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Insect 'apocalypse' in U.S. driven by 50x increase in toxic pesticides: study

nationalgeographic.com

251–260 of 342 posts

Re: Insect 'apocalypse' in U.S. driven by 50x increase in toxic pesticides: study

#251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you mean “my” money? When you spend it, it’s no longer yours. You have land now in this line of reasoning.

Can I sell this land to someone else if I need money? Is the use of that land for the new owner restricted or can it be repurposed for agriculture or other uses?

As a serious answer for anyone reading this who might be curious, even though the the above comment is probably not asking seriously.

Most of these situations the land is placed in a thing called a 'land trust', at least that is the structure I see most often. These are generally then set out with an elected governing board, and a set of bylaws and rules about the lands. Often these rules can require a voting majority of everyone who placed in money on the land to make decisions about the land. Usually there is a minimum amount of land you personally must purchase in the larger purchase to constitutes a "share" like 1 acre.

If someone has a change of heart later down the line the trust actually is a very hard entity to get around even if you are on the board of a small 5-10 person land trust. There have been examples of such boards being flipped and sold, but more often than not what you encounter is: one of the board members is interested in selling off the land and is utterly unable to because of how the trust is structured. They can be pretty robust.

The only difference between buying land and creating your own trust and foundations like this is, the foundation ultimately controls all the board seats of land trust generally.

Re: Insect 'apocalypse' in U.S. driven by 50x increase in toxic pesticides: study

#252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly, they have raised it without pesticides for that many years too.

They have used pest control measures for that entire time. Primarily tillage which contributed heavily to the desertification of the area.

Yeah, of course there are going to be pests. They used trial and error and the errors were local.

Re: Insect 'apocalypse' in U.S. driven by 50x increase in toxic pesticides: study

#254

Slightly tangential, but I want to point out that there's a way forward without pesticides and without economic disaster: We can switch to a "horticultural" mode of civilization. The idea is that we use applied ecology to create curated ecosystems that have a high proportion of plants that are agriculturally productive. (Not to be mysterious, I'm talking about Permaculture et. al. but that term seems to upset a few p…

the agriculture shills keep pushing this notion that their way of growing with chemicals is the the most productive way when I've yet to see a study that indicates that any of what they've done has increased crop yields.

Re: Insect 'apocalypse' in U.S. driven by 50x increase in toxic pesticides: study

#255

Slightly tangential, but I want to point out that there's a way forward without pesticides and without economic disaster: We can switch to a "horticultural" mode of civilization. The idea is that we use applied ecology to create curated ecosystems that have a high proportion of plants that are agriculturally productive. (Not to be mysterious, I'm talking about Permaculture et. al. but that term seems to upset a few p…

the agriculture shills keep pushing this notion that their way of growing with chemicals is the the most productive way when I've yet to see a study that indicates that any of what they've done has increased crop yields.

If farmers couldn't increase yields they wouldn't buy all of that expensive chemical stuff. If you could farm without buying chemicals or reducing yields, you should go out and do it, you would put everyone else out of business and make a killing.

Re: Insect 'apocalypse' in U.S. driven by 50x increase in toxic pesticides: study

#256

Slightly tangential, but I want to point out that there's a way forward without pesticides and without economic disaster: We can switch to a "horticultural" mode of civilization. The idea is that we use applied ecology to create curated ecosystems that have a high proportion of plants that are agriculturally productive. (Not to be mysterious, I'm talking about Permaculture et. al. but that term seems to upset a few p…

the agriculture shills keep pushing this notion that their way of growing with chemicals is the the most productive way when I've yet to see a study that indicates that any of what they've done has increased crop yields.

Modern science has increased yield for corn by a factor of 8: https://images.app.goo.gl/QfcFrk4nvu7uw6M67. I’m only 35 and it’s doubled in my lifetime.

Re: Insect 'apocalypse' in U.S. driven by 50x increase in toxic pesticides: study

#257
post #22

I'm part of a group developing RNAi-based pesticides which are topically applied (so non-GM). They are extremely species specific; when designed properly they can avoid even close relatives of the target insect, and the by-product of the active ingredient is degraded RNA, which is harmless. The OECD had a meeting on it recently to help develop a regulatory framework - link here if interested ( https://www.oecd.org/ch…

What's the name / link for the group? I'm interested in learning more about this.

Re: Insect 'apocalypse' in U.S. driven by 50x increase in toxic pesticides: study

#258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the agriculture shills keep pushing this notion that their way of growing with chemicals is the the most productive way when I've yet to see a study that indicates that any of what they've done has increased crop yields.

Modern science has increased yield for corn by a factor of 8: https://images.app.goo.gl/QfcFrk4nvu7uw6M67 . I’m only 35 and it’s doubled in my lifetime.

Except you're not accounting for the nutritional density [0] per yield being reduced and also the fact that the majority of cash crop goes to feeding livestock.

[0] https://rodaleinstitute.org/why-organic/issues-and-prioritie...

Re: Insect 'apocalypse' in U.S. driven by 50x increase in toxic pesticides: study

#259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the agriculture shills keep pushing this notion that their way of growing with chemicals is the the most productive way when I've yet to see a study that indicates that any of what they've done has increased crop yields.

If farmers couldn't increase yields they wouldn't buy all of that expensive chemical stuff. If you could farm without buying chemicals or reducing yields, you should go out and do it, you would put everyone else out of business and make a killing.

The article claims this at the end:

> Farms using neonics had 10 times the insect pressure and half the profits compared to those who use regenerative farming methods instead of insecticides according a 2018 study. Like agroecological farming, regenerative agricultural uses cover crops, no-till and other methods to increase on-farm biodiversity and soil health. The regenerative corn-soy operations in the study didn’t have to worry about insect problems, said co-author Jonathan Lundgren, an agroecologist and Director of the ECDYSIS Foundation.

> Farmers who are dependent on chemicals are going out of business, said Lundgren, who is also a grain farmer in South Dakota. “It’s painful to see when we have tested, scientifically sound solutions. Working with nature is a good business decision,” he says.

It links to this study as a source: https://peerj.com/articles/4428/

Re: Insect 'apocalypse' in U.S. driven by 50x increase in toxic pesticides: study

#260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the agriculture shills keep pushing this notion that their way of growing with chemicals is the the most productive way when I've yet to see a study that indicates that any of what they've done has increased crop yields.

If farmers couldn't increase yields they wouldn't buy all of that expensive chemical stuff. If you could farm without buying chemicals or reducing yields, you should go out and do it, you would put everyone else out of business and make a killing.

Maybe there are network effects at play which make it difficult to do what you suggest?
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