Seen and Noted

Every once in a while you hear about a pairing that, on the face of it, is so unlikely or so bizarre as to be completely unbelievable. However, the impossible appeared last week — and almost as quickly disappeared. According to the GardenRant blog, the National Wildlife Federation announced that they were partnering with Scotts, the TurfBuilder people. That statement alone was enough to make a gardener’s head spin. But that wasn’t all that was rotten in Denmark.

Scotts is owned by the Monsanto Corporation. Now for those who aren’t aware, Monsanto is the company responsible for not only Round Up weed killer, but also Round Up Ready crops. That might ring a bell, because one of their Round Up Ready crops caused an innocent Canadian farmer to lose everything he owned. Some of their GMO (genetically modified organism) crop, through wind pollination, wound up in his fields and Monsanto sued him for patent infringement. Yes, actually! And those crops end up being what the environmentally aware like to refer to as Frankenfood.

Long story short, the idea of one of the nation’s leading environmental protection groups joining forces with a company like Monsanto leaves one gaping in astonishment.

Fortunately, the garden blogosphere lit up like a Roman candle when the news came out, and shortly thereafter, the NWF announced that it had thought better of the whole thing and backed out of the deal. Kudos for the decision, but I’d still think twice before donating to NWF again ...