With full credits to Dr. Huber and Jerry Carlson

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Jerry Carlson's Notes from Dr. Don Huber presentation Dec. 16, 2009

High yield hybrids:  More N must be taken up after tasseling. Also, 
high yield corn can use ammonium better, as opposed to nitrate 
nitrogen.  75% ammonium, 25% nitrate N.

NServe takes  nitrous ammonius out of the rhizosphere. Other 
organisms fill the void about 9 days.

Glyphosate takes entire groups of organisms out of the soil.  
Biological buffering becomes very difficult when you have a compound 
that persists in the soil for years.

About 80% of our nitrogen losses are conversion to nitrous oxide, and 
volatilization.  Not leaching, which occurs only in sandy soils.

A lot of our ag chemicals are chelators.  Tordon chelates copper.  
Glyphosate is a powerful chelator for many ions.

There’s ten tons of living material in an acre of soil.  It’s a 
living entity and the quality of its life impacts mineralization of 
nutrients.

Manganese availability depends on biological activity; it can only 
use Mn2+ and not Mn4+   Most bio availability occurs between 5.2 and 
7.8 pH.
Take-all in wheat is a manganese converter. Amplify the take-all 
fungus with carbon and energy, it amplifies its growth.

Filaments of Take-all coat themselves with Manganese Oxide, MN04.   
Take-all ties up manganese and can impact the following crop.

Improved nutrition reduces disease.  Manure on wheat stimulates 
resistant to rhizoctonia.
Copper deficiency:  Ergot on wheat, produces LSD.

Ergot sclerotia -- closes the capillaries.

Closest I’ve seen in my 55 years to a prolonged recovery period from 
the impact of glyphosate.

Inserting the RR gene in plant reduces Mn uptake efficiency. It adds 
a stress on the plant’s physiology. Another system is running in the 
plant. If you have a good mineral soil with lots of buffering, the 
loss of efficiency may not hurt yield much.  But in a MN-deficient 
soil, yield could suffer and really bomb out.  This is why many of 
the soybean varieties are off the market.

In soils that 15 years ago we were concerned about manganese 
toxicity, we’re not seeding manganese deficiency because we’ve 
changed the soil microflora so much with glyphosate applications.

Iron, manganese available to plants only in reduced form (H).

Sulfur only available in oxidized form.

Gypsum gives you a good source of soluble CA plus soluble Sulfur.

Converting nitrate nitrogen into amine form, amino acids, can take 
16% of the energy (sugars) built by the plant. This is why high-
yielding corn needs a 75% ammonium form of N, and 25% nitrate form.

Fusarium wilt in melons and fruit -- go for Nitrate form and calcium.

nitrapyrin = N-Serv

Recognizing nutrient disease interactions with Glyphosate

Canadian: I’ve seen all those symptoms, just never associated them 
with glyphosate.
Going to glyph, we changed tillage and crop sequence too.

Learn to watch for the symptoms; there’s a limited way the plant can 
express itself.

Single most important indicator of head blight is use of glyphosate 
in the past three years.

Glyphosate was patented as a metal chelator.  Monsanto patented as a 
herbicide.  Needs ammonium sulfate in the tank to tie up  metals and 
minerals.  Binds minerals -- Ca, Cu, Fe, Mg, Mn, Zn.

EDTA is a chelator of 13.

Glyphosate penetrates readily, moves throughout the plant, chelates 
with minerals and it’s not available for the plant from then on.

Micronutrients tied up won’t be available for any future growth.
About a fourth of the glyphosate is exuded from the root system.

Once the initial flashing is over,

There is 1,000 times more glyphosate in the vascular system than 
there is unbound minerals.  There’s an abundant supply of glyphosate 
to chelate all minerals in the plant for about two weeks.

There’s an 80% reduction in Mn uptake.

Translocation of Fe, MN, Zn from root to shoot is reduced by more 
than 80%.  Once it’s chelated it doesn’t move.

Chelating means bonding.  EDTA turns loose of minerals eventually, 
glyphosate does not.

Liberty Link has degradation within a two-day period.

All of the degredation products of glyphosate are toxic to the plant, 
even the RR resistant plant.

100% of the kill of plants with glyphosate is to open a secondary 
pathway for microbial organisms.

Chelation of micronutrients -- accentuates drought stress. Three-
fourths of the gly moves to shoot, repproductive and roots.

About a fourth of the gly moves into the soil via living roots.

We don’t know of any organism that uses gly as a nutrient source.

It sits there and accumulates for several years.  It’s toxic to N-
fixing microbes, Mycorrhizae, Earthworms, PGR organisms, Mycorrhizae, 
Bacterial shikimate pathway.

We are starting to see glyphosate in grain, such as wheat planted 
after glyphosate crops.

In Humans, we need a lot of micronutrients too.

Mandated phosmet insecticides chelated copper in cattle in England, 
and there was an outbreak of BSE.

There may be some organism found to break it down, but haven’t heard 
about it.

Glyphosate is an amino acid; it looked like it would biodegrade. 
However, the French forced Monsanto to take “biodegradable” off the 
label because they couldn’t demonstrate it.

