News Release

The Missouri Department of Agriculture Plant Industries Division’s Pesticide Program reminds producers to explicitly follow all directions for use, restrictions and special precautions found on all pesticide labels.

One such pesticide, Dicamba, has been widely discussed over the past few months. Dicamba is a useful herbicide chemistry, historically registered by the U.S. EPA for use in burndown and preplant applications for the control of many broadleaf weeds in the production of cotton and soybean crops.

The U.S. EPA approved for conditional registration the following Dicamba herbicide products for use in-crop as post-emergent application in Bollgard II XtendFlex cotton and Roundup Ready 2 Xtend soybeans during the 2017 growing season: 

• DuPont FeXapan herbicide plus VaporGrip Technology, EPA Registration Number 352-913;
• Engenia Herbicide, EPA Registration Number 7969-345; and
• XTENDIMAX with VaporGrip Technology, EPA Registration Number 524-617
   

Producers who desire to use these new Dicamba herbicide products are encouraged to make sure they receive a copy of the complete supplemental label for the product in use. Each of the new Dicamba herbicide products have been approved with supplemental labeling that provides the mandatory directions for use, restrictions and special precautions that must be followed.  Pesticide users are required to have the complete supplemental label in their possession when using the herbicide. Failure to possess the supplemental label during use of the herbicide will be a violation of federal and state law. 

As always, the use of older U.S. EPA registered Dicamba herbicides in-crop for post-emergent application in Bollgard II XtendFlex cotton and Roundup Ready 2 Xtend soybeans is a violation of federal and state law and their unapproved and off label use may result in severe penalties.

Beginning this growing season, the Department of Agriculture has the authority to issue a fine up to $10,000 per violation, or $25,000 per violation for repeat violators, to any person found to have knowingly used any herbicide for a crop for which the herbicide is not labeled for use, which results in the herbicide drifting or coming into contact with another person’s field, onto another person’s personal property, onto another person’s real property, or onto another person, which resulted in damage.

The goal of Plant Industries Division’s Pesticide Program is to prevent unreasonable adverse effects of pesticide use on non-target crops and the environment while helping assure the availability of pesticides needed to maintain our quality of life. This is accomplished by licensing pesticide applicators and dealers, registering pesticides and performing inspections and investigations in the enforcement of the Missouri Pesticide Use Act and the Missouri Pesticide Registration Act.

The department also administers the Missouri DriftWatch site, a voluntary, online pesticide-sensitive crop locator service to provide a place where producers of pesticide-sensitive specialty crops, including bees, can map their crop and hive locations. Pesticide applicators can use the site to find sensitive crop locations in an effort to minimize the potential for damaging pesticide drift. For more information about this service visit https://driftwatch.org/.

Additional information about the Missouri Department of Agriculture can be found at Agriculture.MO.Gov. Audio clips related to this news release can be downloaded here.

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