A week ago I was saddened to see this video on Aminopyralid contaminated compost posted by gardener and YouTube personality Karen Land on her channel Love Your Land:
After posting that video, she found one of mine and dropped me a line. We corresponded back and forth about the danger of Aminopyralid and I asked her to write up her complete tale of herbicidal woe.
Tomorrow she shares her story here in an in-depth post you won’t want to miss.
On Saturday I got a comment from another gardener on my post More Victims of the Satanic Grazon Herbicide asking about a garden he mulched with hay he knew to contain the toxin:
“I have mulched and composted with hay that I absolutely knew was sprayed with Grazon and it didn’t affect anything so far as I could tell (I was ignorant and didn’t know any better). How did you trace the root cause problem to Grazon and not some other issue?”
-HWoolrich
My answer:
The characteristic twisting of the new growth makes it obvious once you’ve seen it once. Aminopyralid inhibits the cell stacking function of the plant, causing fractal-like distortion. Some plants, like melons and greens, are a lot less susceptible. Others, like beans, tomatoes and eggplant are very sensitive. Grasses, such as corn, won’t show any problems at all.
I posted a video earlier this year showing a garden that had been partially wrecked by Aminopyralid-laced horse manure:
The terrifying thing about Aminopyralid – and its trademarked product Grazon – is that it’s now everywhere.
This is why I dedicate a decent portion of my book Compost Everything: The Good Guide to Extreme Composting warning gardeners of the danger and sharing the many ways in which this toxin can get into your garden and render the ground poisonous for years.
I sent a copy to Karen last week and she’s been enjoying the read thus far:
In a way, Aminopyralid launched my garden writing career. I couldn’t believe what had happened to my garden. I gave it what I thought was a great, organic amendment… and lost $1000 worth of plants and poisoned multiple beds. The story needed to be shared, so I did so in Natural Awakenings Magazine and at Mother Earth News and I have continued to cover it here and in my books.
Don’t let this happen to you.
And come back tomorrow – you need to read Karen’s article.
You can have greener thumbs by this weekend!
21 comments
Hi, David. I love watching your videos and will subscribe today, finally! One question about the Aminopyralid in manure – Does that include bags of Black Cow manure? Cary uses it mixed in with gardening soil when he plants. Could plants do well without it, and what would you use in place of it?
Also, the banana tree you gave us looks wonderful. Huge amount of bananas that are very close to being ready for
harvesting. In fact, I cut one off to see if it will ripen. If it does, I can start harvesting a bunch at a time to extend the time we can eat them. The pineapple plant you gave us is huge but still waiting for a pineapple, should be soon.
And I still want to try the green vine along our fence, the one with the small orange goards, just out of curiosity sake. I’m trying to remember how you and Rachel cook them. Your family is incredibly blessed to be able to do what you are doing. I just admire you both so much. Please give Rachel my love and blessings!
I’m almost 100% certain that Black Kow is safe. I need to call them, though, and see how they screen for Aminopyralid.
That’s AWESOME about the bananas! That pineapple will produce soon – probably in spring if it’s not blooming now. You can trick it into blooming earlier by throwing apple peels in and around it.
You can get a better version of the bitter gourd than the wild one if you hit the local Asian markets. Ask them for bitter gourd seeds or a ripe bitter gourd fruit. They really are pretty harsh to eat but excellent for you.
I’ll say hi to Rachel.
Thanks for your reply!
Just wondering if you were able to find out if Black Kow contains herbicides. I’ve asked them, but haven’t received a response. Thank you so much!
Some of my gardening friends have had Black Kow hurt their plants. I don’t trust them.
That’s a shame! my homemade compost isn’t ready yet, so I was hoping that Black Kow would be safe. Are there any brands available in Florida that you’re aware of as being safe to use?
I have noticed that Black Kow is now about 1/2 the manure content it used to have when I started using it.
I used to sprout seeds in it, and never noticed a problem. The tomatoes I grew with it as a supplement were always better than without it. But maybe your results would explain some anomalous results I have had in the past 2 to 3 years.
The problem is, I can’t make enough compost to make up for the garden supplements I need. It’s an ongoing evolving problem which, if I “solve” it this year, that “solution” may not work the next.
Thanks for all the excellent gardening info, DTG.
This happened to me on a few of my hedges. My Walters verbernum, sweet verbernum, and yest today tomorrow all are affected. Will the hedges ever return to normal? I sprayed a ton of horticultural charcoal recently to absorb whatever is there. Looks like some of my sweet verbernum leaves just recently started to come back normal but pale.
