Saskatchewan and federal officials are investigating reports that some northwest Saskatchewan herbicide dealers are illegally promoting Gramoxone PDQ as a dessicant.
“We’re getting (reports) from quite a few different sources,” said Trent Catley, a pesticide investigator with Saskatchewan Agriculture.
Gramoxone PDQ is a new non-selective herbicide that is registered for pre-seeding burnoff. It is a combination of diquat and paraquat.
Diquat is the active ingredient in Reglone, the only registered dessicant.
Gramoxone PDQ is not registered as a dessicant and it is illegal to promote it or use it as such.
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Saskatchewan Agriculture weed specialist Clark Brenzil said he has received a number of anonymous calls from pea growers who told him they have been using Gramoxone PDQ to dry down their crops.
“There has been a lot of it applied to the northwest,” Brenzil said.
Some of these growers are now finding buyers won’t accept their peas because of the illegal use of the Gramoxone PDQ.
Gramoxone PDQ has never gone through the tests required to show it will not leave chemical residues in food made from treated peas, Brenzil said.
Catley said dealers convicted of promoting herbicides for non-registered uses can face fines and jail.
But the most severe penalty, for farm supply business owners, is losing their licence to sell herbicides, Catley said.
Murray DePape, of Zeneca Agro, the company that makes Gramoxone PDQ, said the company is unhappy that some dealers may be illegally promoting its product.
He said Zeneca has told dealers not to sell it as a dessicant, and took extra precautions to minimize the risk of it being wrongly used.
“We asked our distributors not to sell PDQ after June 30 because if it was, it was likely to be used as a dessicant,” he said.
DePape said Zeneca has been called by producers wondering how to use Gramoxone PDQ as a dessicant, and the company has told them not to use it. After the Saskatchewan agriculture department reported the chemical was being misused, Zeneca sent a letter to all sellers reminding them the chemical was not registered to be sold as a dessicant, DePape said.
Bill Haase, the manager of Wilkie, Sask.’s Finora Canada Inc., said his company has been worried by reports of producers misusing Gramoxone PDQ.
They now specifically ask every producer who sells them peas whether they applied the chemical as a dessicant.
“We do not knowingly purchase product treated with unlicensed products,” said Haase. “There are no exceptions.”
He said his company, which ships grains all over the world, relies on honest producers to admit if they have misused a product.
“You have to rely on the integrity of the seller,” he said.
Catley said investigators do not yet have enough evidence to charge any dealer. He said it is possible that some do not understand the seriousness of illegally promoting herbicides.
