WGBH Roundtable; Pesticides

Good evening we are undertaking a new line of discussion an inquiry one which I suppose in a sense is familiar to most of you because of the writings of Rachel Carson and the question of a silent spring or a more silent spring when we used to have. Is one that we are grateful to Rachel Carson and others for having raised for us the treatment of the resources of our great commonwealth including the resources of trees of wildlife and indeed the conservation of human resources is one of deep concern to the citizens of the Commonwealth. This evening we have to discuss the problem of pesticides in Massachusetts. Some very well-informed people who have a deep concern with this question. Our topic is Massachusetts and the problems of pesticide and our participants are Mr. Allen Morgan who is executive vice president of the Audubon Society of Massachusetts and Dr. George Michael who is chairman of the pesticide board and director of the Food and

Drug Commission for the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. And Mr. Henry S. Davis who is a member of the Executive Committee of the Massachusetts arborists society. In addition we have with us a well-known member of the Fourth Estate a state house reporter for The Boston Globe. Mr. Bryant Rons. In the state house an act was defeated or rather put aside which are borne directly upon some questions we're going to talk about later is evening this was House bill 3 0 4 4 which in a sense was a substitution for an earlier House bill to seven to nine. The essential gist of both bills was that they would provide exemption from license control of tree wardens and superintendents arborists and others who have to do with the application of pesticides. On trees and other.

Other material in the local communities of the state. That is the bill was set aside but it would have provided for exemption of such personnel from a license control and would have provided them in the case of House Bill to 8:53 with a license without examination. This raises a question which I suppose is at the heart of change in Massachusetts. Another example of the difficulty we have in adapting governmental forms and procedures to changing technical and technological conditions of modern life. We have four generations in Massachusetts had local officials who have real responsibility for the management of trees and the care of green growth in our in our local countryside. At the same time in the last few decades we have had the development of a whole technology of pest

control using chemicals which changes the conditions of life. For the. The green growth the for the trees of our countryside. And of the questions that arise are questions at this point of how control of pesticides and their application can be efficiently managed and at the same time. Preserve whatever forms of local control. Are necessary in this regard. To clarify what. I perhaps have confused in my introduction here we have the help of the panelists I have named and perhaps to give us some history of the efforts at local management of these. Resources and at the same time to tell us about the evolution of pesticides. I'm going to turn now to our panelists and ask first Dr. George Michael who is chairman of the state pesticide board if you will tell us a bit about what the

situation is as he sees it. Dr. Michael. Thank you doctor. This matter of pesticides. As we have come to understand it today I went through a process of evolution starting at the end of World War 2. Up until last time our purses the size were very few and not all of the highly lethal or highly toxic Mariah. However our agricultural interests found after the invasion of Germany that many very highly toxic chemical compounds were being used by the Germans with a great deal of effectiveness in the control of insects. These chemicals included some of the very highly toxic phosphate organic phosphate compounds and the like. We then developed a series of technical logical

advancement in these products here in the United States. And this material was released in ever increasing quantity and numbers for use in agriculture and to control pests in general. We have in the United States a registration act under the United States Department of Agriculture which registers all pesticides to be used in the United States. We have in Massachusetts and now a parallel law which will allow our state due to a recent amendment that went through the last couple of months the opportunity to review the work done by the federal government. And if we feel that in the interest of protecting the people of Massachusetts that more stringent regulations of a certain compound unnecessary or if we believe that a compound shouldn't be used at all

we will have the prerogative of utilizing the judgment which is in the best interest of our people. Two or three years ago with the help of the Audubon Society the Farm Bureau and the Department of Natural Resources and I was they came into being a pesticide board. This board has a duty protecting the public against the indiscriminate use or against the ab use of pesticides by anyone who may use or apply these materials on the land of another. In other words it does not apply to the homeowner himself who may wish to spray in his own home. It doesn't apply to directly to a farmer who follows the

schedules set forth by the University of Massachusetts experiment station which by the way carefully considers the use of pesticides by the farmer and says For they definite procedure that he should follow. If the family however deviates from these good tools then he comes under the purview and licensing provisions of the statute. The statute doesn't also apply to pest control operator is who may use these materials within a building or under a building. But it would apply to them if they use it outside of these areas and this pesticide board was given the authority to license users and applicators by a regulatory process that is a process of establishing rules and regulations. It also was by statue ordered to license airplane

