Comments of EPA draft by Lars Baker, Jan2010 

Let me preface these remarks with the statement that I am a lay reader of some very 

technical documents full of freighted meaning with which I am unfamiliar. No doubt I will 

get smarter at time goes by, but for now many of these issues may be taken care of 

once I understand them better. Some of these comments may seem paranoid. I 

certainly do not think the EPA is some vast conspiracy with evil intent. But, as a 

bureaucrat myself, I understand that there is program creep and definitions that once 

were unambiguous are re-interpreted to allow very different activity that was initially 

envisioned. 

1.1.1 The general definition of Areawide Pest Control is very broad. It certainly includes 

every weed and pest district in Wyoming if the spray at all. Fifteen acres, and from the 

discussion on the Web cast the acres are cumulative for the applicator, will put every 

weed district under the permit. Most commercial applicators will be exempt because 

they are not running area wide programs. This definition also mentions irrigation ditches 

specifically. 

1.1.2.4 ESA: It looks like they could use this NPDES permit to regulate all pesticide 

applications under discharge-related activities, depending on how that is defined. It is 

possible to imagine 20 years from now that you would have to get approval pretreatment for any pesticide use to get a finding of no adverse impact. 

1.2.2 the list of folks required to do NOI clearly includes any weed district applying 

pesticides and all cities and towns who take on mosquitoes regardless of size. The 

acreage thresholds are just for the smaller commercial applicators or farmers that don’t 

get included under the other definitions. The only folks that are exempt are relatively 

small operations. Thus, the entire pile of paperwork and reporting will be ours. A few 

applicators will just go out of business and find other work. For weed districts, I guess 

we could go back to being weed cops and write people tickets for not treating weeds 

and let them figure out how to get around the permit, NOI’s and record keeping. I 

suspect most of us will try to figure out how to still provide service. I have no way to 

estimate the paperwork demand at this point, but it does concern me. 

2.1.2 I can’t imagine a commercial applicator not already doing this. I have no objection 

to this as a best management practice, but it will involve record keeping. I can see the 

file Daily/Weekly/Monthly/Annual records of maintenance activities and eventually 

saving the data for each calibration test to be able to show that it was done correctly 5 

years after the fact during an investigation of a contamination. 
2.2.+++ Integrated Pest Management. One of the great challenges Weed and Pest 

Districts have is the actual implementation of IPM. We teach it, and demonstrate it, but 

mostly districts just supply one aspect of IMP, pesticide application and the landowner 

must supply the rest of the management. These rules my improve performance by 

mosquito abatement districts run by municipal and county governments by improving 

the pre and post application monitoring. But thresholds are tricky. How many WNV 

positive mosquitoes does it take to result in disease? We tested Culex tarsalis all 

summer and it was not until August when the mosquito numbers were actually 

declining, did we actually start getting positive results from our testing. Yet, as in the 

past the sentinel species for WNV is humans. Human diagnosis preceded detection in 

the vector population. And we tested thousands of mosquitoes every week. I am 

convinced the percentage of Culex carrying WNV is a fraction of a percent. So, what is 

the threshold? Do you not treat until you get a positive human case? Or do you think 

preventively and say that every mosquito that you kill tonight is one more that cannot 

bite an infected bird and become a vector to other birds and humans? 

So, some of this is good, and since the BLM will be under the general permit, or will 

they? If in Wyoming the permit is issued by DEQ, will federal agencies be governed by 

it? Maybe they will be under the EPA general permit? IF the permits are the same, the 

result should be. At any rate, with permit in hand, the BLM will be more effective in 

dealing with lessees to get IPM on federal lands. Municipalities will sharpen up their 

mosquito programs a little. But mot commercial applicators will have little influence over 

the IPM while at the same time be responsible for implementation. A farmer hires the 

COOP to spray his grain. Others do the same. In the course of the summer they treat 

thousands of acres. It appears they come under the permit, yet have no control over the 

integrated management practice on the farm beyond the one they contribute. 

I just don’t see how this will work. How do you deal with this in the NOI? Who is 

responsible for the pollution? The applicator, or the farmer who did not perform the best 

management practices? Maybe it is not that hard. Certainly, a commercial applicator 

would identify the pest and would not use an ineffective pesticide at an ineffective rate. 

But, he can’t do the guy’s fall plowing that is so important to weed management. 

 2.2.3 Still talking about ditch banks. To me that means terrestrial weeds on ditch banks, 

not aquatic vegetation in the ditch. We are dealing with multiple species. They are 

already mapped. The law says the threshold is “0”. But, it sounds like we need separate 

species specific plans and monitoring. Fremont County Weed and Pest treats weeds on 

ditch banks about 1,100 center line miles of irrigation canals each year, some of the 

ditches are treated twice, once for annual weeds and sweet clover just to improve 

visibility and access, then later for the designated noxious weeds. In most cases we do 
both sides. Some ditches are in Indian Country. Will that take a federal permit? State 

permit, or both. Early on in the discussion it said the general permit would not cover you 

if you had another permit or they decided you needed a separate permit. So, here a 

ditch, operated by the BIA that crosses privately owned land. State law does not apply 

on the Indian land and Tribal law does not apply on the private. Federal applies to both, 

so I will need either an agreement that the DEQ permit does apply on the reservation, or 

I will need a federal permit. 

