Native Plants

Q. Who is Mr. Smarty Plants?

A: There are those who suspect Wildflower Center volunteers are the culpable and capable culprits. Yet, others think staff members play some, albeit small, role. You can torture us with your plant questions, but we will never reveal the Green Guru's secret identity.

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Wednesday - March 20, 2013

From: Lubbock, TX
Region: Southwest
Topic: Diseases and Disorders, Pests, Trees
Title: Long term effects of pesticide from Lubbock TX
Answered by: Barbara Medford

QUESTION:

I have 9 western pecan trees about 20 years old. Trunk sizes is from 18" to 39". I used a product Bayer Tree and Shrub, applied to the trees. I wonder what it will do to the trees. I talkd to Bayer and they told me not to gather the fruit for this year. Will there be long term effect to my trees?

ANSWER:

This is probably something you should have asked Bayer when you contacted them; it is also something that should have been asked BEFORE the product was applied. We tried searching the Internet on the product and all we got were advertisements for it, which would hardly have mentioned ill effects of the product.

We went through one of these advertisements, clicking on the link for Product Details, which gave us a video on application. The main message we got from that was that you should carefully read and follow the instructions on the label. Since this is a systemic, which means it travels up from the roots into all parts of the tree, and is a poison, we would certainly agree to the advice not to eat the pecans for this year. Beyond that, we have no way of knowing when it will again be safe to ingest those pecans.

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Wednesday - March 20, 2013

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