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Today I visited the ranch of Jerry Abel in Elgin, Texas, site of the mysterious death of 15 cattle after exposure to cyanide gas spontaneously produced by hybridized Bermuda – Tifton-85 forage grasses. This is a story with nationwide interest, having also been covered by CBS News and others (http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57459357/gm-grass-linked-to-texas…).
Along with Darrin McBreen from InfoWars.com, who was also present at the farm today, we spoke with Jerry and his wife about the bizarre events that have unfolded there.
There are some mysterious facts surrounding this incident, including the sudden disappearance of a document by Dr. Larry Redmon, entitled, “Potential Toxicity Issues with Tifton 85 Bermuda grass.” Earlier this morning, that document was suddenly pulled from the Hays County Agriculture & Natural Resources web page. It originally appeared here: http://haysagriculture.blogspot.com/2012/06/potential-toxicity-issues…
As of this writing, that page now reads, “Sorry, the page you were looking for in this blog does not exist.”
InfoWars researchers, however, were able to acquire this report from another source, and they provided it to NaturalNews. It states:
Recently, 15 head of Corriente roping calves died as a result of prussic acid poisoning in Bastrop cattle in a clean field of Tifton 85 bermudagrass. While this has never been reported before, results of analyses of rumen contents and the fresh forage confirmed death was due to prussic acid poisoning. Forage specialists and researchers here and the vet diagnostic lab at first denied the possibility of this. Even the researchers and breeders at USDA-ARS — Tifton, GA, doubted the findings, but after multiple site visits, multiple forage analyses, and DNA analysis of plants from several fields from several environments across Texas, we can come to only one conclusion — the death of the cattle was indeed due to prussic acid [cyanide gas] poisoning.