Dicamba brings in record number of complaints
The Illinois Department of Agriculture has recorded over 100 more dicamba-related complaints than in 2018, and it’s not done counting.
With 455 dicamba-related pesticide complaints submitted to the Illinois Department of Agriculture as of Aug. 16, the 2019 growing season has leaped ahead of 2018’s total of 336 dicamba complaints.
Aaron Hager, University of Illinois weed scientist, says label revisions have clearly not helped in Illinois, where an estimated 6 million acres of soybeans were treated with a dicamba herbicide product this year.
“We’re going to increase our complaints in the largest soybean-growing state again this year because you cannot label volatility,” Hager says.
He says higher temperatures and more fields going to dicamba-based weed control are responsible for a surge in pesticide complaints from 2017 to 2019. Illinois’ July 15 cutoff for applying dicamba on soybeans planted after June 1 — a 15-day extension granted by the state’s ag department — allowed application during warmer days in 2019.
From 1989 to 2016, there was an average of 77 ag-related pesticide complaints in a year. Thanks to dicamba, that average has surged to 406 in 2019. Like the two years prior, 2019 complaints mainly have been filed by farmers.
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With 455 dicamba-related pesticide complaints submitted to the Illinois Department of Agriculture as of Aug. 16, the 2019 growing season has leaped ahead of 2018’s total of 336 dicamba complaints.
Aaron Hager, University of Illinois weed scientist, says label revisions have clearly not helped in Illinois, where an estimated 6 million acres of soybeans were treated with a dicamba herbicide product this year.
“We’re going to increase our complaints in the largest soybean-growing state again this year because you cannot label volatility,” Hager says.
He says higher temperatures and more fields going to dicamba-based weed control are responsible for a surge in pesticide complaints from 2017 to 2019. Illinois’ July 15 cutoff for applying dicamba on soybeans planted after June 1 — a 15-day extension granted by the state’s ag department — allowed application during warmer days in 2019.
From 1989 to 2016, there was an average of 77 ag-related pesticide complaints in a year. Thanks to dicamba, that average has surged to 406 in 2019. Like the two years prior, 2019 complaints mainly have been filed by farmers.
Click Here to read more.