Fwd: Animals Avoid GM Food, for Good Reasons

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Sat, 13 Dec 2003 13:50:14 GMT

 

Animals Avoid GM Food, for Good Reasons

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ISIS Press Release 13/12/03

Animals Avoid GM Food, for Good Reasons

***********************************

Experimental and anecdotal evidence shows that animals seek to avoid GM food and

do not thrive if forced to consume such food. Dr Eva Novotny (eva)

reports.

In the course of preparing a submission to the public hearing on a genetically

modified (GM) maize that the UK government wanted to put on the National Seed

Register, I had the opportunity to review evidence on how animals respond to GM

food. The evidence makes interesting reading.

 

Chardon LL experiments

*******************

Chardon LL is a GM maize engineered for tolerance to the herbicide glufosinate.

The whole plant is intended as cattle-feed, but no experiments on whether this

is safe or suitable has been carried out.

Approval of the application of Aventis for commercial growing of this maize in

the UK was granted on the basis of two animal-feeding experiments, one on

feeding kernels to chickens and the other on feeding the isolated GM protein to

rats. In both experiments, the investigators concluded that the tested animals

consumed food and gained weight normally.

However, reanalysis of the data led to a different conclusion.

The first experiment fed Chardon LL maize kernels to 280 young broiler chickens

over 42 days, purportedly to detect differences in nutrient quality of corn

samples. All the chickens were allowed to eat at will.

The official report said: “Results of live bird traits … show that source of

corn … had no effect on body weight, feed intake, … or percent mortality over

the experimental period …” and “Glufosinate tolerant corn from the U.S.A. is

comparable in feeding value, for 0-42 day broilers, relative to the commercially

available corn hybrid. Therefore, the nutritive value of glufosinate tolerant

corn hybrid is equivalent to a commercially available corn hybrid.” The

mortality rate was judged to be normal.

Closer examination of the data shows up many unexplained anomalies.

Although chickens on the GM diet have, on average, weights only 1% below the

average weight in the control group, the error bars are much wider for chickens

fed GM maize; and they grow progressively wider as the experiment progresses.

During the first phase of the experiment (days 0-18), the test group eating GM

maize consumed 9 gm more than the control group; during the second phase (18-32

days), consumption had dropped to 7 gm less; and in the final phase (days 32-42)

consumption by the test group had fallen to 63 gm less than that of the control

group. Again, the error bars are much greater for the test group and increase

with time.

Average body weights and feed intakes of the chickens do not vary significantly,

as concluded in the study. Nevertheless, the much larger error bars for both

these quantities give concern that the weight gains and the feeding patterns

were erratic in the treated group, indicating that at least some of the chickens

were not thriving on the glufosinate-resistant maize.

Information on deaths during the study is given only in the form of mortality:

7.14 ± 5.47 % for chickens eating the glufosinate-resistant maize and 3.57 ±

4.29 % for those fed commercial hybrid corn. Although the former values are

twice those of the latter, the study points out that values of 5 to 8 % in male

broilers are normal at that laboratory.

Nevertheless, it may be significant that the mortality rate was twice as high

among the chickens eating the GM maize as compared with those fed commercial

non-GM hybrid maize.

Another experiment involved feeding PAT-protein to rats. This study on rats,

like that on chickens, has little relevance to cattle, as the digestive systems

of these animals are very different. Furthermore, it was not the Chardon LL

maize itself, but the isolated PAT-protein it contains that was tested; and the

effects of feeding the isolated protein must be expected to differ from the

effects of feeding the whole maize.

Also, the very short time during which the experiment was pursued (14 days)

gives no indication of possible long-term effects of feeding over a lifetime,

especially when the maize is to be fed to a very different animal species. Only

five male rats and five female rats were used in each of the four groups, and

the individual rats had substantial differences in weight even at the start of

the experiment.

Nonetheless, the studies claimed, “Average mean food consumption over treatment

was in the same range for treated groups and controls”, “Occasionally recorded

differences between controls and treated groups were generally small, showed no

dose-relationship or consistent trend…” and “Mean body weights were similar for

treated groups and controls. There were no differences which could be attributed

to treatment with the test article.”

Although the purpose of the study was to test for toxicity, the data provide

evidence that the animals may not be thriving on a diet including the

PAT-protein. The evidence for this suggestion comes from data on body weights

and food consumption.

The 40 young, rapidly growing rats were divided into two control groups and two

test groups, each containing 5 males and 5 females. All animals were allowed to

eat at will.

Tables provided, separately for males and females, the average weight of each of

the four groups as measured on several days of the experiment. For males eating

a small amount of PAT-protein, weights remained nearly the same as for one of

the control groups; while for those eating the high dose of PAT-protein, weights

fell progressively below those of all other groups, even though these rats were

marginally the heaviest group at the beginning of the experiment. Females in

both groups consuming PAT-protein had weights falling gradually below those of

the two control groups, although the females fed the high dose were the heaviest

group at the beginning. For both males and females consuming high-doses of

PAT-protein, weight gain per day, averaged over the duration of the experiment,

was distinctly lower than for either control group.