Most of my trees and my blackberries never recovered. Once they took up the toxin, they just sat there – some of them for four years, losing leaves in winter, leafing out a little in spring, never dying but never growing either.
Haven’t heard anyone mention this: “There are four known persistent herbicides: Clopyralid (Dow AgroSciences, 1987), Aminopyralid (Dow AgroSciences, 2005), Aminocyclopyrachlor (DuPont, 2010), and Picloram (Dow AgroSciences, 1957).” Copied from the US Composting Council’s frequently asked question # 1:
http://compostingcouncil.org/persistent-herbicide-faq
There’s four of ’em! Gaaaah! They’re a family, the picolinic acid family.
World’s worst family!
I once grew beautiful veggies from seed, and they were on the deck set back about 7 or 8 feet. waiting to be put into the raised beds. I thought they would be safe from “True Green” there, but NO! Apparently it can be carried by the wind for up to a mile or more. It took my heirloom tomatoes and peppers over a month to recover, and all fruit on the pepper plant (over a dozen) were lost. Until then, it had been shaping up to be one of my best tomato years yet.
I don’t know if it was the same herbicide, but it or something like it just isn’t safe around vegetables at all. And it wasn’t just my tomatoes. When I went to get some potting soil from Walmart, some of their tomatoes were affected, as well
Here’s some info with pictures of tomatoes that looked like mine.
https://huskerhort.com/tag/herbicide-damage/
I was there the next year as well, and by then we had prohibited TrueGreen from using any spray herbicides. No use though, because the city was spraying around a retention pond not far away, and it had the same effect. That was in Indiana, but I haven’t had that problem in Florida, even though a few of my neighbors use TrueGreen or some other lawn service.
How do I get rid of this awful chemical? I have worked so hard moving over 20 yards of compost and topsoil to build beautiful lush garden beds only to find that they are all contaminated with grazon.
I do not have the resources to remove and replace this soil and compost (I literally layered soil and compost to build up no till beds.)
I am a single mom and spent a lot of money purchasing this poisoned soil and compost thinking I was investing in food security for my children only to find that I wasted all of that money and effort on deathbeds. I am just sick about it.
Is there some way to remove this wickedness? I planted dozens and dozens of beautiful tomatoes and peppers that I started from seeds only to have a deathbed of deformed, twisted, stunted, poisoned plants.
I am so sorry, Caroline. It is satanic stuff.
I added crushed charcoal and some soil from elsewhere to my beds and turned it under and could garden on them again the next year. For now, you can plant corn and it will grow. But all the broad-leaf stuff won’t. Really, it’s sickening that they allow this product to stay on the market.
Thank you for this insightful article. I was thinking of tilling some dairy cow poop into my lot to make it more organic and in my garden beds but now am worried of permanent damage to the land. I am not comfortable with the veracity of the information I receive so I am trying to test the poop and will try growing bean seeds to test. Is there any other that’s more sure and quicker that I can use? Thanks!!!
I have transplanted tomatoes into the stuff and watered them well, then seen them start to deteriorate in a week or two as new growth begins.
That’s exactly what I’m doing right now with 2 bags of Black Kow I bought yesterday. I had some volunteer tomatoes that needed to come out anyways. Fingers crossed!
hi David, I mix peat, compost or manure and perlite for my container soils. My peppers are all twisted at the tops and stop growing. Tomatoes have small cupped leaves and what should be large toms are plum size. I have used amerigro compost and black kow manure so I don’t know which is the culprit. I will start my chile peps again in new medium even though diseases are usually brutal in fl summers. I just repotted a lemon tree in 30 gallon container and am quite nervous about herbicide in compost.
I am confused on what to do about new soil mixes. No space to make my own compost. Do you know of any safe manures or compost to use? Also I wonder about soiless mixes. My concern there would be if organic fertilizers would work with no soil or manure to break them down. Amy advice would be appreciated.
I don’t use any compost or manure from the store anymore – I keep hearing stories of people getting in trouble. Safest bet is to make your own compost. I’m very sorry, Neil – it’s a bad feeling. Currently I am using cover crops to make up the lack of easy compost availability.
I don’t understand how these are legal??
Probably by design.
[…] I also try to get a wide variety of materials for maximum mineral content. Seaweed is quite valuable for this, as is cow manure (provided it’s not the evil kind you’ll find across most of the United States). […]
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