while, skeptics concede. But eventually, they say, nature will evolve again.

Many scientists say the evolution in farming and the widespread Roundup use already has contributed to the demise of the prairie and many of its species, including milkweed, bees and butterflies. The prospect of widespread use of even more toxic herbicides is alarming, they said.

“We’re going back 20 years, and that scares me,” said Mace Vaughan, a pollinator conservation specialist with the Xerces Society.

There is another solution, say Potter and Ostlie, but one that can work against the economic interests of farmers and pesticide companies: Plant something else for a while. Alternating corn and soybeans, and mixing in other crops from season to season, can improve the soil and defeat the bugs and weeds, say agronomists.

“Rotate. That’s how you get rid of it,” he said. “Rotate, rotate, rotate.”

http://healthimpactnews.com/2012/pests-adapt-to-gmos-requiring-more-pesticides-for-gm-crops/