spray is by far blanket mode more of an area than any ground applicator could do in a certain time. So these men are now licensed by the pesticide board for aerial spraying in Massachusetts. The pesticide board by the way consists of the Commissioner of Public Health as the chairman the commissioner of natural resources the Commissioner of Public Works. The director of the fish and game division of the Department of Natural Resources. The chairman of the reclamation board and the commissioner of agriculture. And believe me as chairman of this group it is a very active and conscientious body which is determined to protect the public without having us lose the highly desirable. Benefits can

be obtained from the use of proper proper use of pesticides. Now we have during the last several months set up a draft of rules and regulations upon which we would base our licensing process. I might state that this licensing process is absolutely an educationally oriented type of mechanism. We feel that no one who applies themselves as long as they can read the English language should fear and not be unable to obtain a license. We feel that everyone will have a license who really intends to apply himself to this work. We of course are setting up this licensing process as a means of protecting the person who applies the material in the first instance. In the second instance to protect the environment of

our communities. We also want to protect our human beings who may come in contact with these extremely toxic materials as well as domesticated animals and so forth. We are very much concerned about our crops that are growing in the fields and we want to make sure that besides the pesticide the farmer uses to protect these crops that there aren't additional blankets or pesticides applied by general type of spraying and so forth. Now the press a sideboard really has its work cut out for it and has set forth to conduct an educational program in this area the likes of which has never been conducted before. Of course all of this material that we're talking about today the people that we are reaching I guess and part of this educational process we have already

conducted about 20 courses in different locations of the state for those who are interested in this subject and we will conduct about 30 more within the next month or two period. And so that is about it. Thank you very much Dr. Michael. Just let me ask one question. How long did you say the pesticide board had been in existence almost two years now of years now and its work is really in a sense just getting underway in full. That's right. This is an experiment as you know doctor and it's been a very high just feeling our way along to do it and do the job properly without disrupting an essential services. Right and when you talk about licensing applicators you're talking about public officials who are responsible for this sort of thing at the local level and also private people as well that's great. Yes that's correct. All right thanks very much Dr. Michael. I'd like if we may for a moment to turn to Mr. Allen Morgan who was executive vice president of the

Audubon Society of Massachusetts because we know that people have been very very much concerned about this subject Mr. Morgan. What are your views Dr. Patterson. I view it. Often misunderstood. We've been in a terribly difficult position because in the pesticide controversy it has been terribly easy to say that the ban was against progress against raising better food against public health and all this sort of thing when really this hasn't been the case at all. Our position is that the technology that applies in terms of pesticides to raising food doesn't necessarily apply blanket to the countryside. Our concern is based on the fact that these new products I've very toxic most of them are relatively nonselective. And there has been a tremendous a tremendous

wave of public opinion that in effect says well if DDT is wonderful for raising KHON let's spread it all over Massachusetts so we won't get bitten by mosquitoes anymore. And this again puts Audubon in a difficult position because no one likes to get bitten by mosquitoes. I don't like to get bitten by mosquitoes but there's a lot more to it than that. And our knowledge of the biology of our general environment is really so far behind our technical ability to to throw our weight around if I can use that example I use porn and I use boys and. Has outstripped knowledge of the long term result and perhaps I can give you an example. You can spray a robin and we've talked about robins and their relationship to Dutch Elm Disease Control. You can spray a robin directly with DDT and it doesn't hurt him. You can feed him DDT directly and it doesn't hurt him.

What does hurt the robin is his fondness for earthworms and the earthworm picks up DDT in the soil after it's fall in the air from being applied to a tree and he not only stores it within his body and builds it up and concentrates it but he also changes it chemically to something that is new and highly toxic to Robins. Now 20 years ago it looked from everyone's viewpoint as though DDT were the the wonder drug of pest control. Because we we didn't know these subtle relationships. It took us 10 or 12 years to discover this. This food chain problem with the robin. Another problem which is far more basic and fire more serious I think has recently been. Demonstrated by the Bureau of commercial fisheries again in terms of DDT. They have demonstrated that concentrations of DDT that are so small

that technically we couldn't detect their presence as recently as five years ago. Now essentially eliminate the capacity of plankton in the ocean to manufacture food. Now again in terms of public debate this is a terribly difficult argument to try to sell to the general public a plan B because of of note most people don't recognize the importance of plankton here in microscopic plants and animals in the ocean which are the basis of all. And most of our rivers are many of our rivers in North America already exceed concentrations of DDT exceed by a wide margin. What ocean plankton can tolerate. And it's it's using these highly toxic chemicals blanket for essentially nuisance purposes mosquitoes in Gypsy mas and so on. Where from the trained biologists viewpoint the hazards

