Comments on: Testing For Aminopyralid in Manure

By: John

John — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:38:35 +0000

I think we can call it the Madness of King George – absolute patronising piffle from the government.

Don’t you make a pesticide with rhubarb leaves, that’s illegal. No, you get yourself a massive multi-national and you can get what you like approved.

By: freddxxy

freddxxy — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:49:55 +0000

Note that today the Prime Minister’s Office confirms that aminopyralid based herbicides are to be released (with better labelling, so that’s O.K.)

By: Ray

Ray — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 19:06:38 +0000

I wish I’d found this site earlier.
Have planted out most of my tomatoes and they are all affected.
Iv’e obtained some other manure and I’m doing a test now, fingers crossed.
Also some dahlia tubers were kept over winter in some dried compost from the previous year and have started to grow really strangely.
I wonder if I took cuttings from these plants they would grow as normal or is it better to throw the lot and start again.
The problem is that this manure has been on my heap for about 3 years and is spread all over the garden.

Great website keep up the good work. Cheers Ray.

By: Mark

Mark — Tue, 05 May 2009 12:15:40 +0000

I have just found out why my spud plants look so strange … yes Aminopyralid, I purchased soil from a local
earth moving contractor who blends his own top soil with
horse manure.

By: John

John — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 10:09:15 +0000

Hi Tim

Thanks for pointing that out, I’ve removed the link. Luckily I copied the relevant information on testing for aminopyralid into the post above so we don’t actually need their site.

Seems to show the level of consideration they have for us that they just whip it off now things are calmer. The cost of leaving a web site like that up would be less than £100 a year. NOTHING to a company like DOW (oops, I’d best calm down)

By: Tim Richardson

Tim Richardson — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 09:53:11 +0000

It appears that the DOW manure matters website is currently not available. It just brings up the following: “Welcome to a test home page for a new website.
Look forward to exciting news and events at this location.” Well I was looking forward to some useful information on Aminopyralid actually. This link is also mentioned in the current (April) The Garden RHS magazine. I assume the site has been working until now?

By: Gbar

Gbar — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 08:37:29 +0000

Hi there

I heard about the B&Q farm yard manure and talked to them directly about this. It was not a problem with aminopyralid as they are very careful how they source their farm manure and are confident that it is clear of aminopyralid, but the present issue is about the quality and variability of the domestic green waste which is mixed with it. They are now confident that they have sorted this problem and will be selling their FYM shortly.

How have other got on with the bean test?

By: Patrick

Patrick — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 20:22:12 +0000

In February this year, I bought four bags of B + Q ‘Farmyard Manure Soil Improver’, and then discovered all this stuff about Aminopyralid contaminated manure.

I contacted B + Q customer service on their web site, asking if there was any Aminopyralid in this product. They did not bother to reply.

I did the tests as above. The edges leaves of the beans (now about 3 weeks old) grown in manure/compost are looking slightly distorted, compared with the compost only ones.

I went back to B + Q today. B + Q ‘Farmyard Manure Soil Improver’ has been withdrawn from sale. I asked why, and no one knew. I showed them a page I had printed about Aminopyralid contaminated manure (from this web site) and they were very interested, and one asked if he could keep it.

I got my money refunded without any problems.
However, B + Q have NOT issued a product recall, presumably because this might mean to have to pay compensation to anyone who has lost plants by using this ‘Soil Improver’?

BTW, Dow AgroSciences also manufacture ‘Atlas Roundup Ready® soybeans’ and many other GM crops. But of course, these are perfectly safe too, if the farmer reads the information.

By: peter h darby

peter h darby — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 20:17:53 +0000

last year i used peat free compost from wickes and all my tomatoes withered. but i also planted some tomato pants from the same seed in wickes multi purpose peat compost with good results. i think the peat free variety may have been composted with aminopyralid contaminated vegetation.