Across a 1,000-mile long expanse of farm country from the Great Plains to the Midwest, millions of acres of crops have withered, leaving some fields little more than a brown swath of death.

With thousands of complaints of crop damage across more than 3 million acres in 24 states — including some 100 complaints in Iowa — a longtime University of Missouri plant researcher is calling it possibly the greatest pesticide-caused crop damage in U. S. history.

The culprit is the notoriously drift-prone pesticide dicamba that was supposed to be the answer to weeds’ escalating resistance to the world’s most popular pesticide — Monsanto’s glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup.

As glyphosate-resistant superweeds sprouted across millions of U.S. acres, farmers were assured that spraying both dicamba and glyphosate on a new generation of Monsanto crops genetically altered to resist both pesticides would be the cure.

But the latest pesticide “solution” has created new problems for farmers who choose not to plant those GE crops. With more than 2,600 complaints of widespread damage to soybeans, fruit trees and vegetables, eight states have limited use of dicamba and several class-action lawsuits have been filed against Monsanto.

More than simply an indictment of one pesticide, the dicamba dilemma has spotlighted the challenges of the nation’s increasing dependence on crops genetically altered to resist pesticides, a dependence that has directly fueled an even greater addiction to highly toxic chemicals.

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This was the first year that farmers were allowed to spray it on soybean and cotton fields. (Some farmers did use dicamba illegally last year, provoking disputes between farmers that in one case, led to murder.) Many farmers embraced the new tool. But it quickly turned controversial: Farmers couldn't seem to keep dicamba confined to their own fields.

The problem was worst in Arkansas, where almost 1,000 farmers filed formal complaints of damage caused by drifting dicamba. But the rogue weedkiller has hit fields across soybean-growing areas from Mississippi to Minnesota.

According to estimates compiled by weed scientist Kevin Bradley at the University of Missouri, at least 3 million acres of crops have seen some injury. Most are soybeans that aren't resistant to dicamba, but vegetable crops like watermelons, fruit trees and wild vegetation have been injured as well. The dicamba vapors didn't typically kill the plants but left behind curled leaves and sometimes stunted plants.

"There is no precedent for what we've seen this year," says Bob Scott, a weed specialist with the University of Arkansas.

The Arkansas State Plant Board now has taken the lead in cracking down on the problem. On Thursday, it voted unanimously to ban the use of dicamba on the state's crops from mid-April until November. This amounts to a ban on the use of dicamba in combination with Monsanto's genetically engineered crops. It's not a final decision: The governor and a group of legislative leaders have to sign off on the Plant Board's regulatory decisions, but they usually do so. That won't happen, however, until after a public hearing set for Nov. 8.

The board also approved a steep increase in fines — up to $25,000 — for farmers who use dicamba and similar herbicides illegally.

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Farmers planted a new kind of seed on 25 million acres of soybean and cotton fields this year. Developed by Monsanto, the seeds, genetically modified to be resistant to a weed killer called dicamba, are one of the biggest product releases in the company’s history.

But the seeds and the weed killer have turned some farmers — often customers of Monsanto, which sells both — against the company and alarmed regulators.

Farmers who have not bought the expensive new seeds, which started to appear last year, are joining lawsuits, claiming that their crops have been damaged by dicamba that drifted onto their farms. Arkansas announced a 120-day ban of the weed killer this summer, and it is considering barring its use next year after mid-April. Missouri briefly barred its sale in July. And the Environmental Protection Agency, not known for its aggressiveness under President Trump, is weighing its own action.

“I’m a fan of Monsanto. I’ve bought a lot of their products,” said Brad Williams, a Missouri farmer. “I can’t wrap my mind around the fact that there would be some kind of evil nefarious plot to put a defective product out there intentionally.”

Yet he has been dismayed both by damage to his soybean crops, which were within a wide area of farmland harmed by dicamba, and by the impact even to trees on his property. Leaves, he said, were “so deformed you couldn’t even really identify the differences between them.”

The dispute comes as American agriculture sits at a crossroads.

Genetically modified crops were introduced in the mid-1990s. They made it possible to spray weed killers — chiefly Monsanto’s Roundup — on plants after they emerged from the ground, ridding fields of weeds while leaving crops undamaged.

But weeds are becoming more resistant to Roundup, so the industry is developing seeds that are tolerant to more herbicides. Environmentalists and some weed scientists worry that making seeds resistant to more weed killers will increase the use of pesticides.

Monsanto and another company, BASF, have also developed a new, less volatile version of dicamba, which has been around for decades. DowDuPont, which has its own dicamba-resistant seed, is introducing crops resistant to 2,4-D, another old herbicide.

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The Minnesota Department of Agriculture is investigating about two dozen complaints from farmers about the weed killer dicamba.

Dicamba is used on soybean fields that have been genetically modified to tolerate the herbicide. But Minnesota farmers have joined hundreds in the southern U.S. who allege that drifting dicamba hurts non-resistant fields.

Tim Carlblom said he has seen distinctive dicamba damage on soybean plants in his fields near the southern Minnesota town of Jeffers.

"You see how these are cupped, and the new ones coming out are severely cupped," Carlbom said, showing damage to his plants. "They'll grow out of it somewhat, but that's still damaged."

His soybeans are also genetically modified, but not for dicamba. Carlbom believes the weed killer drifted on to his soybeans after neighbors sprayed the herbicide on their dicamba-resistant soybeans. He's worried it could hurt the fall harvest.

