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-Short Attention Span Theater-
lets hope this is em joke
2005-11-17
Hawke's Bay grape grower Chris Howell wonders how he's going to handle pruning this season after learning it could be painful for his vines. The Tauranga-based Society for the Protection of Organism Feelings has written to Mr Howell and other Hawke's Bay growers calling for a ban on field trials, a newspaper reported. Spokesman Timothy Pickering said an agri-chemical company was carrying out field trials of its products on live crops, fungi and insects in New Zealand.

"We'll be taking action, and organising protests, to bring to the attention of horticulturists that plants, fungi and insects do in fact have feelings, and suggesting measures to increase feelings of peace, love and harmony within the fields and paddocks of New Zealand," he said.

The Hawke's Bay Grape Growers Association discussed the matter at a committee meeting earlier this year, and recently published a letter from the society in its newsletter, Vitis Informus. In his letter, Mr Pickering said recent research by overseas biologists had found evidence that plants sensed and reacted to the presence of leaf-chomping grubs.

"Their response was to emit an odour similar to lavender, thereby alerting other plants to the presence of a predator," he said.

"This process also served to attract wasps, which were drawn by the odour to the plant where they either devoured the grub or injected it with eggs that later killed it."

He claimed other experiments had shown electrical resistance changes in a plant when a researcher thought about burning leaves on the plant. The society was committed to protecting the rights of plants and insects so they wouldn't be exposed to any negative feelings - including fear. But Mr Howell said grapegrowers were bemused and wondered whether the letter was a university prank.

Not that he's ignoring his own vines' very definite feelings.

"They are sensitive wee souls," he said. "They like being looked after and pampered, which is what we do. They don't like it too cold or too hot."

Mr Howell, the chairman of the Grape Growers Association, said it had not responded to the society, which gave just a box number as its address. But he and other members had notices that its initials made up the word "spoof".
Posted by:muck4doo

#10  Should be "Society Protective of Organism Feelings". Makes a better acronym.
Posted by: Slineting Jutch7676   2005-11-17 23:06  

#9  Somehow I don't think those mopes at the Society for the Protection of Organism Feelings believe enough to become breatharians.....wimps!
Posted by: Desert Blondie   2005-11-17 21:58  

#8  Hey, you don't have to like kill animals and plants and stuff! You can buy everything at the grocery store!

Sheesh, you Blood and Sap Thristy Fascist Neocon IllumiNazi BusHitler Murderers are sooooo evil! Halliburton! Oil! Roviavellians!
Posted by: .Gaia n Truth Lover n Stuff   2005-11-17 16:35  

#7  You specieist, you. Just like Hitler! Only worse.
Posted by: Seafarious   2005-11-17 16:20  

#6  Things are going to get a whole lot better when vegans, Janeists and PETA as a whole finally realize that the miracle of life is that it relies utterly upon death.

If it weren't so bone-chilling, a grafitti I saw recently would have been absolutely hilarious. Scrawled upon a wall was:

Equal Rights For Animals

So, pesticide and warfarin manufacturers get their own little Nuremburg trials?

If human beings are going to live, something's got to die. The sooner this simple fact is recognized the better off all of us are going to be. Humane treatment of animals is a noble aim. Asserting that plants and animals must be accorded the same sympathies as our fellow humans is plainly ridiculous.
Posted by: Zenster   2005-11-17 16:14  

#5  And who will speak for the air molecules, as we unfeelingly pull them away from family and friends in selfish respiration? Have we no souls?
Posted by: Seafarious   2005-11-17 16:01  

#4  ok. first animals. now plants. soon, we'll learn that dirt has feelings.
Posted by: PlanetDan   2005-11-17 15:51  

#3  Um, how about you go first, k?
Posted by: .com   2005-11-17 15:42  

#2  So whatcha gonna eat? Happy thoughts? Lol.
Posted by: .com   2005-11-17 15:40  

#1  I hate lima beans!

/I have feelings too Mucky
Posted by: Red Dog   2005-11-17 15:34  

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