EPA should limit pesticides to prevent two-headed Salmon and dead whales

EPA should limit pesticides to prevent two-headed Salmon and dead whalesPesticides are chemicals designed to harm living organisms and it can include humans, animals, whales, salmon, and other vulnerable species. In addition to fatal results, there have been increased abnormalities found in creatures exposed to poisonous substances. Two headed-salmon, snakes, and turtles are not products of healthy ecosystems.Runoff water carries deadly pesticides and pollution into creeks, rivers, wetlands, and ultimately the ocean.Prior to the late 1970s ground-water contamination from field-applied pesticides was virtually unexpected. It was assumed that pesticides in the natural environment would either break down or that the soil, sand, gravel, and rock formations would be adequate to cleanse water of its contaminants before it reached ground water. Today, we know that human activities can lead to contamination of ground water.The first major advancement in controlling pesticide runoff in the Pacific Norhwest came in 2002, when Federal Judge Coughenour, U.S. District Court in Seattle, ruled that Environmental Protection Agency was in violation of the Endangered Species Act, by not controlling the effects of pesticides on endangered salmon.The judge stated that "EPA's own reports document the potentially significant risks posed to threatened and endangered salmonids or their habitat."In conjunction, the Seattle Times reported: The pesticides are common in the state's apple and cherry orchards, potato fields and berry farms. Restrictions could cover big swaths of Washington farmland where streams carry a variety of federally protected salmon and steelhead, according to the National Marine Fisheries Service.Under the rules, the pesticides couldn't be used within 500 feet of streams that carry salmon. Crop dusters would have to stay even farther away, and farmers using the pesticides would have to leave 20-foot strips of land uncultivated along drainage ditches and streams that are home to the fish.According a press release from Earthjustice today: last October, 2008, their lawyers finally succeeded in their decade-long push to make federal scientists start issuing protections for salmon and steelhead in the Pacific Northwest and California from deadly pesticides.Earthjustice claims that the six pesticides reviewed by scientists so far are among the most dangerous chemicals in use. All six—chlorpyrifos, diazinon, malathion, carbaryl, carbofuran, and methomyl—are neurotoxic, pose serious risks to both humans and wildlife, and are frequently detected in salmon-bearing waters. Thirty-one other dangerous pesticides will undergo review by scientists at the National Marine Fisheries Service over the next 3 years.Chinook salmon are endangered and have been on a steady decline for decades. Salmon is the main food source for orca whales, another endangered species. Last summer, it was discovered that seven endangered orcas from the Puget Sound whale population disappeared, including two reproducing-aged females. The whales are feared dead and scientists believe they may have died from malnutrition, starvation, and vulnerability to other threats, like water contamination.Fast action from the EPA is critical in the recovery and preservation of both salmon and whales. The agency supports breaching four dams on the lower Snake River, in Eastern Washington to help salmon recovery, but that battle has been going on for over a decade, without results. Controlling pesticides is another important step that the EPA should be implementing in the effort to help these two endangered species.Late yesterday, May 11, 2009, The Environmental Protection Agency repealed regulations on Monday that allowed small residues of the pesticide carbofuran in food, a move that's likely to restrict the flow of U.S. crop imports. The report said canceling approved tolerance levels on carbofuran usage would "protect people, especially children, from dietary risk." Carbofuran is one of the six pesticides that has been under scientific review, so possilby the EPA is finally starting to make some regulatory progress.Agribusiness and special interest groups have been successful in stalling plans to breach dams and regulate pesticide application for years. It would seem that wormless apples may have more influence and value to some, than the protection of two critically threatened species.

Source: www.examiner.com/examiner/x-5266-Seattle-Environmental-Policy-Examiner~y2009m5d11-EPA-should-limit-pesticides-to-prevent-twoheaded-Salmon-and-dead-whales