to many other kinds of life. Certainly have very great I think for example of the fact that people move from the city and come out into the suburbs and buy a home and want to live in the country and they don't like to get bitten by mosquitoes. Well again no one likes to get bitten by mosquitoes but they they set up a hue and cry for mosquito control with blanket spraying. Never recognizing that there are probably 15 or 20 thousand species of insects and immediate vicinity of their homes that are also becoming killed never recognizing that there are there are frogs in and aquatic animals and birds and many other things which are being affected very broad ways of depend upon my eyesight by further support. Yes precisely and consequently our our position has been. That we think we're paying too great a price or at least we should know and properly assess the real price before we buy some of these blankets brain programs. But

let me reiterate before I close Dr Bettis in that abolition is is not against the judicious use of these tools by properly trained people the way a doctor uses drugs in treating a human patient. What we oppose very strongly is the untrained populace blasting of the countryside with highly toxic chemicals to try to suppress something which is essentially a nuisance. Now we're going to come back Mr Morgan to the point you've made because they interest us very much and ask for some illustrations of what the Audubon Society has done in connection with attempting to get more judicious use of pesticides and poisons. By May I just so we can get around the table here with the panelists I'd like to turn now to Mr. Henry asked Davis. After that we're going to have questions from Mr. Owens. I turn to Mr. Davis who is a member of the Executive Committee of the Massachusetts arborists society. Before you

say anything else Mr. Davis maybe you can tell us just a little bit about the arborists society. Yes this is a group of private men who treat trees in a private way through a commercial. Enterprise. And there are a group of about 35 active companies in this part of the state and then other persons who work for this company. These companies who are members of the association. About four years ago they set up a certification of this group where they will be examined as to their abilities and to carry out care properly. Then there is a second group that is a much larger and older organization called the Massachusetts tree wardens and foresters Association which is primarily connected with the tree warden and the mall superintendent and represents his interests. I wish I could speak for any one group

but I'm not going to attempt to primarily due to the fact that I have a considerable disagreement on this particular point of licensing and control. Understood. About 10 years ago no group of West tempted a Mr. Mannion from the North Shore worked very hard on getting a licensing of these people whether they would be arborists or warns a license that would control them in all phases of their work here regardless whether it was a pesticide control and at the time the notch Department of Natural Resources was the group that was hoped it would mostly handle this type of work and it was defeated and became very difficult and was given up hope that maybe in another 10 to 15 years the public be ready to accept such a thing. And then of course we came along with the crime rate problem and our other publicity that we've been hearing on pesticides the.

Parkman of Public Health came into this picture and this sort of irritated I believe some of the tree wardens as they felt that a group in the field of natural care of natural resources should come under such a department and not under the part of the public. And so right from the beginning there was a split sometimes they were wondering whether Mr. Dr. Michaels or some of the men in the department public health really understood the problem and it has since then been a very difficult licensing procedure to approach on the agreeable terms from all these various groups. But we have this now and we are going to have to try and make this licensing benefit not just the public but both the arborists and the tree warden and the last superintendent and the tree warden. Fifty years ago in this state and in most all of these New England states was a very

important person to the town because trees were a very important thing there were air conditioners. Many of the things that we have today when we sneak away from the shade of trees that are no longer there and some of the tree warden has been continually downgraded he lost a position his position legally in many towns and been in control of the Department of Public Works. And he feels that in some cases again here we come along with the Department of Public Health is coming in and they just will not be such a thing as a person responsible for public trees. I'd like to give a few examples of some of the problems a few rewards have in regard to these pesticides and the use of pesticides. About just a few seasons ago I was passing down a suburban street and saw a mist blowing operation as an air blast machine sprays for control of insect pests along town and city streets and they were spraying

for control of the beetle that spreads the Dutch elm disease. And I was surprised to see these young men wearing no shirt no hat no gloves and they were plying this dormant Sprite is probably the highest concentration of DDT it you would have caved in to you and I stopped and asked them what they were doing and they said Well we're we're trained to kill a Dutch elm disease. And I asked them what they were spraying for and they said well 300 percent concentration. We don't know. And they said just what are we supposed to be for and they were interested but nobody had told me. So then there's this this shocked me a great deal and I looked into the situation and wondering why young college boys are being paid a dollar and dollar 60 cents an hour are out using this type of. And I found was good let me ask Mr. Davis what did you consider this to be dangerous to them personally. Oh I was certainly did it with the oily irregardless of the DDT the

