What happens when you live next to a property that uses 3 different pesticide spraying companies?

What happens when you live next to a property that uses three different pesticide spraying companies?

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is the agency that determines whether a pesticide is safe for residential uses. This determination is made by testing each pesticide one pesticide at a time. What happens then when a neighbor uses three pesticide spraying companies and there is no co-ordination between them as to when they will be applying their pesticides? Sometimes the neighbor has two different companies spray pesticides one day apart — sometimes the applicators want to apply their pesticides on the same day. Either way this means that the neighbor is not exposed to one pesticide --but to a combination of pesticides — and now the safety is questionable.

What would cause a property owner to hire three, or even four, different pesticide companies?

In Connecticut we now have many additional pesticide companies that advertise to the public the need for their very targeted pesticide applications. Years ago there were lawn-care companies that spayed for weed and fungus controlling pesticides and there were tree companies that sprayed trees for various insect controls.

Now, we have added to these two different pesticide spraying companies relatively new “mosquito” control companies that spray every 21 days and we have flea and tick pesticide companies that spray often as well.

With four different pesticide companies, all advertising why people need their special pesticide services, this is how you get neighbors hiring three and four companies with no coordination between them and no protection for neighbors other than signing up on the Connecticut pesticide notification registry.

Many people think that when a pesticide company says it’s product is”organic” that the product is safe.

If it is a pesticide — it is designed to kill things — organic or not — it does not mean it is safe? Organic simply means it was not chemically created. Poison Ivy is organic, arsenic is organic, asbestos is organic — that does not mean they are safe.

Here are what rights we do have in Connecticut:

The Connecticut DEEP, Pesticide Division, has a pesticide registry that citizens can sign up on. This registry requires sprayers who will be applying pesticides to neighboring properties to call the abutting property owner 24 hours in advance of their spraying. The pesticide company is required to tell the abutting property owner what they will be applying — if the pesticide company is asked. This allows neighbors to bring in their pets and close their windows during the time the neighbor’s property is sprayed.

Here are what rights we do not have in Connecticut:

If a sprayer calls and advises the neighbor they will be spraying next door — and the neighbor says, “I am having a outdoor party that day, would you postpone the spraying a day,” the pesticide applicator does not have to do that. The pesticide company’s only requirement is to advise the abutting property owner that they will be spraying and what they will be spraying if asked.

What residential pesticide laws would be helpful in light some people hiring so many sprayers all at once?

With so many pesticide companies being hired by the same property owner, and because the safety of each pesticide is determined by testing them one at a time — should there be a law that requires these pesticide companies to coordinate their spraying schedules?