Toxicity of 2, 4, 5-T

Press, 10 June 1977, Page 12

Toxicity of 2, 4, 5-T

Sir, —I was again amazed, when the Dateline Monday programme was repeated on television, at .he confident manner in which Dr Mann asserted that there are other methods of chemical control for gorse and broom than 2,4, 5-T. Dr Mann obviously has information that no-one else has, and I ask that he inform New Zealand what these chemical alternatives are, particularly for steep hill country.—Yours, etc., H. W. FAWCETT.

April 18, 1977. [Dr L. R. B. Mann, Director, Environmental Defence Society, replies: “Mechanical control of gorse (bulldozing, rotary chopping and grubbing) and biological control (goats and sheep) have proven successful in some circumstances. There are also some chemical alternatives, though their economics and hazards have yet to be fully investigated. A good source of information on such alternatives is the magazine ‘New Zealand Farmer,’ whose then editor (Mr Ronald Vine) said in the issue of June 24, 1971: ‘For the very great sum of money spent by New Zealand farmers each year on 2,4, 5T (and subsidised by the taxpayer), plus the still greater cost of putting it on, we should reasonably expect to be getting on top of the gorse problem, if only gradually. Whether we are can only be a guess. My own is that, while there may well be less gorse than there was on the roadsides and on the easy, ploughable land, no headway at all is being made in reducing the total area of unploughable hill land under gorse.’ Certainly, farmers and the subsidising public are entitled to ask why, if 2,4, 5T is such good value as the makers claim, it needs the massive subsidies arranged by successive governments.”!