oil it was was in the carrying agent in the spray next year it would be very harmful design into their skin. And I called up and made some of the research on this particular problem and found out that the town tree warden was being paid about $700 a year for the his job pre-war. And he couldn't possibly carry on a responsible department dispensing thousands of gallons of these chemicals and being given an income of that amount a year. He had to go out in the spring of the year and carry on a landscape business or some other enterprise to give him enough to live on and still carry on the responsibilities of pre-war. And this is the problem really of the cities and towns could appreciate that if they want trees in the place I want to save these trees they're going to have to give the tree warden a reasonable incomes. And likewise he

must give the town the. Background and experience and training and this licensing I do feel it will help a great deal to lift the standards of the tree warden in the cities and towns if it can be worked in such a way to as an educational program as Dr. Marcus has pointed out. Mr. Davis another question of what you're saying interests me very much in the particular case you spoke of Suburban and sons were missed spraying of the heavy concentration of DDT was occurring. Would the tree warden in that case have have the skill and know how to of known the dangers that were involved would you consider this or was it strictly a matter of whether you had enough time I think you know he probably could have if he had had the time to go in and study the problems of these particular pesticides that he's using. But he barely has the time to go out and hire the college boys at these very small salaries alone to pay them to even send them out to spray the trees which you

directed to another example and this is answering the same question that you just brought up that. The last May about the 10th of May I had a phone call one Saturday morning from a town in the western part here and they said that there were there was a robin on the front lawn it was quivering and shaking and the spraying had been going on the next the day beforehand and I called two other people on the street and they had noticed this other the same condition with another type of bird. The day before it was a weekend and I called the town chap in the town who I knew well who had actually done this for him and he said this is impossible. We realize we're doing this brain much too late but we are being taken off and putting on rubbish collection work and we have only one machine to spray seven or a hundred trees in the town says we must spray these trees and that's why we're doing this so late. They realise sometimes the error but the pressure is unbelievable to accomplish what they have to do with the very small resources.

Very good thank you very much Mr. Davis for having given us an introduction to the problem as you see it. We certainly have gotten some specific information from these three gentlemen with regard to the problems of using pesticides and controlling that use in the public interest. But I'd like to turn now if we may to our representative of the newspapers in this case Mr. Bryant Ron statehouse reporter for The Boston Globe. And I know that Mr. Owens has a deep interest in this field and some good questions to ask Mr. Allen. Well apparently I'm to play the devil's advocate in this where you can rely on you know several you know the angels advocate to if he wanted several questions arise in my own mind during this discussion and one I'd like to put it either Mr. Morgan or Mr. DAVIS. Apparently there's a dichotomy of desires between the two of you. For one who was maybe principal interest would be in preserving elm trees and another was concerned that the spraying of elm trees

may be harmful to Robins I'm wondering what the answer is if either of you would have an opinion how do you resolve this difference do you stop spraying elm trees and perhaps lose them or do you continue and perhaps lose more Robins. Man you must try and I try first. This is a wonderful example because we're as interested in elm trees as anyone else. No one likes to see elm trees die. Many of Mr. Davis is remarks about tree wardens being under finance though a very germane because the prevention of Dutch elm disease has failed and failed miserably across Massachusetts in the last 10 to 15 years. Towns were appropriated money every year and given it to the mosque superintendent or the tree warden and said Here go out and protect our elms and they've gone out and they've sprayed the elms and the elms continue to die primarily because the town has not gone to the technically trained people to find out the

whole story and then decide whether it wants to pay the real price for saving Elmer's because a lot more to it than just spraying. Now I think I think. And then I thought about Ron has never said Thou must not ever spray an elm to try and protect it from Dutch elm disease. But we do object to dosing them all with DDT and then watching them die anyway and at the same time doing a lot of wildlife damage. Well this is all very true and I do think that it's only fair to point out that there are private organizations and there are cities and towns in other areas of the country that can show records of groups of elm trees scattered about a suburban area such as Boston or in specific cities and towns where they lose one elm tree out of two or three thousand elm trees every other year. And this is the case where there are other fans there's the

