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closePesticides, insecticides, herbicides and plummeting reptile populations
Posted by TehachapiGal on 02 Jan 2014 at 06:01 GMT
A reference to this article was in the Washington Post.
It shouldn't surprise anyone that reptiles, bees, birds and other wildlife are plummeting. Stewardship over our life support systems is non existent. Herbicides and pesticides are used more heavily than realized. Edges of freeways, highways, roads, RR tracks are routinely sprayed, for example.
Hundreds of square miles of formerly undisturbed wild lands and mountain ridges in the Tehachapi Pass and the Mojave Desert are now the home of thousands of wind energy generators, solar power plant, power poles and other expensive above ground electrical equipment.
Natural wild lands and tall objects like the nearly 500 foot tall wind turbine generators (WTGs) are prone to lightening strikes that lead to forest fires. WTGs are installed on inaccessible mountain ridges where fire control is impossible. Environmental impact reports always include vague references to pesticide and herbicide use for brush control. At the local wind power plants there is very little vegetation. Based on visual observation it appears that pesticide/herbicide products are routinely used. There is a high probability that reptiles are being poisoned by toxic pesticides and herbicides caused from dispersal of these products in contaminated melting snowpack in the watershed and rainwater. It ends up in the local wetlands and ground water.
Based on recently talking with an Edison Pacific Weed Control worker along our local road who was spraying around the power poles I wrote Southern California Edison to identify the products used and received a response. The local products used are Bayer Esplanade 200SC and Dow Agrosciences Milestone VM.
Esplanade website. http://www.backedbybayer....
A link to the Esplanade Reference Guide is located below the image of the bottle. It provides a stunning overview as to the extent the product is used. There were no independent studies on the product available to be found.
Milestone website:
http://www.cdms.net/LDat/...
Dow Milestone's active ingredient is Aminopyralid.
http://www.pesticideinfo....