USDA shows mineral content of conventional and GMO grain is lower 
than organic.

Bob Kremer, University of Missouri,  analyzes gly in the soil. Lab in 
Pennsylvania tests for metabolic degredation products.

The compound hangs around a long time, both in the plant and in the 
soil.

In the soil, desorbed by phosphorus.

Directly toxic to N-fixers
Mycorrhizae
Earthworms
PGPR organisms.
When you put glyphosate out, you kill them.
All organisms with shikimate pathway are inhibited.

Richard Dick at Ohio State -- stimulation of fungus can immobilize up 
to 150 lbs. of potassium.

If the politics win with the 15-year glyphosate review, we’ll see a 
continuing degradation of our productive base.   This is already 
evident in the Pacific Northwest, where it’s hard to get a decent crop.

China has moved into RR cotton, they’re struggling.

We’ll have to import more food unless we reverse course on GMO/
glyphosate.

When you’re in the hole and keep digging, it doesn’t do much good.

We should use it a lot more judiciously.

RR sugarbeets have very little resistance to rotting in the pile. 
They last two weeks.  But being judicious would help; you don’t need 
a gallon of glyphosate on sugarbeets.

Glyphosate tolerant weeds are finding other pathways, not just the 
manganese which is an enzyme inhibitor.

We have aphid invasions because the amino acid is more appealing to 
aphids, stimulating the aphid population.

Alfalfa -- 20-ft. taproot.  Could be translocating glyphosate into 
the water table.

We’ve had a 1500-fold increase in herbicide use, primarily because of 
glyphosate’s advertising as environmentally friendly.

We’ve ignored the challenge. Now we’re approaching the consequences.  
I have a tremendous confidence in using the abilities to use the 
knowledge the Lord has given us.

Bottom line is that glyphosate stimulates fusarium, nutrient 
oxidizers, and soilborne pathogens.

Texas -- corn fails after glyphosate cotton .   Shikimate test out 
the top.  Lots of 100% failures. Across the road, Non-gmo corn doing 
great. How many insurance claims will the federal insurance program 
allow on this basis?

Have 50 years of failure on biological control of crop diseases on 
regular soils.

My only successes were in building desert soils with biological 
buffering.

Davies spent his whole career into trying to reduce pathogens in 
soils with biological organisms.

Within six hours, you have colonization with pythium. In just six hours.

Whole groups of organisms disappear in a glyphosate environment.

Glyphosate reduces lignin content of soybeans.  Also reduces amino 
acid content of soybeans.

Reduces water efficiency. Takes twice as much water to produce a 
pound of dry matter.

Phil Jones, 8200 paired trials,   presence of RR gene imposes a yield 
drag.  There’s another genetic system for the plant to support.  So 
we have two negative impacts: soil impact plus gene impact.

How would I get rid of it?  Will the RR gene transfer to unintended 
crops and weeds?  That was the basis for the alfalfa injunction... in 
five years, all alfalfa would be RR. Brazil is looking for ways to 
help farmers pull back from RR genetics in corn and beans.

Desorption of glyphosate with phosphate:  Re-releases the compounds 
in glyphosate and has a greater chelation effect.

Sudden Death Syndrome in soybeans is definitely related to the rise 
of fusarium in RR soybeans.

Barney Gordon, Kansas.  Gene present reduced yield effectivness. Took 
additional manganese to offset the presence of the gene.

Jeff Neal, journalist in England... had written story about myth of 
increasing yield.

Tissue tests may show adequate Mn, Zn, but doesn’t reveal if it’s 
chelated with glyposate in the plant and therefore ineffective for 
plant health.

Mineral reduction in RR crops:

RR treated beans 45% lower in Mn, 26% lower in Ca.

Dan Skow, veterinarian with International Ag Labs in Fairmont, MN, 
says they’re adding more manganese to dairy rations because of the 
deficiency in soy protein.

Vet:  Brazilian corn tests in 2005 were much lower in fusarium molds; 
if Brazil has lower mold counts than the U.S. over time, where should 
the Japanese buy?

Soil organisms kill the weed, not the glyphosate itself. That’s what 
happens when you shut down the shikimate pathway. In effect, 
glyphosate is our 24th worst disease.

Fusarium
Phytophtora
Pythium.

Diseases increased by Glyphosate.

Many of those which were controlled in the past are coming back.

And many of the wilts and other fungi are losing host specificity, 
and are impacting more crop species as well as becoming more virilent.

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Remediation
Wait 8 days before spraying manganese to remediate the lack of 
manganese.  What’s happening is that  glyphosate is being released 
and ties up applied manganese.

Manganese carbonate as a treatment to remediate manganese tied up.

When you have an iron defificency in the soil, you have a manganese 
deficiency.

(My side note: In high iron soils of the southeast, maybe there’s 
abundant Mn and little yield drag. .. perhaps that’s involved in high 
yield response to SoySoap in the Southeast while we see muted 
response here)

Tree trunk is a highly absorptive area for glyphosate.