interest and there is the discipline concerned by the property owner to continue a program and it isn't frustrated by the change of the politics in the town so that the next year well we're going to spend the money on a new storage system in the back with the trees and so they start the program and then somebody else decides to go start the next year. And this sort of thing has to be stopped and you have to put it in the hands of a Shakeri commission who's been very successfully carried out in cities and towns and Connecticut and these people have the continued responsibility and they are politically effected and the programs are changed politically. Before Mr. Owens comes home with another question Mr. Davis and Mr. Martin I need to ask one myself because as a completely. On an informed lay citizen I hear I'm confused I thought. From all that I've heard hearsay and what I've read that the Dutch elm disease was pretty much of an epidemic matter over which we had very little control on here you've said

something Mr Davis that excites me very much you've mentioned areas where you say the control apparently is effective enough to keep epidemic proportions of Dutch elm disease from developing Is this correct. Well we have a we have cities of in our area right around suburban Boston and doing an excellent job and we have large private properties that have been doing an excellent job. But the cost of spying each elementary is is really prohibitive. You would theoretically have to show close to schools that keep up the program if you have eight or nine hundred elm trees in a small suburban town of Worcester or this field. And so you have to pick a few important to study medically valuable trees to the town and stick with those trees and not try to spread it all over the whole town because the cost is very very difficult. This is the problem of the failures. Been so terrific. Mr. MARTIN. Well there's there's another part of the problem also it's not just spraying it is sanitation. If I can use a simile which I think is a valid

one. Towns that rely entirely on spraying to control Dutch elm disease can be compared to a physician who uses drugs to try to control a person with appendicitis. You're never going to lick the appendicitis in two you eliminate the source of the infection. And I've been involved very recently in correspondence with a tree warden in a suburban town here in Massachusetts and he has complained bitterly about my insistence on sanitation by saying the town can't afford it. My sanitation You mean while cutting down and destroying a diseased tree. I say to eliminate the source of the infection. Now when you speak of of of this being an epidemic it is an epidemic. And here again we've made a fundamental mistake many years ago we planted too many of one species of tree. Need like the balance that nature goes to work on any standard anything in tries to break it down.

Let's let's play it a dozen different varieties of trees that this would be a good deal safer in the long run. Absolutely if I manage to interrupt now before Mr. Owen's next question I know he's got one cooking here. This is Franklin Patterson at the Lincoln violin center Tufts University and our program tonight is concerned with the topic of Massachusetts and the problems of pesticide. We're fortunate this evening to have with us as participants Mr. Alan Morgan whose voice you just heard the executive vice president of the Audubon Society of Massachusetts Dr. George Michael who is chairman of the Massachusetts pesticide board and director of the Food and Drug Commission for the Massachusetts Department of Public Health. And Mr. Henry asked Davis who is member of the Executive Committee of the Massachusetts arborists society and we have our with us also Mr. Bryant Ron's Statehouse reporter of The Boston Globe whose turn it is right now to come in with that question he was holding back Mr. Romney. Yes I'd like to direct this question to Dr. Michael if I may.

As I understand it and as you say the state pesticide board is conducting a study now which may result in greater restrictions with what may be determined as potentially harmful types of insecticides and pesticides and so forth. I have a can of a very common I know that there's an aerosol can you have your on the table Mr. Owens what it is it's a well it's a very common commercial commercially distributed insect killer. And on the back. It's a list of things different kinds of insects that this world will eliminate. And also in printed very large letters a list of six cautionary measures that a person should take. Now I notice on here it says that this insecticide can be used to spray in clothes and that would destroy a manas. And the first precautionary measure says Don't spray on skin. And so it was this would seem to be contradictory at least and presumably this is the kind of thing that the state pesticide board is looking into now. If the

board came to the conclusion that this can this apparently harmless insect killer were in truth not harmless and decided to take it off the market. And yet the precautionary measures are printed I'm hearing a person can read them and decide for himself whether he should use them or not this seems to be repetitive of the fluoridation controversy the anti-smoking controversy that a person has a simple right to decide for himself whether he'll use that and it's an insecticide whether he'll smoke whether he'll use chlorinated water now how would you justify taking this commercial insecticide after market on that basis that it may be inhibiting some person's personal right. Dr. Michael. Mr. Allen you make a very good point. First I think I'd like to clarify the area of responsibility here. The particular aerosol can you're referring to comes under the Registration

Act which is in force by the Department of Public Health Division of food and drugs. You're trying about state or federal state right now. The pesticide board doesn't concern itself with these packaged items has a side bar only concerns itself with those who may you know or apply pesticides on the lands of another. And I get back to the. Point you make a very good one. You say How can we as a government agency prohibit the sale of an item which might be too toxic or for distribution by a general means to household usage. Well this is not a unusual concept in the field of public health. We do this in many many areas as you know Mr. Rollins. However in order to try not to be too.