There are lots of unknowns in the dicamba issue including concrete proof of how widespread the problem is and who is to blame.

Based on talks he had with farmers using the product, Carlblom believes they're spraying dicamba correctly and avoiding windy conditions. He blames the product itself.

"Allegedly, the herbicide that was put on drifted when it shouldn't have," Carlblom said.

That's the same type of complaint hundreds of farmers across the U.S. made after experiencing what they believe to be dicamba damage. The problem is most widespread in the South. Arkansas, Missouri and Tennessee have taken steps to restrict or even halt dicamba use.

Affected farmers often blame Monsanto, one of the nation's largest agribusiness corporations which brought dicamba-resistant soybeans to the market.

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Arkansas's pesticide regulators have stepped into the middle of an epic battle between weeds and chemicals, which has now morphed into a battle between farmers. Hundreds of farmers say their crops have been damaged by a weedkiller that was sprayed on neighboring fields. Today, the Arkansas Plant Board voted to impose an unprecedented ban on that chemical.

"It's fracturing the agricultural community. You either have to choose to be on the side of using the product, or on the side of being damaged by the product," says David Hundley, who manages grain production for Ozark Mountain Poultry in Bay, Arkansas.

The tension — which even led to a farmer's murder — is over a weedkiller called dicamba. The chemical moved into the weed-control spotlight a few years ago, when Monsanto created soybean and cotton plants that were genetically modified to survive it. Farmers who planted these new seeds could use dicamba to kill weeds without harming those crops.

Farmers, especially in the South, have been desperate for new weapons against a devastating weed called pigweed, or Palmer amaranth. And some farmers even jumped the gun and started spraying dicamba on their crops before they were legally allowed to do so. (Dicamba has long been used in other ways, such as for clearing vegetation from fields before planting.)

The problem is, dicamba is a menace to other crops nearby. It drifts easily in the wind, and traditional soybeans are incredibly sensitive to it. "Nobody was quite prepared, despite extensive training, for just how sensitive beans were to dicamba," says Bob Scott, a specialist on weeds with the University of Arkansas's agricultural extension service.

As soon as spraying started this spring, the complaints began arriving. By June 23, state regulators had received 242 complaints from farmers who say their crops have been damaged. "This has far eclipsed any previous number of complaints that we've gotten, and unfortunately, this number seems to just keep growing," says Scott. "Every day we get an update with eight or ten more complaints."

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Photo from Arkansas Agriculture Department.

A decision by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to deregulate a genetically modified grass seed has raised concerns about contamination in Oregon’s billion-dollar grass seed industry.

Genetically modified creeping bentgrass was created by Scotts Miracle-Gro as a product for golf courses. But the grass escaped from its test plots, and has continued to spread across Southeast and Central Oregon – despite eradication efforts.

The USDA published its final decision on Wednesday, approving a request from Scotts to deregulate the company’s bentgrass seed after determining that the plant is “unlikely to pose a plant pest risk.”

Jerry Erstrom chairs the weed board in Malheur County, where the grass has taken root after crossing the Snake River from Idaho. He’s seen firsthand how fast the grass can spread and how hard it is to wipe out because it’s resistant to glyphosate, the active ingredient in most herbicides.

“There are only one or two herbicides labeled to be used upon it,” he said. “The caveat is they can only be used in dry areas. Anything on a shoreline, in wetlands or along riparian, there’s nothing that can remove it. The only way is by hand or shovel.”

Erstrom expects the grass will prevent him from exporting the hay he grows because overseas buyers shun genetically modified plants, and he’s worried about how much damage it could do if it spreads to the grass seed industry in the Willamette Valley.

“Not only economically but environmentally – the devastation it can cause – people don’t appreciate how bad it can be,” he said. “If this should happen to get across into the Willamette Valley I think it would at least destroy the export market for the grass growers there.”

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The USDA has cleared the way for cultivation of genetically modified tall fescue without conducting an environmental review of the new crop.

The Scotts Miracle-Gro company developed the glyphosate-resistant turfgrass variety with genes from other plants through a process known as “biolistics,” in which a “gene gun” essentially shoots DNA-coated metal particles into the plant cell.

Because the method does not involve the use of a plant pest for gene transfer, the USDA has no authority to regulate the tall fescue, according to a document recently released by the agency.

Controversial biotech crops that are also resistant to glyphosate herbicides — such as “Roundup Ready” alfalfa and sugar beets — were made using a soil pathogen, which required USDA to study the plants before deregulating them.

Scotts began to re-orient its biotechnology program after a regulated variety of genetically engineered creeping bentgrass escaped a field trial in Central Oregon in 2003, which eventually resulted in a $500,000 civil penalty from USDA.

Since then, the bentgrass cultivar has been stuck in regulatory limbo as the USDA has not approved it to be grown commercially without restrictions.

However, over the past four years the company has persuaded the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service that several biotech varieties of Kentucky bluegrass and St. Augustinegrass did not come under its regulatory jurisdiction.

“They’re able to get around APHIS’ authority with their new techniques,” Carol Mallory-Smith, a weed science professor at Oregon State University.

Genetically modified tall fescue, which Scotts has also altered to grow “shorter, thicker and darker green,” is the latest grass crop to be cleared by USDA after Scotts notified the agency that it planned to begin field testing the variety.

Capital Press was unable to reach Scotts for comment, but some in the grass seed industry say the company’s activities have sparked concerns.

Resistance to glyphosate — while potentially convenient for homeowners — can turn grasses into troublesome weeds for farmers.

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons.