Losey (and colleagues) data??

[Ron Gatrelle]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Martha Rosett Lutz" <lutzrun at AVALON.NET>
Subject: Losey (and colleagues) data??


SNIP
> Personally, I can neither accept nor reject the conclusions published by
> Losey et al., without seeing more information.  I also cannot accept a
> blanket statement that their findings are transferable to field
conditions;
> I have lived in Iowa since 1987, spend time most summers hunting for
> Monarch eggs and larvae to raise, and have never yet seen a milkweed
plant
> whose leaves were dusted with corn pollen.  For one thing, there is this
> funny ritual of de-tasseling that goes on every summer . . . oak pollen
we
> have in buckets-full, but not a lot of corn pollen wandering around the
> landscape.  The ditches near cornfields are, however, often clear-cut,
with
> nothing much above four to six inches in height growing there.  Otherwise
> the ditches mostly contain Pastinaca sativa.  Things may be different in
snip

Martha,  Don't you think it is safe to say that a great many people outside
the Corn Belt do not know about de-tasseling.   The only reason I know
about it is because I grew up in Iowa and my grandparents had a very large
farm.  Bt is an "issue" and gets the attention.  But as you pointed out,
the mowing and herbicide spraying in the ditches would seem to be a much
much more relative issue to Monarchs.  When I was a kid virtually all the
rural roads more miles around my grandparents farms were gravel. Today they
are mostly black-top.  Back then (50's) the ditches were largely weedy and
supported large and diverse butterfly populations.

> Just my $0.02 worth, and certainly open to critique from people who have
> more information or more up-to-date information!
>
> In Stride,
> Martha Rosett Lutz
> a.k.a. the old lady sprinter in Iowa
>

Worth a lot more than 02.
Ron Gatrelle
(72 degrees in Charleston, SC
with leps still flying)


 
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