Technical and exact in the items that we must prohibit from reaching our household who may want to use an item we have these precautions such a lot on this hand as you have very alertly observed. We certainly may not be in agreement with some of these cautionary statements on here but up until a month ago as I mentioned we had no choice. We were required by our own law to accept a federal registration per se. Now we are going to try to review these matters. But as in all items of course we have a problem and that is personnel and money. You know how to do these jobs and it's up to greater power than ourselves of the state house to the term on how much money should be appropriated for this particular work. I would say that we would need at least forty thousand dollars in appropriations in order to develop a

staff which would take every label like this that you have here. Of which there are about 3000 now in Massachusetts and evaluate them on various points of consideration. Arthur Michael do you have a laboratory for such evaluation. What do you find the pong rounds are the questions walking around. Dr Patterson we have a laboratory and the governor had provided us in the last supplementary budget what two or three people to start this laboratory gone. We also have one staff person who is working on this as an inspector per se. We are trying to obtain a technical person there. The money can be provided for who would be conversant with these various ingredients that are in here and who may be in a position to evaluate each and every label. Right now for myself to do this or my chief of laboratory was the other qualified person I division it would take a complete time and we just couldnt

do it. However this matter that Mr. Rollins brings out is a very interesting one for all and you want to pursue this. I have one other question in terms now of less control of the Western backed side but in terms of more control I think that. You have regulations now which do not apply pesticide regulations now would not apply to the homeowner or to the pest control operator was working inside and I think now of Mr. Carson's book and in the example which he has of this kind of a professional pesticide operator who did a cleansing job on a home in Florida and a child and a dog who were exposed to the to the pesticide used. The dog died the same day and the child went into convulsions and apparently the results are long lasting. And I'm wondering if there is any attempt on the part of the state pesticide board to gain more control greater

restriction in terms of in terms of that. Well this area Michael Patterson this area was actually a lot of considerable land during the studies on the present legislation. However we did not find sufficient justification to set up a control over the PC area. PC also called a pest control operator. However many of these Manna will be coming under the pesticide board licensing because besides doing work within the home they also do considerable amount of work outside of the home. They have a very strong organization and many of the membership at the initiation of the pesticide legislation probably should be excluded from this legislation and they were very effective in lobbying against it.

What sort of licensing are they under now they're under no licensing at the present time. The only licensing they will be affected by would be if they get out and so the work on lawns and trying to get rid of pests like lawns and so Mr. Davis I think is a point of connection here to all just point you brought up of course book so many of these cases are. It used I think unfairly in the respect that in checking into these situations you find out that the applicator didn't know really all that he should know about the particular material he was applying in a great many of these cases they were improperly applied too much put on the improper material put on for the particular situation and this licensing that we're talking about in Massachusetts is the sort of thing that's going to prevent these things from coming out that reflect on many applicators who are knowledgeable in all respects in regard to this up occasion and they will not be reflected upon by such situations that indicate that

applicators don't know how to apply. I'm really rather surprised Mr. Davis and Dr. Markel to hear if I do hear correctly that PCOS would be passed pest control operators are not under any licensing provisions. Oh is this correct. That's correct and they are obviously. And even though they're not outdoors with public property they are dealing with the materials but less presumably less diverse less well-versed Sort of them. Have in their homes and with families to some extent of people. We do require licensing over what Christian or other occupations where dangers are involved. I'm at a loss has to account for the fact that PCOS are not license or no license at all this frightens me to some extent. While I don't live in my home I yeah I long time ago.

