Use of Chemicals in Growing Tobacco

[deluxestogie]

Seems like we needed a place for comments about the pros, cons, uses and misuses of insecticides and chemicals on tobacco. This could encompass anti-sucker products as well.

I'll start with the following, which inadvertently hijacked another thread.

whats so bad about insectides?

My response:
1. One of the reasons I grow tobacco is to avoid the chemicals applied to commercial tobacco.
2. Here's a discussion of the toxicity of Sevin (carbaryl), if you're interested - http://www.pesticide.org/get-the-facts/pesticide-factsheets/factsheets/carbaryl
3. Sevin kills bees and other non-pest members of the soil/plant/animal ecosystem.
4. The "inert" ingredients of carbaryl products are seldom tested.
5. Back when arsenate of lead was regularly used to fight hornworms, "tests" demonstrated that it was "safe."

On the same theme, the following news story appeared today:

The pharmaceutical giant Pfizer will voluntarily suspend US sales of a poultry-pumping additive after studies showed it can leave traces of arsenic in chickens' livers, the US government announced on Wednesday.

"Alpharma, a subsidiary of Pfizer Inc., will voluntarily suspend US sales of the animal drug 3-Nitro (Roxarsone), a product used by poultry producers since the 1940s," the Food and Drug Administration said in a statement.

The FDA said a recent study of 100 broiler chickens found that those treated with Roxarsone, which makes their skins more yellow and boosts their growth, had higher levels of inorganic arsenic in their livers than untreated chickens.

The FDA approved 3-Nitro in 1944, when it became the first arsenic-containing new animal drug product approved by the US regulatory agency.

Some poultry farmers use it to ward off coccidiosis, a parasitic disease that attacks animals' intestines. It also helps chickens gain weight and gives a golden color to their skin.

It's taken the FDA nearly SEVENTY YEARS to reconsider their original approval!

Now, I'm not generally an alarmist, but "FDA Approved" doesn't carry much authority, when it comes to even common sense chemical usage.

I do recognize that many fields of agriculture, including tobacco, require chemicals to make any profit. But my tobacco is not under that constraint.

Bob

 

[Ashauler]

Profit is only one constraint to consider. Time available to tend the crop is another. I attempted to go all organic with my crop of 12 plants last year. I was woefully outgunned and lost a tremendous amount of potentially smokeable tobacco to hornworms. I simply did not have the time to hunt them down and squish them.

For me, the limited use of chemicals is perfectly acceptable.

 

[Jitterbugdude]

Organic can be tricky to use because there is so much bad information out there. Hornworms are very easily controlled ( 100%) by spraying Bt every few weeks or Spinosad. Aphids are easily controlled by spraying soapy water, or if you have the time, spraying them off with a garden hose. Spinosad is also suppossed to kill aphids and in my experience so far this year, it does. Cut worms are easily stopped by sprinkling diatomacouse earth around the plants when they are young. I've grown a lot of crops in th epast and tobacco is one of the easiest to grow organically, with minimal input. A lot of organic growers use Retenone. I do not because it kills everything including beneficial insects. So does neem.

Organic is an easy way to go, getting thru all the BS about it is the hard part. I also raise chickens organically. You would not believe the amount of people that have told me you MUST use a medicated feed for chickens when they are young. Never have/never will and I have zero mortality with my chickens.

Randy B

 

[Ashauler]

Well, there you go, it appears that I was woefully misinformed. What type of expense are we talking about for the Spinosad? I agree, soapy water works well for aphids and they did not bother me much at all. The hornworms were an entirely different matter though.

 

[deluxestogie]

I agree that time is an important matter. From a commercial standpoint, time = labor cost. For an otherwise busy home-grower, time effectively places a limit on the size of the crop. That limit is much lower without the use of chemicals, but it is also much higher than my tobacco needs.

About 200 years ago, when tobacco growing was entirely done by hand, and without chemicals of any kind, most authorities considered between 1 and 3 acres of tobacco as the maximum that an individual farmer could manage alone. [Alone, of course, means with the assistance of spouse and children.] Once all the plants had been transplanted from the seedbeds, the greatest amount of work, aside from harvest, was suckering and picking hornworms.

I don't think I'd want to do that by hand with more than 100 or so plants. But the key to picking hornworms is to check for them daily, and spot the tiny ones early. They leave only tiny divots. The big ones, though, take a few weeks to get big.

So far as I know, every chemical that kills hornworms, also kills the parasitic wasp that helps control hornworms.

Bob

 

[Ashauler]

And there is the rub, my plot is about 20 miles from my home and I simply cannot get there every day. At most I can get out there 3 times a week, and can only spend significant time working the crop on the weekends. This will be just fine for cultivating, weeding, watering, suckering etc.....but them dadgum hornworms kicked my but with that schedule last year.

 

[deluxestogie]

I think that the reason there is any controversy at all is because every one of these compounds has been tested, and seems to not cause any serious, immediate biologic problems for mice and men. The same is true of the toxic vegetables we eat (the solanidine in green tomatoes, the goiterogenic compounds in all the cabbage family, cyanogenic compounds in lima beans, etc.; the list is really quite long). So a path of moderation is reasonable. The largest risk with most agricultural chemicals is exposure of the grower during application of the chemical.

