And now for something completely different

I was diagnosed with stage 4 prostate cancer about 11 months ago. At that point my PSA reading was 56. Cancer had metastasized into my ribs and pelvis. Oncologists put me on their standard protocol of Luperon and Zometa. It was recommended to me that I supplement with AveMar Ultra, taken with Pomegranate or Cranberry juice. AveMar Ultra is fermented wheat germ. After measuring 56, my PSa dropped to 23, then 16 and has been in a range between 8 and 10 since then. I’m 74 now and feel well enough that I think I’ll die of something else before the cancer gets me. I would love to hear from others who have been supplementing with AveMar Ultra.

Zeke said @ur momisugly December 14, 2012 at 10:33 am

The study is meant to have a little slightly retaliatory fun because I get tired of having studies thrown at me all of the time about what I should do with my life down to the last little watt and rice grain and air molecule.

If what you say is tongue-in-cheek, perhaps you should say so. Sorry for not immediately seizing on that you were making fun. As it happens, I too tire of people telling this libertarian what to do (and think).
However, you have failed to provide support for your thesis regarding being forced by law to purchase and consume organic produce at twice the price you are prepared to pay. The link you provide is to agreements regarding low-input sustainable agriculture (LISA) and this is not organic agriculture as defined by law. LISA advocates use artificial fertilisers, synthetic pesticides and herbicides eschewed by organic practitioners. However, I’m happy to play your little game.
Back in 1980 if memory serves, we had an agricultural conference in Adelaide under the auspices of IFOAM. It was well attended by farmers of every ilk and we had many interesting farm walks on LISA and organic farms. Attendees from overseas remarked on how well we all got along as similar events in Europe and North America had the various camps all at loggerheads with no serious communication occurring.
Sam Jericho is a LISA farmer on the Eyre Peninsula of South Australia where he grows wheat using no-till. The wheat is drilled into sod killed with herbicide, rather than killing the sod by mechanical ploughing hence it’s often called chemical ploughing. As well, Sam’s father had planted out many shelter belts of trees, commencing this in the 1920s.
The ABC radio reporter who was on the walk with us asked Sam if he would have made more money farming the way his neighbours had. Sam said it was likely he would have, “…but I’d only have spent it!” It’s of note that, in this particular season, the area was deeply drought affected and Sam’s neighbours didn’t have a crop worth harvesting, sending some into bankruptcy. Sam had a 30 bag/acre crop to harvest. Yes, Sam’s neighbours’ crops were heavier than his in a good year, but Sam had a crop to sell when prices were at their highest due to drought when they had nothing to sell.
You see Zeke, maximum yield of crop per acre is not the farmer’s goal. His (or her) goal is to have more money in the bank at the end of the year than was there at the beginning. The goal of the agro-chemical industry is to maximise its profits at the expense of the farmer. As for LISA and organic farmers having a crop to sell in difficult years rather than no crop at all, I fail utterly to understand how this “doubles prices”. I also note that almost every organic farmer I have talked with has been proud of their low level of debt. Almost every conventional farmer I have with has been heavily in debt and suffered badly during the world financial crises during the last 30 years.

Don says:December 13, 2012 at 12:04 am
[…]The likely explanation is of course that the sodas were “stabilized” by sorbates to prevent fermentation (“spoilage”). I couldn’t help wondering if sorbated commercial soft drinks might have the same effect in vivo, knocking our microbiotic friends– and thus our health– for a serious loop. Something to think about.
Brings to mind ruminations regarding the effect of chlorine in the drinking water. Obviously the overall result is beneficial to health with regard to harmful bacteria and viruses. But what is the effect on the gut?

Hey just wanted to give you a quick heads up. The text in your post seem to be running off the
screen in Chrome. I’m not sure if this is a formatting issue or something to do with internet browser compatibility but I figured I’d post to let you know.
The layout look great though! Hope you get the problem solved soon.
Cheers

Rick said @ur momisugly December 14, 2012 at 9:02 pm

It has been conservatively estimated that eliminating modern farm practices like using chemicals and fertilizers would cut world food production by 1/3 and would increase food prices by 50%. Billions of people around the world are struggling to maintain food security now. Imagine the predicament the world would face with food price inflation of that magnitude.

