Mysterious Cattle Deaths in Texas - Is it the Grass?

http://www.prisonplanet.com/gmo-grass-kills-cows-in-texas-cyanide-gas.html
These cows were apparently eating Tifton 85 grass, which is a hybrid bermudagrass, not a GMO as originally reported - and then dying - and people think the grass has started making cyanide gas.

The farmer had been growing this grass for 20 years for his cows, because it's supposed to be easy to digest, with no prior ill effect.

Also, the cows died of prussic acid poisoning. (CORRECTION, I thought this was something else besides cyanide.  I'm not a chemist.  Apparently it's another name for cyanide.) Some grasses (like Tifton 68) make a certain amount of prussic acid, but the field wasn't in a stage which would have been expected to have high prussic acid levels at this time of year or moisture level.  However, the cattle were hungry and thirsty and had been turned into a new pasture that had not yet been grazed this year.  If the grass was the cause, it may have shocked their systems somehow.

See here for the debunk: https://pearlsnapsponderings.wordpress.com/2012/06/24/a-load-of-bull-tifton-85-bermudagrass-gmos-and-cyanide/

The original link quoted at Prison Planet has gone dead: http://www.weareaustin.com/news/top-stories/stories/vid_2393.shtml

My guess is there's something else that is killing the cattle, unless for some reason the grass has suddenly mutated to a completely different variety.  Or maybe the farmer bought the wrong seeds - like they were mislabeled this year? That is, if he had to plant it anew each year.

ANOTHER NOTE: here is another Prison Planet article, where they make a lot of hay about an article about Tifton 85 grass with prussic acid problems, going missing from the county website.  Also apparently it's not all just one farm, but several with this problem.
http://www.prisonplanet.com/health-ranger-investigates-cyanide-producing-tifton-grass-on-cattle-ranch-in-elgin-texas.html