I have developed an insulation against such shock and lice and so forth because when you're trying to get legislation through in a legislature and with a democratic system you try your best to convince the legislature toys that this is something that is necessary. On the other hand someone else may have a more convincing idea. What the site you mean and what form it may take maybe it is a question of all forms of variations. However I do feel that there will be within the next year or two a move made and I'm hoping that as a result of this press the side board program that this move will come from the press control operators themselves. That is those who are doing a good job will feel that there should be anything that. Will allow a

incompetent person from using these materials. I saw that I think this will be covered within a short period of time. No as a private citizen I certainly hope so because the prospect of perhaps on trained personnel dealing with highly toxic materials that may affect children or animal life is a rather disturbing one. I think Mr. Morgan of the Audubon Society has a point here. I just think it's in Congress that that because the best control operate is strong lobbyists they can they can avoid licensing when we're now going to have licensing to try to protect wildlife. This certainly is it seems as though a breakdown in the democratic process. Why on this logic it wouldn't make sense if the pharmacists could organize a sufficiently strong lobby of evasion the license withdraw and deal as they wish with drugs correct. I come back to you Mr. Morgan just for a moment and I don't want to preempt a Mr. Rollins

question here but I would appreciate it if you'd tell us a little bit more about what the Audubon Society. Does both in terms of public education or education of the public and in terms of studying the ecological aspects of the use of pesticide poisons you mentioned an interesting development of understanding of the impact of DDT on the wildlife of robins. What what sorts of things does the society do to transmit information and to discover information about the relationship between pesticides and wildlife and trees and so well. Doctor the the job of basic research in pesticides is such a gigantic one involving so many years and so many millions of dollars for personnel and so forth that as a practical matter our research is devoted entirely to research in the literature

trying to be kept entirely up to date on the biology of what we're talking about. And we have one full time person who for the last three or four years has done little else. Dr. William H. Jerry who is a trained professional biologist and has specialized in this we have also asked investigating the literature literature and I'm translating that so that you can make it available to the public. Yes and then we have. Our function primarily is one of education. We try to popularize an interest in the out of doors we try to sell the public on the fact that our environment is pretty important to people and that people's help is a reflection of the health of their environment and we try to to point out that our technology doesn't provide us. So it is not the sole provider of our food and that there are a broad biological problems here as we try these technological manipulations

but our role therefore is primarily one of trying to make the long term implications digest them and put them into a form where the layman can hope to understand them but it's a terribly difficult problem because we. Well as I say three or four years ago samples of seawater that were said to have no DDT in them have now been demonstrated to be lethal to something like an oyster within a very short period. What I want to reference to is the society Mike with regard to informing the legislature. Well we're a charitable nonprofit organization and such. We are prohibited from lobbying and we don't know what I said in forming legislation. We we educate the public. We educate our members we educate the legislators as best we can. We do appear at hearings very very occasionally on very important subjects often as a result of a direct invitation by someone like Dr. Michaels

or commissioner Foster of natural resources. But. We do our best to join former members and we hope that the public in turn will inform its legislators. Now I'm not around like you. I question eat for Eva Mr. Davis or Mr. Morgan I'm just wondering if there have been any attempts at coordination on the investigatory level between people arborists or people interested in plant life forms and persons interested in wildlife with this interview that perhaps if you can get together and decide what's good and what's bad and what should be done on an independent level while the state is working on this on the governmental level if perhaps this kind of frontal assault on two different levels wouldn't be a good thing I'm wondering if anything has been attempted in this area. Mr. Market man I man I try to answer this first this is a terribly difficult question. I get along wonderfully with Mr. Davis and I hope he with me

because we have done just this. But and this point was brought out a little earlier by one of the other speakers. We get up against problems like this. I have I know of one Superintendent of Public Works for example who has fought Audubon in opposition on pesticides very strongly not on the basis of the biology involved but on the basis is the fact that spraying in his community represents a an additional form of revenue so that he can keep more department employees at work than he otherwise would be able to. In other words you run up against the the personal financial vested interest of you know well perhaps in that interest patronage but in other interests pesticide applicators who is out to make a living period. And he has been so conscientiously are not on the fact that you've got to spray all the trees in Middlesex County or they'll die. And besides he gets paid and paid well for it.

Design is unfair Mr. Davis yesterday. Well I think just a little unfair to Morgan in the respect that there are those sort of lost behind the scenes men that have spent their lives in this that have been so reduced in their authority that they are doing their best behind the scenes to protect the trees the public interest but there are these political entities whether they are the heads of the Department of Public Works or whatever they may be who find these funds in their hands they do use them in such a way that it is advantageous to the whole department. And if something has to be done with us for that some time to look for the tree spray at the proper time of the year. But there are men working within these departments that have been so downgraded that you can't really see them or hear from them properly in the field work. Our organization is.