Apart from the ecoloonies, agrochemical companies, and people like you and Zeke nobody is contemplating “eliminating modern farm practices like using chemicals and fertilizers”. All farmers, organic, LISA, as well as conventional use fertilisers, pesticides, tractors… Here’s a few of the industrial chemicals used by organic farmers:
Copper sulphate, basic slag (byproduct of iron smelting), sodium silicate, sodium bicarbonate, potassium permanganate, potassium stearate, iron chelate… Oh dear, not so “chemical-free” is it?
The single most important crop-limiting factor is water. If you are worried about food security, worry about that! As it happens, there is, as Willis has pointed out elsewhere on this site, no looming world food shortage. The world’s food problems are those of distribution (the poor got no money to buy it) and overproduction that keeps prices low so farmers make sweet fanny adams in the way of income without subsidies from the government. That is, you pay less for your food at the shop, but more in taxes to the government. And guess what the government record is like in this regard. This attempt at scary shit is worthy of.. oh, an Al Gore, a Micky the Mannikin?
And just for the record, I have inspected the results of many agricultural trials, including in some cases withheld data. The agrochemical companies only allow the publication of the results they want promulgated. It’s widely known in farming circles that herbicides reduce cereal yields/acre. As I wrote earlier, it’s not about yields/acre, it’s about the excess of income above expenditure. And even that might not be obvious from a short-term trial.
Back in the mid 80s I came across two 30 year long cereal trials in Europe. The control plots received no fertiliser nor were crop residues handled organically. The fertilised plots were fed the recommended rate of artificial NPK. Yes, there was a yield increase (15% IIRC), but that was insufficient to pay for the fertiliser, never mind the cost of applying the fertiliser!
I note with somewhat grim amusement that some years ago the vegetable growers on the North West Coast of Tasmania were persuaded to use high-analysis fertilisers. Naturally they cost a lot more per unit of N, P & K than the ordinary fertilisers they were used to, but they were assured that because they would spend less time applying the much smaller volume, they would be ahead financially. Unfortunately, the crop responses to the new fertiliser was to say the least, disappointing. Turned out that most of the crop response to the old superphosphate was down to its sulphur content. There being no sulphur in the high-analysis fertiliser, yields went down. There’s nothing quite like a good plummet, I always say.
I live among farmers, on a farm, so I have a different perspective than city-slickers who, by and large, are completely clueless when it comes to farming Frankly, you and Zeke are no better than the woman who phoned me to ask what organic sprays to use for organic apple production. When I explained that it was much more than sprays, it was an integrated approach requiring attention to fertilisers, varieties and past land use, she interrupted me to say she wanted to tell her neighbour what to use so she wouldn’t have to put up with his nasty chemicals. I asked who her neighbour was and when she told me I fell about with laughter. Her neighbour was an organic orchardist! So it goes…

Re: WordPress and Chrome: I’m using Chrome and this site has always looked fine to me!
Re: Pompous Git and Lentillists: **LOVE** it! :>
Re: Chlorine in our water: Did you know that suburban neighborhoods that allow swimming pools expose their children to 1,417% more deadly chlorine gas (Outlawed in war by the Geneva conventions!) than suburban neighborhoods that ban swimming pools? Do you love your children? Join Ban The Pools today!
;>
MJM
P.S. Yes, I made up the 1,417% number… but it could well be true! Play it safe: live with hippies who don’t take showers!

Rick said @ur momisugly December 15, 2012 at 7:46 am

“It’s widely known in farming circles that herbicides reduce cereal yields/acre.”
Could you please link to the sources that would support that statement. How do herbicide companies remain in business when the use of their products reduces yield?