If you decide to use a chemical, as preferable to having a seriously damaged crop, then follow bigbonner's advice and use the least toxic one that will do the job, use a little as required to get the job done, and be careful in handling and storing the stuff.

Bob

 

[FmGrowit]

The formula used in the decision to use chemicals is a combination of economics, human compassion and common sense. I use one chemical at a rate of 50 times less than the manufacturer's recommended rate of application. I never spray as a preventative measure, but spot treatment is necessary occasionally. If I didn't spray at all, I wouldn't have a crop to harvest. Early identification of potential infestation also reduces the amount of chemical application needed to remedy a problem.

The anti-sucker chemical I use doesn't work on Orientals and there's considerable information becoming available to allow selection of varieties that naturally produce fewer suckers. If I planted 10 or more acres, I'm sure I'd have to resort to a regular regiment of chemical applications, but one acre is quite manageable. Last year I didn't spray any MH, but opted to hand sucker instead. This year, I'm looking forward to trying the ancient technique of suckering that Bob reintroduced. Rather than removing the sucker, break it at its base , but leave it attached to the stem. The thought is the sucker will continue to try to grow without the plant sending out a new sucker as it would if the sucker was removed.

There are commercial growers who only care about the bottom line and that's another really good reason to grow your own or buy from a specialty grower.

 

[Jitterbugdude]

Well, there you go, it appears that I was woefully misinformed. What type of expense are we talking about for the Spinosad? I agree, soapy water works well for aphids and they did not bother me much at all. The hornworms were an entirely different matter though.

I can't remember what I paid. A jug of the stuff will last for a few years and costs something like $20.00. I think it is marketed under the name "Monteray", regardless, a google of Spinosad would get you some vendors. As for Bob's concern about killing off the parasitic wasps. The beauty of Spinosad is it only kills whatever eat it. So, spray it on the leaves and whatever eats the leaves will die. So, parasitic wasps, lady bugs, assasin bugs etc are not killed.

Randy B

 

[BigBonner]

Fmgrowit
Im with you on the chemicals . I use way less than the manufacturer says to. I only use admire or the generic to control aphids .I use some Mh to control suckers Which I have to Me being on a larger scale grower .

Admire is listed for use in vegetables .

After topping tobacco the lable say to wait 21 days before harvest . I wait 4 weeks some time more before harvesting . I have seen some farmers get in a hurry and harvest at two weeks .I have seen farmers use more than the recomended amount thinking more was better .The chemicals have to be strong on their tobacco . Other than that I use NO other chemicals on my tobacco . I can put up with a few worms eating my tobacco .My tobacco has been tested by Phillip Morris and has been found chemical free .For this reason I still have a contract with PM .


Here may be a bit of info . Look toward the bottom for Fatty Alcohol http://www.uky.edu/Ag/TobaccoProd/FactSheets/PDF/Alternative Sucker Control Methods.pdf

 

[FmGrowit]

I'm pretty sure we use the same thing...Acephate is the active ingredient. If I were to blend all of my leaf from the '09 harvest, the amount of Acephate in my leaf would be less than 2 nanograms (2/1,000,000,000ths of a gram per gram of cured leaf) Anything less than 1/1,000,000,000 is considered undetectable. Keep in mind, my calulations do not take into consideration the overspray that doesn't even hit the leaf. Nor does it account for the half life of Acephate which is 7 days (every 7 days, the chemical degrades by half). If I didn't use it, I would probably have half of the harvest I do get. I've seen aphids infest a portion of a field. They work fast and can do a lot of damage if left unchecked.

 

[Chicken]

my crop was totally infested with hornworms,,,,

i used a product containing B.T. bacillius therogeniuos,,,

and im amazed at the results,,,,

look closely and you'll see nothin but dead hornworms,,,

...

 

[deluxestogie]

Amazing photos, Chicken. Next season, I'd work at picking the hornworms early. Various insects are developing resistance to the BT.

Bob

 

[Tom_in_TN]

Hey guys, with all due respect, so you want to get rid of Tobacco Hornworm.

Learn how to attract these beauties and life will get better.

Because once they are around this is what is in store for the Tobacco Hornworms:

Sure, you may end up sacrificing a little bit of your yield in the beginning, in the end you will profit.
Stop buying/using pesticides and a whole new world opens up.

 

[Jitterbugdude]

The only problem with that is for every hornworm that a parasitic wasp lays her eggs in, there are literally a 100 or more that she does not. I really like Monteray (spinosad). I use it to control hornworms yet my tobacco always has a nice population of lady bugs and parasitic wasps

 

[johnlee1933]

Seems like we needed a place for comments about the pros, cons, uses and misuses of insecticides and chemicals on tobacco. This could encompass anti-sucker products as well.