Done a great deal to try and do some research on this but they have been concerned they've been concerned in turning over information to certain groups that may be played up and written in what is Mr Rounds is referring to here Silent Spring and not realistically evaluated. And this dramatizing these issues is of some concern in turning over information. But I happen to be concerned with this and last year turned over soil samples to Dr. William Tompkins of the Westborough laboratory division of fish and game from underneath a large very large on free for all. And to determine whether this particular elm tree had a high degree of DDT underneath the tree actually been sprayed for a great many years and also just how far away from this particular tree. The DDT residue was the most of the concern here was that there was

a hay field where the hay was being sought. And we were concerned that there was a rift going on in that field even though the tree was sprayed prior to any grass coming out and that there might be some contamination and it was assume by us frankly before this laboratory test that there probably was contamination. But I have a letter here which states that the soil underneath the young tree was definitely highly concentrated with very many Robin feeding directly underneath our own tree would be injured by the DDT. But past the drip line or the spread of the tree there was practically no relief on the soil top and these sort of tests that they're made in their cities and towns an arborist will turn in various trees where they kept careful records of the amount of concentration on to the pesticide bar to Mr. Tompkins the top count of your Fish and Wildlife Service done this cooperation can be felt. That is sensible.

Research for me started on the home front you might say. And then these regulations can carry into the field. Mr. Morgan another camera I just comment very brazen that is one of the problems here. Mr. Davis is spoken of the of the tree superintendent who's been on the job for 40 years. One of the problems is that our technology has run the competence of the layman to make judgments here and the public just refuses to take a technically trained person like Dr. Michael like Dr. Drew Carey and take their advice. The superintendent who's been on the job for 30 years cannot be competent to work to judge these new pesticides because his training no matter what it was was before they had evolved. It's become a terribly technical subject. And when you hire a lawyer boy you've got to take his advice and we should be hiring technical experts here and taking their advice. I would say to me this is exactly the work that you and Mr. Davis do Mr. Maher and I would be extremely important to the public in the way of translating and make of it making

available reliable information. I know that Mr. Owens has another question here that he wants to put to someone not a question but first I'd like to perhaps some of the listeners may be interested will be talking about DDT and I know a lot of people might think of that as a harmless powder which a lot of soldiers had dusted dusted their clothes with during the war but the arms towards the war. List Council as pointed out in her book that there are two major types of insecticide poisoning and for the first of them is a chlorinated hydrocarbon in the second isn't an alkaline organic phosphate DDT years of the higher hydrocarbon type and it is considered a cumulative poisoning in that it collects in the fatty fatty substance of the body and may result has resulted in the disintegration of the liver and other types of tissue so it is definitely potentially harmful but a question to

Dr. Michael would be this is saying as there are approximately 200 new chemicals of this nature produced in the United States every year and this is these are the kinds of things that we wouldn't have to deal with on a day to day basis is there any kind of re-education and we realize that there isn't a basic education or educational process when when a person is licensed by this to any kind of re-education other words of a tree would require every year to come up to for this licensing and will he get this indoctrination every year and after Mark our short answers we hope to childish all and what the educational process of the licensing plan where they met with the Santa licensees on a periodic basis whenever a controversy develops. This would mainland that you do look forward to a continual education program because the technology is changing constantly. No question one of my it was the continuing primary good. We have time gentlemen for a closing remark a brief one from each of you I know Dr Michael has a

further comment that he wants to make one thing that we haven't had much time for which we should have tried to include was a big word for prevention. Mr. Morgan has pointed out sanitation in conjunction with the Dutch elm disease and a great deal of pesticide spraying can be eliminated by good preventive measures. For now that's the direction in which we are to move us. Mr. MARTIN Well I think all I can reiterate is that the public must recognize that there is a major problem here and that it isn't one that's going to be settled in public fiery emotional debate. They've got to take the train advice of people like Dr. Michael and the pesticide board and live with it. All right Mr. Henry after Davis but I just hope that people will make sure that the man whom they hired to do their spraying is licensed and he is properly train the public's responsibility here is terribly important

to make sure that whoever they are having do this frank that they are liable and take their word on the necessity and rely on the licensing of the state is carrying out. But I do believe that the public must be responsible. Thanks Mr. Davis Mr. Round Yes I agree that with Mr. Davis that the public does have to take the responsibility and I see every day at the State House the power that lobbyists of pesticides and other lobbyists have. And the only thing that we have to offset it the general public is the outcry the letters to legislators and so forth letting them know what our feelings are.