Comments on: When good people use Roundup

By: richard

richard — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 16:58:21 +0000

Help!
Our town citizen’s group maintains a nice preserve. One of the active members offered to apply Roundup to Poison Ivy. I opposed, saying that, although trouble to some, Poison Ivy is a native plant which has beneficial attributes for birds and wildlife.
I am opposed to using a herbicide that may also affect other plants and amphibians.
Could someone offer any strong arguments I can bring to our board should I find that they would accept the offer of herbicide treatment?

I offered to go in and prune egregious growths near paths if that would do the trick. (Now if they take me up on it,I’ll have to find the time to do this)

By: Paul

Paul — Tue, 27 May 2008 19:54:24 +0000

Great website. I am a avid gardener in the Atlanta area. I’ve found Roundup to be a very useful herbicide for specific purposes i.e. spot weed control on driveways,along edges and controlling poison ivy, etc.
None is ever applied to my vegetable garden as I try to be a organic as possible.

By: Susan Harris

Susan Harris — Mon, 12 May 2008 22:36:05 +0000

I just found this in a pamphlet about “Garden Maintenance for the Eco-Friendly Gardener” published by Green Springs Garden in VA, which does the best and most eco-gardening public education in the DC region. It calls Glyphosate “a relatively safe herbicide with minimal impact on the environment due to rapid breakdown and few effects on non-target species.” Around water they say to use a formulation without surfactant, like AquaMaster or Rodeo. Glyphosate is “commonly used to control perennial weeds and exotic invasive plants. Some perennials are very difficult to remove without herbicides.”

By: Jeff Lowenfels

Jeff Lowenfels — Sat, 10 May 2008 17:00:33 +0000

It isn’t the Chemical in round up that kills the plant that is of concern….a danish study showed that the ‘inert’ ingredients do stick around in the soil and do get into the water system and are not good.

The idea that we can all just use a little, sometimes, and all will be fine is not a valid one…….

Let’s stop poisoning ourselves!

Cheers,

Jeff Lowenfels

By: Mike Malterre

Mike Malterre — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 22:46:15 +0000

I have been searching for an alternative to chemicals and have had no luck. I have 1200 feet of ditch bank to keep clear (by law) and a 1/2 acre pond that fills with eurasian milfoil. I have had to use Reward and Cutrine on the pond as natural methods have failed. Burning the ditch was outlawed and I could never hold down a job and do it by hand. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. 10 acres is a lot to do by hand!

By: Kathy Jentz

Kathy Jentz — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 21:58:20 +0000

I see Round Up as a LAST resort — I have it in my garden shed, but have not had to take it out all last year. I do not like the cavileer way it is sprayed in parks, schoolyards, etc. I think that every means possible should be used before it is employed. We cannot know the longtern effects. Remember how safe “DDT” was considered back in the day?