Contaminated manure & compost - weedkiller destroys tomatoes, potatoes, beans etc

kristen: I agree with you about making an example, the trouble is this situation was recognised last year whan several commercial potato growers lost crops (reported in the Farmers Weekly in Nov) and a "reeducation programme" was instigated, I think the supply chain is too complex for these warnings to be passed on in every case. Its just Human Nature that someone somewhere will forget to pass on the warnings.

Re the rotavating, yes that is the advice from the chemical maker (Dow AgroSciences Ltd). I am supposed to rotavate the ground now and then again in late summer/autumn, and not to replant until next year. the idea is to encourage the breakdown of any vegetative matter which the chemical sticks to. The bacteria in soil can then breakdown the chemical, which can be very quick or very very slow depending on your soil type. I have just found out that the 'half life' of this weedkiller in clay soil is 339 days, I'm not sure exactly what this means, but am guessing it could take a couple of years to get rid of it :(

Unfortunately I did spread it all over my plot

 

kristen: I bought thirty 80litre bags to give my veg patch a treat! I have used it before but not in that quantity. Thanks for the ideas, I had thought of growing a green manure but that in itself might pick up the weedkiller and prolong its life. The problem is that the chemical attaches itself to plant material and does not break down until the plant has rotted away. I have had advice from Dow AgroScience Ltd (the weedkiller maker) as follows:

"In our view, rotavation is by far the best practice. This incorporates plant tissue into soils where it will decompose and allow the associated chemicals to be degraded by soil microbes. Once degraded, the chemicals should pose no further risk to crops. Ideally, thoroughly rotavate, or fork over several times as soon as possible, then repeat in late summer/ early autumn. Plant tissues generally break down most rapidly in warm, moist soils.

We would not recommend replanting this year. The ground needs to be thoroughly rotavated and plant residues given time to break down"

So no more growing on the affected areas for a while

 

and muscles to match as i don't have a rotavator!

 

I took some photos of my Runner beans yesterday, to show what the weedkiller damage looks like. The variety is Polestar. Not every plant is showing damage I guess that's because I didn't spread the contaminated compost evenly. I planted these beans out 6 weeks ago, they have grown very very slowly and its only been this last week that this fern like top growth has appeared confirming the weedkiller damage.

The first photo shows how the damage affects the top growth. The lower leaves look normal, but the upper ones have the thin curly fern like appearance:


The next photo is a close up of the runner bean with aminopyralid damage, you would not guess it was a runner bean plant from this photo. The leaves have strange growths crinckly on the edges:

 

Here's my potato row, photo taken last night. I planted these on 26th April and they look to have nearly grown away from the weedkiller damage. The earlies in the foreground are a bit shorter and they show a bit of damage, the Pink fir Apple at the back don't show any damage, so the variety may make some difference.




Here's a close up of the aminopyralid damage, its not such a marked affect as on my tomatoes (see my first post in this thread), I think that's because I only used about 50% contaminated compost on my potatoes:



The yield on the earlies is very good, I dug up a couple of roots last weekend, but unfortunately the advice is not to consume them.

 

kristen: yes I do need to pull it all up and destroy it somehow. What's stopping me is that I have contacted quite a few agencies about my problem and offered to show them the damage, no-one has yet, also I have shown some local gardeners around to try and raise awareness and I am hoping the local allotment society might be interested.

 

:thumb::thumb::thumb:

Blimey just when it looked like it had all gone quiet:

Just had an email from Nigel Farage our MEP who has been really kicking up a stink with the PSD. Dow have withdrawn it from sale and PSD have suspended its licence:

A snippet of the note from PSD:
"Dow have now indicated that they are withdrawing products which contain
aminopyralid from sale and PSD is formally suspending their
authorisations whilst we investigate the options for preventing a
recurrence of this problem. A key issue in our consideration will be
whether the conditions of use regarding manure are sufficient, or
sufficiently well known."

What a great result gang, I thought it had all gone quiet!!!!!

:thumb::thumb::thumb::thumb:

I have a few emails to digest and will post more when I fully understand the situation, just had to be the first one to break the news.

 

Hopefully their bit about "A key issue in our consideration will be
whether the conditions of use regarding manure are sufficient, or
sufficiently well known" means that the PSD will take responsibility for education and broadcasting warnings. I think we will see this chemical back in use again it will be interesting to see what restrictions are put on its use.


I'm still struggling to comprehend that we have managed to get this banned, but we need to be on our guard and in particular like you say, there could be as many problems next year because this years grasslands have already been sprayed.

 

I am not too sure about that, this chemical has been used in the States for a while longer than in the UK, and as you know the american "sue everyone for anything" culture is not so prevalent here. I would have thought if Dow could weather the compensation claims in the States; over here it would be at a lower more 'acceptable' level. But if you are right then compensation claims tend to get settled prior to going to court so I think we will never know - unless a helpful insider within Dow wishes to spill the beans :rolleyes:

2010! Yes I agree, also farmers have been producing silage for use over the winter which will also prolong the effect. Can silage be kept for longer than a year? I don't know - I do know that hay can be kept longer - are we looking at 2011 then!

If anyone is getting any manure/compost then ask lots of questions of the supplier.