Fedco Seeds, a fantastic cooperative seed company from Maine that specializes in fresh market varieties for the Northeast, has reported GMO contamination in two of their sweet corn lots. The 2007 Feco catalog identifies varieties Tuxedo and Lancelot (both are hybrid varieties) as testing positive in random sampling.
It’s tough to find information on their web site on this, but on page seven of their catalog they do a nice job of describing the situation. You can go HERE for a PDF of the Fedco catalog and scroll down to page seven.
Fedco has taken the Safe Seed Pledge, tests their varieties for contamination , and is run by some of the best seed people in the business. CR Lawn is a seed wizard and works with great staff like Roberta Bailey and Nikos Kavanya. Thanks for all your work guys.
Also, an update from Fedco on the Seminis-Monsanto issue. Two years ago when I reported on Monsanto’s buyout of Seminis, many seed companies were in a bit of a dilemma. Seminis has some great varieties that their customers have grown to love, but many of their customers also weren’t fond of Monsanto. Fedco decided to work diligently to replace their Seminis varieties with equivalent genetics. CR Lawn writes of the progress towards replacement :
So How Are We Doing? Two years ago when Monsanto bought out Seminis, we decided to phase out our Seminis line. ..At the time of our decision, Seminis was our biggest supplier, accounting for 70 varieties and more than 11% of our gross sales. We set about, through our research and trials, to replace the Seminis selections with the best varieties we could find. In two years we have fulfilled exactly half our quest. For 9 of the varieties we have found alternate sources and for 26 more we have found comparable or superior replacements. We pledge to persevere. Some niches will be easier and quicker to fill than others.
