This commentary is by Michael Bald, a resident of Royalton.
The pull of gravity, cycles of the moon, the four seasons and their corresponding light conditions: These are environmental constants with which we animals and plants have evolved. Sure, there is variation within “normal” ranges, but earth’s environmental constants have largely remained true to their historical range windows. There is a reliable predictability.
But even as global warming monkey-wrenches our sense of normal with shifting temperature regimes and intensified weather events, a silent, new environmental constant has arisen in Vermont since the 1940s.
It is now a given, an absolute certainty, that the landscape of Vermont will see thousands of pounds of pesticides applied over the growing season, year after year. Tons of toxin, typically in the same location hotspots with pinpoint regularity. Seventeen tons of glyphosate in 2020, and 31 tons of atrazine.
I say this occurs in silence because we do not speak of it, ever.
Plant species that colonized Vermont’s landscape since the Ice Age adapted to, accommodated, and likely even depended on the annual migrations of billions of birds. Those migrations would have included the passenger pigeon, whose overflights served as a regular fertilization event on the swamps and forests below. All that excrement from massive bird populations was a resource, a juicing of the ecosystems that no longer happens.
The spawning runs of salmon serve a similar nutrient-transfer role. How does a complex forestland respond when its annual nutrient showers gradually fade as flocking bird populations go extinct? Those showers were a constant, a regular happening.
Clearly, the change was drastic, and it synchronized almost seamlessly with the aerial pollutants of the Industrial Revolution. The industrial substances trickling from the sky, however, were not nutritious and beneficial. Rather, acid rain leached the soil of important ions like calcium and magnesium, elements that every tree needs. And acid rain served for a full century as a reliable environmental constant.
So since the mid-1800s, Vermont’s landscape has seen termination of the regular fertilizer program (marked by extinction of the passenger pigeon) and a century of injurious acid rain. Thankfully, pollution laws have offered some relief from the acid rain constant, but new toxins soon arrived.
As humanity emerged from the hell of two world wars, waves of new pesticide products appeared on store shelves, some newly created and some repurposed. Many were targeted for homes and gardens.
Today, our annual cumulative pesticide total is one of our most devastating environmental constants. Why? Because even though pesticides break down over time, those breakdown products accumulate and the impact amplifies year after year.
In our soil and water, the breakdown products mingle with everything else we’ve flushed or cast aside. Eventually the result is debilitated soil, contaminated water and broken food webs. This is the toxic legacy, part of it.
Pesticide data does not track secret ingredients in the formulations. Over 2,000 such additives are permitted (chemicals to penetrate waxy leaf coatings and supposedly even PFAS compounds). Why is this allowed to remain secret? Why do we tolerate glyphosate in our cereals, our beverages, and our honey (FDA studies) without a peep of opposition? What is the impact on human health and immunity?
In 2022, the impact of humanity is everywhere a new environmental constant. While seasonal windows now carry signature noises (think leaf-blowers), the growing season is marked by our toxic signature. The issue is amplified in Vermont because the St. Lawrence Seaway is, from a jet stream perspective, “the tailpipe of North America.”
Not only do we deal with our own self-inflicted mess, we suffer the carry-in that rainfall brings from the Midwest. U.S. Geological Survey data shows that growing season rainfalls carry an herbicide, fungicide, insecticide signature; multiple contaminants are typical and the latest high-profile toxin is dicamba, a relative of Agent Orange.
What can Vermonters do now that pesticides are so established? I submit one clear first step: We could stop pretending. Stop pretending that others have dumped this disaster upon us, and acknowledge our own role in fixing it.
Farms use big quantities of pesticides, yes, but so do golf courses, colleges and utility companies. We spray poison ivy in state parks and dab herbicide on native beech trees in national forests. Agency of Agriculture figures capture only pesticide use reported by professional applicators; we have no clue what people purchase as individuals.
We, the citizenry, turn to synthetic chemicals to clean the cracks in our sidewalks, and to manage vegetation, fungi and insects everywhere they exist. We even use herbicides in arrogant, misguided efforts to restore habitat for our favorite birds and mammals. Odd — even birds know better than to soil their own nest.
Do we have the power to alter this new environmental constant? Of course. We are a problem-solving species, and solutions to our pesticide addiction already exist. We have other tools and creative minds. Purchasing power is real and allows us to support visions for clean water and uncontaminated landscapes.
Informed environmental stewardship for the benefit of our children is a choice. For decades, however, the constant has been our unwillingness to make the choice.
