Widespread pesticide damage reported, despite so-called "protective steps"

A University of Missouri report estimates that drift damage from the pesticide dicamba has occurred across 1.1 million acres of agricultural crops, trees and other plants so far this year.

This comes less than a year after the Environmental Protection Agency and many states introduced additional restrictions meant to prevent off-target damage from the pesticide. Last year dicamba drift wreaked havoc on a reported 3.6 million acres of soybean crops not genetically engineered to resist the notoriously drift-prone pesticide.

“The widespread damage to crops and even hearty trees like the catalpa and Bradford pear confirms this drift-prone poison can’t be safely used and shouldn’t get approved by the EPA again,” said Nathan Donley, a senior scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity. “You’d have better luck herding kittens than getting dicamba to stay put. The EPA’s new leadership needs to end the use of this dangerous pesticide.”

Highly toxic dicamba products are designed for use primarily on next-generation soybeans genetically engineered to resist what would normally be a fatal dose of the pesticide.

A previous report released last month noted that reported damage to specialty crops, vegetables, ornamental species and trees has increased dramatically, indicating that many types of plants can be damaged by dicamba.

Earlier this year a Center report found that more than 60 million acres of monarch butterfly habitat are projected to be sprayed with dicamba by next year. Dicamba can degrade monarch habitat in two ways: by harming flowering plants that provide nectar for adults as they travel south for the winter and by harming milkweed, which, as the only food of monarch caterpillars, is essential for the butterfly’s reproduction.

“In addition to the farming community again getting slammed by dicamba drift, this uncontrollable pesticide is harming wild plants just outside of agricultural fields that provide important animal habitat,” said Donley. “The only reason farmers are turning to dicamba is to kill the glyphosate-resistant superweeds sprouting across millions of acres. Dumping more and more pesticides on crops just keeps farmers on the pesticide treadmill. Meanwhile neighbouring farms and wildlife pay the cost.”

Dicamba has a time-limited regulatory federal approval that is subject to expiration by November 9, 2018 unless it is renewed by the EPA. The agency will decide in mid-August whether to renew the new dicamba registration or let it expire.