4.1 Is record keeping on everything you do all day long, so that you can document that 

you checked the calibration, checked for leaks, etc. If you can’t document it, then it 

never happened. 

4.2 If you don’t keep a record of your follow up, then it never happened. Treating weeds 

will be a research project. I already do a lot of that and have actually published as a 

result, but most commercial applicators will not go back, and even when we put an 

emphasis on following up, I’d guess less than 20% of our treatment sites are critically 

examined post treatment and only a tiny fraction of those post treatment visits generate 

any paperwork. This will be a big change. 

4.3 I think they are talking about water monitoring here. I appreciate that this is not an 

initial permit requirement, but USGS can find Tordon, 2,4-D and dicamba in the Wind 

River near Riverton every year. The concentrations are always near t he limits of 

detection, but they still see it. My guess is that a required water monitoring program will 

increase the cost of using pesticides to the point no NPDES permits will be needed, the 

ultimate goal of the entire environmental effort for many years. There are at least ten 

weed and pest supervisors in Wyoming who have hit the rule of 85. For the rest, they 

need to start to cross train as water sampling technicians. 

5.0 The Pesticide Discharge Management Plan: I have little concern over the idea of a 

management plan. Most Districts have something already in plan that will meet at least 

some of these issues in a general way. But, if you have to answer all the questions in 

5.1.2, that will take research. It appears to be species specific and that would multiply 

the size of the document. Hoary cress is easier to kill in late May or early June. Russian 

knapweed is easier to kill after July. They take different herbicides. But, I really get just 

one chance. I use both herbicides as a tank mix, and at least one, maybe both species 

will be treated at less than optimum receptiveness. So, I increase the herbicide above 

the minimum effective rate at the optimum time for the application to ensure control. I 

wonder if I will still be able to do that under the permit. It is impractical to try to make a 

separate application for each target species. There just too many weeds and so little 

time. 
The PDMP is further compounded by massive land surface I am tasked with, over 

6,000,000 acres. I can produce maps of all the weeds we have ever sprayed in the last 

ten years. That gives me an idea of where I will spray again, but we find we infestations 

every year and have been trying to get everyone before they can get well established. I 

cannot predict where I am going to be working except in a general way. I would think 

that most commercial applicators are only booked out a few weeks ahead, and at this 

time of year are just hoping they will get some work. For them to develop a plan 

showing all the fields they intend to spray is impossible. 

5.1.3 Description of control options. Here is where you list all the stuff over which you 

have no control, and the few things you do control. Will I need to document my analysis 

of every pesticide available, species by species? Site by site? Season by season? That 

is a lot of research yet to be done. If the data does not exist, am I responsible to 

generate it before I can use the pesticide? And then develop an rotation schedule and 

a tank mix system to reduce resistance. This is mostly about mosquitoes isn’t it? They 

are not really thinking about weed control on ditch banks, but they mention ditch banks 

as a mosquito treating location. Could it really be that they are not thinking about 

terrestrial weed control at all? If it only applies to mosquito abatement, I think we are 

half way there, but it is not clear at all. EPS defines a pest as a “living organism that 

causes harm”. That include weeds, but I don’t see terrestrial weeds in their thinking. 

They are looking at moss, algae, and submerged vegetation that are controlled by a 

direct introduction of a chemical into the water. 

What are the “waters of the US?” In Cheyenne I heard first “navigable waters” roughly 

enough water to float a log, but the EPA guy, Rise, said that has been expanded to 

include even temporary flood ponds if a migrating duck could land in it. Maybe irrigation 

water is not included once diverted. 

5.1.5 They finally require the documentation for all the monitoring schedules which will 

mean they expect to see the documentation of the monitoring in the report and will want 

to see that you met your scheduled documentation or get an explanation as to why the 

schedule did not work out. 

6.1 describes what will happen to you if you do not document everything. Mostly, they 

talk about remedial actions and plan revisions, but the fines are in there somewhere. 

After all it is the EPA. 

Appendix A.I Definitions 

Active ingredient certainly include terrestrial herbicides 
Adverse affects seems limited to aquatic species. That’s good and sort of suggests this 

is really aimed at aquatic pest control. If that is the case, and they say flat out it does 

not apply to terrestrial weed control, then I will be comforted a great deal. Having to 

document a mosquito program will be enough. 

Appendix B. I knew there would be penalties 

Final analysis: 

I does look like it is primarily focused on mosquito control programs and the treatment 

of aquatic pests, but the door is certainly left open for other activities that could result in 

pesticide contamination of the waters of the US. It looks like Weed and Pest programs 

will fall under the permit, but it is not clear which activities would be included. Fremont 

County Weed and Pest may not be affected directly since we do not actually treat any 

aquatic sites, that is all done by the tribes and municipalities. Nonetheless, it will be a 

significant burden on relatively small communities. Hudson and Shoshoni with 

populations under 1000 people treat well over a section of land in their adulticiding 

effort, but only a fraction of that could be considered riparian or aquatic. And little of the 

aquatic is actually treated with a larvaecide. I just do not know how to read this and 

maybe you can get some clarification while in Dallas. 

Thanks for your interest, 

Lars Baker, Fremont County Weed and Pest