I'
On the same theme, the following news story appeared today:

The pharmaceutical giant Pfizer will voluntarily suspend US sales of a poultry-pumping additive after studies showed it can leave traces of arsenic in chickens' livers, the US government announced on Wednesday.

"Alpharma, a subsidiary of Pfizer Inc., will voluntarily suspend US sales of the animal drug 3-Nitro (Roxarsone), a product used by poultry producers since the 1940s," the Food and Drug Administration said in a statement.

The FDA said a recent study of 100 broiler chickens found that those treated with Roxarsone, which makes their skins more yellow and boosts their growth, had higher levels of inorganic arsenic in their livers than untreated chickens.

The FDA approved 3-Nitro in 1944, when it became the first arsenic-containing new animal drug product approved by the US regulatory agency.

Some poultry farmers use it to ward off coccidiosis, a parasitic disease that attacks animals' intestines. It also helps chickens gain weight and gives a golden color to their skin.

It's taken the FDA nearly SEVENTY YEARS to reconsider their original approval!

Bob

In general Bob I agree but you have to realize that since 1944 there have been tremendous advances in detection equipment. I worked in research for many years for a leading developer of more sophisticated and sensitive detection tools. While I agree the arsenic may always have been there, I suggest that failure to detect it had to do with the equipment available to the testers and not the testers themselves. This is much like the Mercury scare in Lake Champlain 20 years or so ago. It came from a paper plant on the lake. Better equipment could detect Mercury at the parts/billion level and the scare was on. I talked with one of the New York State Ag guys at the time and was told "Yeah, If you eat perch three times a day for 70 years you might have some effects." I think the arsenic in chicken livers may be in the same category. The level of arsenic in chicken livers is way below toxic levels unless you live on them and still way below LD50 the level

That said, I still use no insecticides except some of the biological "pest directed" ones i.e. Japanese beetle grubs

John

 

[Tom_in_TN]

I could be wrong about the tobacco hornworm. No tobacco has been grown anywhere near my place
for many years. My experience comes over the past 10 years and not using any pesticides.
I understand the tomato hornworm is similar but a slightly different worm. Every year I see a few
"hummingbird" moths in the late evening. Shortly after that hornworms show up on the tomato plants.

I leave them alone and see a bit of damage to the leaves.
Then I see the hornworms with the cocoons on them.

Then I never see anymore hornworms for the rest of that year.

The earth on my property has plenty of parasitic wasps. I see lots and lots of different parasitic
wasps every year. In fact, just last week I saw 2 parasitic wasps in my garden and it is
still winter. They were searching the dirt for something, or had just hatched out.

So not using any pesticides or herbicides for about 10 years, there are lots of different wasps around.
In the spring and summer I see them quite frequently when I sit for a rest and smoke. I watch them
digging a burrow and within a few hours or so they are bringing their prey, caterpillars of all sorts,
and stuffing them into the burrow. Sometimes I see them bring 2 or 3 caterpillars before closing it up.

I keep 3 areas under some trees and carport bare of plants. That's where the wasps make burrows
and lay eggs. Not sure where the braconid wasps that prey on hornworms winter over but I
know they are here. Same with all the paper wasps and mud-dobber wasps that live around here.
They prey on spiders, caterpillars and other insects. I leave them alone and they leave me alone.

I am still learning.

 

[indianjoe]

Tom,
I sure hope you do not have infestation of hornworms this year, that would be encouraging. Maybe we can learn something about those wasps, but I got lots of wasps too and hornworms aplenty last year. Like Chicken I use BT, but plan on getting some spinosad this year to mix it up.

 

[Tom_in_TN]

Indianjoe, I will have some hornworms!!! Always have some visit us. But if I can keep the infestation down, that would be encouraging. We used pesticides when I helped my brother raise burley 30 years ago but we never smoked any of those crops. Got plenty of chemicals from the commercial cigs though. Stopped smoking those in 2001 and switched to hand rolled cigars. Made a vast improvement in my health too. So then I stopped spraying pesticides on the food I was going to eat.

Got a few ideas I'm kicking around. Plant some early tobacco and tomato, let the bugs eat on it to get a larger predator population. If I can get some money for it I would raise some plants under Agribon cloth to get wrapper leaf for cigars. Shade cloth can fully enclose the plants and keep bugs at bay. I know hornworms come from sphinx moth eggs, also known as hummingbird moths. They fly at night as the weather warms. I can shine a light on a white sheet at night to see when and what moths start coming into the area. Also need to keep the moth population down that go after my corn. Who knows? But, better to use pesticides just on the cloth instead of the plants. Plus, I wonder after successive years of growing tobacco if there could be an increase in certain bugs?

Got to locate some more ladybugs for the aphid problem. Have only seen a few so far this season. Already collected several mantis egg sacks. They will hatch in April.

The parasitic wasps I mentioned in my post above are the ones that go after hornworms. May start carrying my camera with me to document some of the wild things that go on here in Baccyville. The biggest wasps around here are Russian hornets. They are very scary wasps. Do not mess with them critters. I watched them clean out some bugs that infested a Lilac shrub couple of years ago. Sounded like a squadron of helicopters.