During the latter half of the experiment, data for individual animals show that

2 males and 2 females on the low-PAT-protein diet were rapidly falling behind in

weight as compared with other rats in the same group and in both of the two

control groups. Of the rats on the high-PAT-protein diet, 3 males and one female

were falling behind in weight during the latter half of the experiment.

While these data are not conclusive because too few animals were studied over

too short a time, the low rates of weight-gain in several of the animals eating

PAT-protein suggest that some individuals were not thriving on the diets that

included PAT protein.

The data also showed unusual patterns in the food intake, averaged over the

group, of animals consuming the high dose of PAT-protein, suggesting that the

diet did not suit the rats. In the middle of the experiment, both males and

females on this diet had an increase in food intake followed by a dip, unlike

the other groups; then, over the last five days, their food consumption showed a

sharp rise, again unlike other groups.

 

Stray cattle did not eat GM maize

**************************

The following press release -‘Damage To Gm Maize National List Trial Site’ - was

issued by the then Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food on November 10,

2000:

“The NIAB (National Institute of Agricultural Biotechnology) have notified MAFF

of damage to a national list trial of GM forage maize taking place in Somerset.

The damage was caused by cattle straying onto the site in October. There is no

evidence that the cattle ate any of the maize.

“Sheridan - the maize in question - has full approval under European GM

legislation to be marketed for both animal and human food use. The undamaged

maize at the site has since been harvested.”

Sheridan is a GM forage maize that contains the same genetic construct

(conferring herbicide tolerance) as Chardon LL. It is interesting to note that

the cattle did not wish to eat any of the maize.

 

‘When the Corn Hits the Fan’

**********************

American journalist Steven Sprinkel wrote an article with the above title in an

ACRES, USA Special Report dated 19 September, 1999 (reproduced on the Natural

Law Party Wessex website, http://www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex/ ), which

contains the following excerpt.

“After four months of retrieving anecdotes from Kansas to Wisconsin, I think its

high time to sample the producer community more thoroughly to see how many

stories are out there. About the hogs that wouldn’t eat the ration when the GMO

crops were included. About the farmer who said “Well, if you want your cattle to

go off their feed, just switch them out to a GMO silage.” About the farmer who

said that his cattle broke through an old fence and ate down the non-GMO hybrids

but wouldn’t touch the Round-up ready corn, and as a matter of fact “They had to

walk through the GMOs to get to the Pioneer 3477 on the other side.” About the

cattleman who saw the weight-gain of his cattle fall off when he switched over

to GMO sources. About the organic farmer with a terrible deer problem on his

soybeans, and when he drives out at night there are forty of them mowing down

his tofu beans while across the road there isn’t one doe eating on the Round-up

Readies. About the raccoons romping by the

dozen in the organic corn, while down the road there isn’t one ear that’s been

touched in the Bt fields. Even the mice will move on down the line if given an

alternative to these “crops”. What is it that they know instinctively that most

of us ignore?”

 

Other incidents of cattle refusing to eat Bt maize

************************************

Various scientists working actively with the farming community in the United

States have reported difficulties feeding GM maize to cattle. In April 2000, one

of them (who has asked to remain anonymous) sent the following information:

“There have been dozens of such reports over the last two years. Generally, the

reports are concerned with Bt maize. Many farmers feed maize to their cattle

just as it grows, without mixing in other feedstuffs. Typical reports are that

the farmer buys a new shipment of maize, which his cattle either refuse to eat

or eat with reduced consumption. Upon making enquiries, he discovers that the

maize is a genetically modified variety. When he replaces it with a non-modified

maize, the cattle start eating again.”

 

Scientific evidence for animal preferences

*******************************

Although it may be difficult to credit animals with the ability to distinguish

between GM and non-GM feed, this anecdotal evidence is supported by scientific

evidence that they can indeed distinguish between organically- and

non-organically-produced feed; moreover, they have a definite preference for the

former (see “Do animals like good food?” this issue).

 

Conclusion

*********

Re-analysis of experiments on chickens and on rats fed Chardon LL GM maize

suggest that, contrary to the official conclusions, at least some individual

animals do not gain weight as rapidly as they should when given a diet including

GM feed. Furthermore, there appear to be irregularities in the feeding habits of

at least some animals given GM feed. In the experiment on chickens, mortality

was twice as high among those fed the GM maize as among those fed non-GM maize.

Existing scientific evidence indicates that farm animals prefer organically

produced over conventionally produced feed; while a substantial amount of

anecdotal evidence on both domestic and wild animals indicates that, given a

choice, they will avoid GM feed and, if forced to eat GM feed, they do not

thrive.

(This is an edited version of Report for the Chardon LL Hearing: Non-suitability

of genetically engineered feed for animals, by Eva Novotny, Scientists for

Global Responsibility, May 2002.)

 

 

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