Development of a pest-management plan by the Ministry of Forests, Range Branch,
British Columbia, application number FOR-SBC-PMP-2024-2029.
Our town still has a small, free community newspaper, in which the government occasionally prints notices to the public. One recently caught my eye.
The notice proposes a long-term, five-year pest-management plan for BC forests. Apparently our forests are infested by them, and the ministry proposes managing these pests with, among other interventions, herbicides. Herbicides stop the growth of those invading species. Starting in April 2024 and for a subsequent period of five years, therefore, the forest ministry proposes to control forest pests through use of 'mechanical, cultural and biological control' plus herbicides. We are confronted by potent pests indeed.
Theoretically, herbicides target weeds and other unwanted plants. Herbicides, a subset of pesticides, are either selective, killing only broad-leafed weeds such as thistles or dandelions, or non-selective, capable at sufficient dosages of killing any plant encountered. The majority of the products listed in the notice are selective herbicides, meaning that they limit their kills to particular types of plants; non-selective herbicides, also included, are not so limited. One herbicide listed in the notice is low on the toxicity scale, although others make up for that. Chlorsulfuron, for example, is "100 times more active than traditional herbicides"; picloram stands out for its persistence ('half-life from one month to several years'); florpyrauxifen-benzyl is thought by Health Canada to contain acceptable levels of "impurities from toluene" while also providing a few neurotoxic responses; and triclopyr, although selective for broadleaf plants, will also kill mature trees as it penetrates the bark. So mature trees can also be targeted.
Glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup that appears in the ministry's list, is a non-selective herbicide that will kill any actively growing plant it contacts unless that plant has been genetically rendered 'Roundup ready'. The one listed herbicide besides glyphosate that is nonselective is imazapyr, which kills a spectrum of plants from weeds to deciduous trees. Imazapyr is also considered 'soil active'-- it persists, making it 'very effective at killing large trees'. It also leaches into both surface and underground water. Dicamba, which you may have heard about in relation to cancer, is a selective herbicide that kills broad-leafed plants that have not been genetically altered to be tolerant.
Selective or not and particularly when applied outside of cultivated areas-- ie, in natural surroundings-- pesticides affect much more than what one might consider 'pests'. After Monsanto's patent on glyphosate ran out in 2000 the free-for-all began and any enterprise could include glyphosate in its products. Despite repeated assurances that Roundup would rapidly break down after application and that amounts needed would diminish over time, today pesticides are applied lavishly not only for pest control but even in the case of glyphosate to speedily desiccate crops meant for human consumption. Roundup is not only the top-selling herbicide in Canada; it is the most used herbicide on earth. Aerosols from herbicides applied to our rural areas can and will affect humans, birds, insects, and animals on land even as those herbicides migrate into surface waters. In water, glyphosate and its breakdown products are long-lasting and highly toxic to aquatic organisms including amphibians and shellfish. The need for dynamic constancy in the microbiome is not limited to critters; healthy, undisturbed soil harbors its own bacterial microbiome, while soils to which glyphosate and other chelating pesticides are applied are progressively degraded.
We are not immune. When glyphosate was first marketed the manufacturer deemed its product safe for humans because the herbicide affects a biome-- the shikimic-acid pathway-- that humans do not have. But bacteria in our intestines do contain the shikimate system, disruptions to which affect our own gut-brain axes and can cause prolonged effects on immune function. When humans consume amounts of glyphosate that the US considers acceptable for daily intake (ADI=1.75 mg/kg body weight), gut physiology is significantly disrupted, causing physical and psychological effects such as inflammation and anxiety.
Recent work supported by Moms Across America detected glyphosate in 100 percent of food samples taken from US fast-food brands. The organization collected and sent 42 samples from 21 brands to the Iowa-based Health Research Institute (HRI) in their original packaging, intact and frozen. HRI analyzed the samples for glyphosate in addition to 236 agrochemicals, four heavy metals, PFAS phthalates, mineral content and 104 commonly used veterinary drugs and hormones. All samples contained heavy metals and glyphosate in variable quantities while over three-quarters contained other pesticides as well. In the US, fast-food companies are now contributing their products to school lunches.
It's almost impossible to escape the onslaught. Organically grown food may not have glyphosate intentionally applied, but the wind can and does carry residues, and farmers have been sued for it. But that's another story.
Most land in British Columbia--94% of it--is owned by the Crown. What forests remain to us have survived for eons. Why does the BC Ministry of Forests feel such a need to control what it calls pests? Why should everything but evergreens be banished from our forests when a diverse ecosystem with a functioning soil biome is vastly more resilient? I suspect that this pest-management plan is less about managing pests than it is about facilitating logging companies in their extractive efforts. Might we be witnessing another of those public-private partnerships in which expense and profit are allocated with utmost discrimination?
Our world is becoming unlivable as we enter this sixth extinction event, and extinction is forever. We have transformed our planet into a place inhospitable to life as we knew it. What kind of twisted faith makes us believe that we can poison our way back into the garden?
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