Since Googling “herbicide grain yield” seems beyond your Googling ability:
http://www.daff.qld.gov.au/documents/PlantIndustries_FieldCropsAndPasture/Sensitivity-barley-wheat-cultivars-herbicides.pdf
As with most research, the questions that arise are interesting. How did they obtain weed-free ground for the control plots? Methyl bromide? What is the history of herbicide use in these plots? Glyphosate (Roundup), for example, accumulates in the soil leading to long-term disease problems in wheat crops.(smut, rust, bunt etc.) Fungal diseases are more prevalent in some years than others; some are controllable, but at the expense of spraying fungicide; some are controllable by changing to another variety, but different varieties differ in yield.
Herbicide companies remain in business because, unlike you, they know that the farmer is not at all interested in maximising yield. Here’s a link to the world record tomato grower Charles Wilber:
http://home.comcast.net/~pobrien48/Tomatoes_World_Record.htm
Now, ask yourself: “if maximising yield is what it’s all about, why don’t all tomato growers use the same technique as Mr Wilber? Why do they tolerate yields of less than 5% of Mr Wilber’s crop?” See my previous comments for the answers.

Zeke said @ur momisugly December 15, 2012 at 11:01 am

Corn yields in bushels per acre since WWII have increased by a factor of 5. Countries that were unable to grow enough wheat to support themselves have become net exporters of wheat after the Green Revolution. This includes the use of dwarf varieties, the use of chemical fertilizers, and the use of pesticides. Wheat rust is a nasty disgusting beast – including 100′s of varieties – that has been vanquished largely due to the scientific genious and vison of Drs Stakman and Borlaug, and to allow it to come back because of this misplaced faith in the glories of organic farming would be a devastation to the grains on which so many lives depend. I have no problem with other people sticking to their own diets. I never, ever buy organic and the food I prefer often comes from several continents. We are each paying an additional 1,000 bucks a year in higher gas prices, and food prices are climbing, while taxes are increasing and power bills are also getting higher. Respect my decision not to eat organic, as I respect others’ decisions to go on a Paleo or a raw food diet or an organic regimen. Reading this thread is sufficient to illustrate that no one agrees, and the science is not settled, on the best diet or the best way to treat any given disease. Preserving individual liberty is the best default in this case.
I am speaking because the Sustainable Agriculture push is beginning right now, and is being carried out, like the co2 regulation perpetrated on us by the EPA, by unelected, unaccountable offices and officials in the EU and in the US.

What makes you think that organic grain farmers don’t use modern varieties wheat? Are you aware that an estimated 15% of that increase has come from the increase in atmospheric CO2?How do you avoid eating organically grown food? Do you avoid eating in restaurants?
http://www.rickstein.com/Eggs.html
Currently I’m quaffing some very excellent 2008 Viking Grand Shiraz. It comes from a vineyard that is biodynamic (even more organic than organic according to its practitioners). The grapes in Viking used to be sold to Penfolds where they were included in the justifiably famous Grange Hermitage. I note that the same vintage Grange is selling for nearly $4,000 a case overseas. I paid $240/case for the Viking. Is the Grange a superior wine? Yes, but not by very much. When you buy your Grange (or equivalent), how do you know that it doesn’t contain any organically grown grapes? Is $4,000 really only a little over $240? Hint: the rapidity of conversion to organic by Australian grape growers has amazed me, though since I know why they are converting, it shouldn’t: higher yields and an increase in quality.
In my fridge is a piece of Italian ham (prosciutto) from Italy, a country in a different continent than Australia. As it happens, this too is organic, though it’s not labelled organic. How do you avoid this problem of food that’s organic, but not labelled as such? Are you psychic? Or do you just avoid high quality food? Note that just because the food you buy is from a different continent doesn’t mean it’s necessarily conventionally grown. I’m not alone in growing organically, but not bothering with organic certification required if you want to label your produce as organic.
Yes, food prices are rising, though I note not as fast as energy prices and they impact all farmers! This has absolutely nothing to do with the move towards more sustainable agriculture that began several decades ago. LISA was and is about reducing costs and improving the farmer’s bottom line. And, once more, LISA does not equate to organic. Examples:
Broccoli growers in the Lockyer Vally, Queensland were experiencing increased resistance to synthetic pesticides by aphids. The solution adopted was to alternate rows of broccoli with rows of rape. The rape wasn’t harvested; it was grown because it was particularly attractive for predators that consumed the aphids. While yield/hectare went down, the cost per kilo to produce the broccoli fell even more, so the farmer’s bottom line improved.
My neighbours are apple growers and during a Christmas party conversation many years ago, one asked me what I’d use to control Light Brown Apple Moth. I told him that I would use Dipel (Monsanto’s brand of Bacillus Thuringiensis var. Berliner). I also told him that it would cost a lot more than malathion, but it was available in bulk from the local rural supplies store. It wasn’t until a couple of years later that I got around to asking my neighbour if he’d tried using Dipel. His face broke into a large grin as he told me that far from being more expensive, because he only needed to apply it far less often than malathion, it worked out far cheaper in use. He also liked that he didn’t have to wear his “space-suit” while applying it.
While you might wish to dictate to farmers what they should, or shouldn’t use, I have only ever told my neighbours what I thought when they requested it. As one of them told me years ago, about a decade after I bought the farm, “We just watched what you were doing and ended up copying you.” His brother came to me several years later and showed me the results of a petiole analysis from one of their orchards. He asked me what fertiliser I’d apply based on the result. I said: “Nothing.” He replied: “That’s what I was going to do.” The yield from that orchard was a record crop. The following year was almost a complete repeat: the second biggest harvest ever. The goal in orcharding is producing fruit, not wood and leaves at the expense of fruit, which is what applying fertiliser, organic or artificial, would have achieved.

