(Continued from Page A 10) (the farming side) is made up of the hard-working, responsible conservationists who grow our food. (Higher crop yields have saved IS million square miles of wildlands from being plowed for crops.) Let’s further suppose, for the sake of argument, that the other side (let’s call them eco zealots, just to pull a label out of thin air) are certified, off-the wall extremists. If you, as a regulator, keep splitting the difference in a debate between responsible pes ticide users and shouting ban them-all demonstrators, you will gradually veer toward banning everything. You will eventually deprive your farmers of the key Walk-In • Catalog • Web Sales - www.farmerboyag.com Call or email us today for a FREE catalog. TOLL FREE 1-800-845-3374 • 717-866-7565 Put ' The Purafire heater provides a consistent, cleanburning and fuel efficient source of warmth for all types of poultry and swine houses Choose from two models, the CBOM variable output (40.000-80,000 BTUH) and the C 225 (225,000 BTUH) Each is LP or natural gas compatible and can be mounted inside or outside your confinement house Electronic ignition BASKET FANS With Cord and Ceiling Mounting Brackets. - 1/3 Hp, 24”, 1/2 Hp, 24” & 1/2 Hp, 36” Litter Scale An entire litter can be placed in the portable Way Pig at one time. The new oversize scale gives a clear readout of the weight in pounds and Kilograms. The compact design allows it to glide easily through aisles and around tight corners. /- —^ inputs needed to protect your food against bugs, bacteria, and weeds. That will ultimately force you to either starve millions of people, or plow down millions of acres of wildlands for low-yield crops. Soil erosion has been the Achilles heel of civilization for the 10,000 years since we learned to farm. (Before that, our weakness was a tendency to kill all the game in the area and then start a war over hunting rights with the tribe next door.) In the last 25 years, we solved the erosion problem with a system called conservation til lage. Conservation tillage uses crop residue to protect the soil structure and cuts soil erosion HEATERS QUALITY PRODUCTS AT WHOLESALE PRICES Direct Drive Quantity Pricing Available RMER BOY AG Supply! OLESALE AGRICULTURAL SUPPLIES! (<H&) FEED BINS We assemble,deliver and set up bins on your farm * Weather tight die-formed roof ‘Stronger engineered sidewalls ‘Ground controlled fill caps ‘Galvanized rollformed legs ‘Engineered leg braced systems ‘Fast flowing hopper bottom With CORE AUGERS and I 8& Flex-flo™ AUGER SYSTEM in 2 1/4” dia. to 5” dia. STAINLESS STEEL HOG FEEDERS From Nursery to Finishing Feeders. Economically priced r EXPERIENCED & KNOWLEDGEABLE ' L SALES STAFF High Feed Costs Getting Ton Down? Save $$ With These HIGH EFFICIENCY HOG DINERS A feed-down design permits feed to be dropped to the feed pan with easy access for the animals, eliminating feed from being dragged out and wasted. * *2* * k Available in a @ | ..v iIUCI’O lassuou.. .gi you a system that wiHJast many years by up to 90 percent. Instead of burying weed seeds with the moldboard plowing that used to invite wind and water erosion, it uses herbicides to control weeds. The U.S. Society for Soil and Water Conservation noted that conservation tillage is a key part of “the most sustainable farm ing in human history.” Atrazine is the most flexible and cost-effective herbicide for conservation tillage. It’s been used for decades, in at least 80 countries, on all sorts of terrain and circumstances, with no dis covered health or environmental side effects. The eco-zealots target atra zine because traces of it are often occasionally found in our groundwater. They make the usual cancer allegation. But the EPA itself recently reclassified atrazine as “not likely to be car cinogenic to humans.” This echoes an earlier decision by the International Agency for Re search on Cancer, which says atrazine cannot be classified as a Whichever the Producer Prefers carcinogen. That essentially means that atrazine is safer than the chlorine we use to purify our drinking water. Chlorine actu ally does cause tumors in rats at high doses. But it also kills the bacteria that would otherwise kill us. Paracelsus 500 years ago laid down the basic rule of toxicol ogy: “The dose makes the poison.” Almost everything is dangerous at high levels, includ ing table salt. Almost nothing is dangerous at low levels. The U.S. permits only a tiny amount of atrazine in drinking water: 3 parts per billion (ppb) (That’s like three aspirin tablets in an Olympic-sized swimming pool.) Great Britain allows 15 ppb. Australia has set the limit at 20 ppb. The French Minister of Agriculture has banned it but that’s a political gesture. He offers no evidence that atrazine is not safe. The EPA has come up with a couple of pretty far-fetched ac- cusations in its latest round of atrazine musings: A. Atrazine may disrupt the homing instincts of salmon. (Sci- See Lancaster Farming Cow Cam Visit our Website at www.lancasterfarming.com Can You Afford To waste Hay? STEIN-WAY Try the BALE BOSS Hay Saver Barn Equipment ❖ Free Stalls v Sand Traps ' 1 •t* Sell-locks v Waterers * Gates ❖ Bale Boss Hay Savers Call: Joe Speicher 17*> North Imler Valley Rd linler. PA 166 SS (814) 276-3304 1-888-605-2422 Quality Barn Equipment at Economical Prices Delta, PA B’x4B’ Installation Lapp’s Curtain System • Save up to 30% on fuel/energy costs • Bams are warmer in winter, cooler in summer • 4 or 6 ply insulated, with white vinyl outer layer. Non-insulated, single layer also available • Average payback - TWO YEARS! • We also repair other brand curtains LAPP’S Lancaster Farming, Saturday, December 15,2001 -All ence doesn’t give much credit for “may,” and salmon are ex posed to virtually no atrazine.) B. “Continued atrazine use is likely to pose a risk to health and integrity of some aquatic communities.” (A single study claimed atrazine would kill the underwater weeds on which some marine creatures feed; but an independent scientific panel concluded “The inferred effects . . . cannot be confirmed from the published data, and were discounted in subsequent publi cations by the same research ers.”) All of this sounds like a pretty thin basis for banning restricting one of our most important con servation tools. Especially since the same eco-zealots who want to ban atrazine are defending a widely-used organic pesticide pyrethrum which an EPA sci ence panel has classified as “a likely human carcinogen.” Dennis Avery Senior Fellow Director Center for Global Food Issues Hudson Institute 5935 OLD PHILADELPHIA PIKE, GAP, PA 17527 PHONE: 717-442-8134 • FAX 717-442-3112 SALES & SERVICE fT. INC. equip;
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers