Glyphosate Wine
Food Chain Radio Show #1141
Michael Olson, Author & Urban Farming Agriculturalist
California’s 100% Weedkiller Wine
Guest: Zen Honeycutt / Executive Director & Founder / Moms Across America
Why is weedkiller in 100% of California wine?
If you were to look here, you would see a photo of yours truly working the weeds between young Cabernet vines in the Rogue River Valley of Southern Oregon.
Michael Olson Food Chain Radio – California’s Weedkiller Wine – Why is Glyphosate in 100% of California’s wine?
The fancy French cultivator attached to the Kubota was designed to slide beneath the soil surface and separate weeds from their roots, then automatically retract at each vine.
Of course, nothing attached to a tractor is ever automatic for very long, and so yours truly soon became the retractor for each vine.
We were growing organic grapes, and so were willing to fight the weeds in such a manner.
Most everyone thought we were crazy. “Spray the damn weeds and be done with it!” they advised. (Those Southern Oregonians were very practical people. What took us a week, took them a day!)
Seems like that practicality has won out most everywhere. In fact, about two million tons of the weedkiller glyphosate, trade name “Roundup”, have been sprayed on America’s croplands.
And so the weedkiller glyphosate is now found in just about everything, including water, air, food, blood and mothers milk.
And speaking of mothers, 100% of the California wines tested for Mom’s Across America contained the weedkiller glyphosate, including organic biodynamic wine from vines that were never, ever, sprayed with herbicides or pesticides.
And so we ask…
Leave a comment below: Do you think it possible to find a wine that does not contain weedkiller glyphosate?
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I am looking for wine that does not contain glyphosates. Do you have any recommendations?
Great, Roundup wine. What’s next, Roundup water?
Hi Michael,
Our organization representing 1,000 California wineries just learned of your program airing tomorrow with Zen Honeycutt. The basis for this conversation is a report from 2016 on results of testing of 10 wines that the Moms Across America group acknowledged was not a scientific study.
We would appreciate if you would share our brief comment below and refer your listeners to our webpage at http://www.wineinstitute.org/the-facts for additional information in the interest of fairness.
Wine Institute Statement on Glyphosate:
According to Carl Winter, Professor of Food Toxicology at the University of California at Davis, wine as a source of glyphosate should not be of concern to consumers. “An adult would have to drink 2,500 glasses of wine a day containing the highest glyphosate level measured every day for 70 years just to reach the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s preliminary level of health concern.” The group publicizing this story has acknowledged its report is not a scientific study. It is based on the testing of 10 wines and the results lack validity and context.
Best,
Nancy
Nancy Light
Vice President, Communications
Wine Institute