Rick said @ur momisugly December 15, 2012 at 2:43 pm

Southern Queensland Australia must be a fertile farming area or they wouldn’t be testing and selling herbicides.
…
If these test plot results are the smoking gun against herbicides for this area in Australia why do farmers continue to purchase these products in this area?
In our neck of the woods, organic farming is not exactly mainstream and I’m guessing that Southern Queensland Australia is no different.

Perhaps you should have read what I wrote above more closely. “As with most research, the questions that arise are interesting. How did they obtain weed-free ground for the control plots? Methyl bromide?” Some method of preplant weed suppression would appear to have been used. If it was methyl bromide, or steam sterilisation, then that would have suppressed yield. In that case, what was being compared was one yield-suppressor versus a different weed-suppressor.
What I was thinking of when I passed the original remark was the conversation that occurred between conventional and organic wheat/sheep farmers at the IFOAM conference in Adelaide in 1980. The conventional growers asked the organic growers “what do you do about smut, rust, yellow-spot?” etc. The organic growers all reported no problems. Note well that this does not mean these diseases were necessarily entirely absent; just that controlling them was economically unviable because they were occurring at such a low level.
When farmers conduct trials on their own properties it’s in the context of their individual whole farm operation. The farmer isn’t just applying herbicide to a crop, they are also applying fertilisers, often including foliar nutrients, organic and inorganic as well as pesticides. Unsurprisingly, they all interact and often in unpredictable ways. At Grove, the agronomists identified thirteen variables affecting the results from apple thinning sprays. I don’t know of a single orchardist who ever even attempted to evaluate their use of thinning sprays on the basis of those thirteen independent variables.
I became aware of the downside of soil sterilisation when there was a trial of specific transplant controls here in the Huon Valley. When you transplant a young tree into existing orchard it will not thrive. The “traditional” method was to sterilise the soil with methyl bromide. The study looked at that versus a commercial compost called OR90 and a commercial pelletised poultry manure product called Dynamic Lifter. I told the agronomist the orange ruffy (a fish) had shown herbicidal properties when used on pasture at a friend’s farm. Indeed, it exhibited similar properties after having been composted with eucalyptus bark, that contains a natural herbicide, Anywho, the first year the methyl bromide and poultry manured trees were neck and neck, both well ahead of the control and OR90. By the third year, the poultry manured trees were way ahead. SE Queensland agronomists replicated the trial a year, or so later.
Yes, you can kill everything in the soil: earthworms, actinomycetes, mycorrhizae, etc, but there’s a cost to this as there is to everything.

