Pesticide tags are quite a common sight in suburban neighborhoods. I know when walking around my neighborhood, they are on nearly every lawn, and it always surprises me that this is the case. Some of you reading this may have pesticides in use on your lawn right now. They are a fairly common form of lawn treatment, however they have a lot of negative side effects that not many know about. In many cases, they actually end up doing more harm then good. So, in this post, I wanted to summarize exactly what lawn pesticides are, what they do, and why they can be so harmful, not just to the environment, but to humans as well.
Side Note: Some of the topics discussed in this post have been briefly mentioned in other posts as well. I am creating this just to have a complete summary of all the information I have mentioned in the past.
What are pesticides and what are they used for?
Basically, pesticides are just liquids used to exterminate pests or unwanted life from a particular location. They are mainly used to limit the life spans of pests, and what a pest is can be decided by the user. Most often in lawns, pesticides are used to kill weeds and harmful insects. This is done for two reasons: one, to make the lawn look nicer by only having grass within it. And two, to create a slightly safer environment by eliminating any potentially harmful insects. For most companies and public areas, like golf courses, these pesticides are used for strictly aesthetic purposes.
What's so bad about pesticides?
There are a few different ways pesticides can be harmful, and often these downsides affect both humans and animals alike. So, in this section I wanted to give a quick rundown of the 4 main unintended side affects pesticides may have. Here they are:
1. Run Off- During rainfall, many pesticides recently sprayed onto lawns end up rubbing off, and mixing into recent rain. This rain water eventually finds its way into a nearby stream or river. When these chemicals are absorbed into the water it begins to poison it, which can cause serious health issues for animals that rely on it. Additionally, if these chemicals enter a water source that humans rely on, we may even end up drinking our own chemicals. While the majority of run-off comes from areas like large fields and golf courses, pesticides applied to lawns are also a large contributor to this factor.
2. Volatilization- As talked about briefly within a previous post, volatilizaiton is the process through which pesticides turn into a gas or vapor. This happens most often when pesticides are recently applied, and then evaporate. Once turned into a gas, the pesticides travel to nearby areas, and affect wildlife that can be miles away from the initial point of application. This process has already been linked to a huge problem in frog population and reproduction. If you would like to learn more about volatilization and the effect it has on wildlife, make sure to visit the Green Science Blog by clicking here.
3. Leeching- leeching, a bi-product of run-off, has serious negative consequences for humans. When pesticides are absorbed into rainwater, sometimes the water does not find its way into a river, but rather is absorbed into the ground. As we know, much of the water humans rely on comes from below the ground. These pesticides often end up contaminating this valuable groundwater, and affect people all around the world.. Many rely on this groundwater, yet even so it is often poisoned by these pesticides.
4. General Exposure- Possible circumstances aside, just being near a lawn that has used pesticides recently can slowly affect your health. In fact, pesticide exposure has been linked to various diseases such as asthma, birth defects, cancer, leukemia, lymphoma, and other harmful conditions. Obviously, a one time exposure to these pesticides will not put you at harm, but common exposure to recently applied pesticides in lawns will put you at a much higher risk than simply avoiding them and not using them.
In one-time cases, these problems may not seem so bad, but they are occurring more and more often as pesticide use begins to grow. The thing about these problems is that they are occurring all over the world. Pesticides are used globally, and as such the problems that they cause affect nearly the entire world. In fact the World Health Organization estimates that nearly 220,000 people die of pesticide poisoning each year, which is a truly scary number.
What's the point of this?
I just wanted to mention that the point of this information isn't to try and make you scared of lawns and the pesticides within them. Obviously they have their uses, and sometimes they are necessary for specific reasons. However, I just wanted to point out the downsides of pesticide use, and hopefully make you a bit more cautious before you decide to put them in your own lawn. So, with that mentioned, let me get on to the next topic.
Are pesticides even worth it?
The short answer, in my personal opinion, is a resounding no. To me, the downsides and health detriments they have been shown to cause are just not worth it. If I owned a house, a pretty lawn would not be worth the possible consequences it might cause. However, on the other side of the argument, pesticides may be necessary for a particular family or company. You never know why they might need pesticides. A family member could have a particular allergy to an insect or weed, and the only option for them is to use pesticides to clear them out.
However, the majority of families use pesticides for their aesthetic value, and that I would highly recommend against. So, to begin wrapping up this post, if you are considering implementing pesticides into your lawn, I hope you ask yourself if it is really worth it. Is a slightly better looking lawn worth the possible consequences it can cause both your own family and the environment? In the end, it's your decision.
Conclusion
So, no matter what decision you make, it is at least important to be educated on the possible effects your decisions have. And the beauty of the solutions to environmental problems such as pesticide poisoning is that there are so many different paths we can take to solve it. Even if you need to implement a pesticide solution into your lawn, there are countless healthier alternatives that you can use instead, all of which I will be talking about next week, so stay tuned. I would like to give a quick thank-you to those who were able to make it to the end of this post, I know the topics discussed here can occasionally be a bit dry, but I think they are important nonetheless. I know I learned a lot while researching this post, so I hope you were able to learn a bit as well. Thanks for reading.
All credit for information used in this post goes to:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/what-to-know-before-you-spray-your-lawn-with-pesticides/2014/07/07/77d719a2-f63c-11e3-a606-946fd632f9f1_story.html?utm_term=.cd3d41d24282
http://www.epa.nsw.gov.au/pesticides/pestwhatrhow.htm
https://www.nature.com/scitable/blog/green-science/the_dangers_of_pesticides
https://www.beyondpesticides.org/assets/media/documents/health/pid-database.pdf
http://tiki.oneworld.net/pollution/poisonings.html
Images:
https://www.towncreekfdn.org/dispatches/suburbs-with-a-side-of-pesticides-please/
https://topturf.net/
http://recycletorrance.org/safe-disposal-of-pesticides/
http://www.pkwy.k12.mo.us/southmiddle/teachers/jrademeyer/runoffrescue.html
http://www.personal.psu.edu/faculty/a/s/asm4/turfgrass/education/turgeon/modules/07_pestmanagement/pesticides/volatilization.html
https://www.flowcontrolnetwork.com/saline-groundwater-better-than-seawater-for-desalination-researchers-say/
http://www.natural-treatments-for.com/natural-treatments-for-asthma.html
http://quitmarijuana.org/blog/pesticides-in-weed/
https://www.healthandenvironment.org/what-we-know/environmental-contributors/chemical-environment-overview/pesticides
http://articles.dailypress.com/2014-08-23/features/dp-fea-diggin-0824-20140823_1_pesticide-disposal-program-disposal-company-virginia-department
http://www.thealternative.in/lifestyle/is-the-price-of-going-organic-worth-it/
https://www.pinterest.com/pin/99923685455060153/
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