In terms of diet and cancer, remember that “there is no safe level” for any Class A Carcinogen, including such things as sunshine and ethyl alcohol. The latter element is present in quite measurable quantities in orange juice. If you give your child a nice glass of OJ every morning, by the end of the year you’ll have given then the rough equivalent of a pint of Guinness Stout.
So not only are you getting your little children drunk, you’re giving them cancer.
Of course my REAL point is that worrying about such things is simply neurotic.
– MJM

Zeke said @ur momisugly December 15, 2012 at 6:35 pm

“While you might wish to dictate to farmers what they should, or shouldn’t use…”
I have communicated precisely the opposite and have repeatedly emphasized individual decisions in matters of diet and medicine on this thread, which is on topic because the study here is about a potential link between diet and cancer.
I am defending because I know it would be disastrous for the USDA to begin to systematically take away food choices and reverse agricultural advancements, and drive up prices by implementing Agenda 21/Sustainable Ag/Rio +20.
I wish more students would learn about Lysenko, Stalin, Mao, and the disastrous effects of government using science to destroy the food supply.

Discussed this with some friends. Their take was that US and European farmers are on the government teat and so likely will reap the consequences; he who pays the piper calls the tune. Australian farmers are not subsidised by government.
Your original claim was that organic and LISA would lead to a dramatic decline in food production. I demurred and pointed to the examples of the world record tomato grower and Sam Jericho having a worthwhile harvest when his neighbours didn’t. You have provided no counterexamples. I do agree that implementing ecoloony policies would be a disaster. The fact that they promote organic/LISA doesn’t mean they understand what organic/LISA actually entail and you conflated the two concepts yourself. I can remember one ecoloony who wrote to me that they favoured biodynamic agriculture because “it’s animal-free”. BD is centred on the use of preparation 500 manufactured by filling cow horns with cow manure and burying them over the winter!
On your latter point I agree. But be aware that it was the overzealous promotion of synthetic pesticides, fertilisers and herbicides led to a backlash among farmers and agronomists that peaked here several decades ago here. Growers didn’t take up the then new methods of LISA/organic/IPM because of government mandates; they did so because they gave improved profitability and other benefits. The researchers at Grove here in the Huon Valley told me in the late 80s they had ceased chemical research back in the 60s in favour of research into biological controls for pests such as the introduction of predator mites and methods of avoiding killing pollinators by selecting appropriate insecticides and alternate row spraying.
I became involved when James Wong developed a new spray regime that substituted agricultural lime for most of the fungicidal sprays then used in the apple orchards. The optimum result was the traditional copper, followed by one (sometimes two) conventional fungicide applications and after that several applications of lime solution. The organic producers merely omitted the conventional fungicide. Or, as in my case, used sodium silicate. Incidentally, the lime spray also eliminated codlin moth as the newly hatched grubs, like the fungal spores, couldn’t tolerate the high pH on the apple surface. Despite your assertion that the organic producers should have been harvesting only half what the conventional orchardists were, I never saw any evidence of a significant difference in yields. As I pointed out early in this thread, the major crop-limiting factor is water.
At that time I was asked to deliver papers to conferences held by the Australian Institute of Agricultural Scientists and Australasian Institute of Plant Physiologists among others. They were well-received The only hostility I experienced came from the ecoloons who claimed that I was “rubbing shoulders with the enemy”. A couple of years ago I was invited to undertake a doctorate in agriculture despite my lacking a relevant degree. I demurred because I find my more recent research into the history and philosophy of science more fascinating.
The new improvements to orchard practise led to pack out rates of between 90 and 95% compared to 60% of the previous decade. Unfortunately, world markets have changed since then and this is the first year that Tasmania (The Apple Isle) hasn’t exported any apples overseas. The largest orchardist went into receivership a couple of years ago and many have had to leave the industry. The organic growers who rely on local markets continue to increase their market share and remain profitable. A similar story applies on the North West Coast where the major vegetable processor relocated to New Zealand. The rubbing of hands among the NZ growers didn’t last long as the vegetables being processed are imported from China. So it goes…