Problems with crop dusters!

[WTA]

It's almost the time for the cotton farmers to start defoliating again and I'm looking for advice on what to do to prevent them from overspraying my farm or what to do if they do it again.

2 years ago they were defoliating the cotton across the highway from us and 3/4 mile from my fields and the wind was blowing badly towards us. They totaly wiped out my 20 acres of wheat I had planted to graze my animals through the winter on. I replanted but the defoliant they used had a residual effect and nothing came up. Pretty much I was screwed and had to buy very expensive hay through the winter. The crop duster also killed out my two neighbors (between us and the cotton fields) that year.

Last fall, a crop duster was coming all the way over my house to do his turn with a couple spray nozzles dripping.
Here in West Texas, anyone with living trees is really doing something right because mother nature here and trees don't see eye to eye very often. That guy zapped two of our biggest shade trees dead and knocked all of the leaves off all 25 of my pecan trees. The pecans must have some resistance because they came back this spring but the two shade trees in my yard didn't. They are dead.

Both times I called that farmer and told him the problem. He is totally oblivious and doesn't care. Around here the cotton farmers think the world revolves around them and everyone else is unimportant. He even had the gall to tell me that I am breaking the law spraying weeds in my fields because the wind drift can harm his cotton. He's full of it. I ground spray, use the proper nozzles and pressure and only do it when there is no wind. It would be stupid to do it any other way. I have an alfalfa field right in the middle of my bermuda and wheat pastures. The stuff I spray on the grass will kill that Alfalfa real quick if I'm careless. My closest neighbor also has alfalfa and wheat fields so we are all real careful.

Just these darn crop dusters that are being stupid.

Does anyone have an idea who I should call this time if they spray us again. I'm going to sue somebody but I don't know who. Probably the farmer and the crop duster company. My neighbors will be in on it too and one of them is a lawyer. He threatened a lawsuit last year after our fields all got hit by defolient. I'm also planning to report them to the EPA and FAA. Maybe even homeland security. They get their britches in a wad about terrorists stealing planes and spraying nerve gas over cities. To me these crop dusters are eco terrorists. Spraying toxic chemicals over land it isn't intended for can be a health risk to people it's coming down on right?
I really hope the threat of lawsuit last year will put a stop to the carelessness of the crop dusters but I am not holding my breath. If anyone has any other ideas to prevent them from killing us out again or for what to do in case they do again please let me know. Our livelihood on this small farm depends on those winter fields and my trees.

[Pat]

You didn't suffer hypothetical damages, you suffered real damages. Threatening a lawsuit is only hypothetical to them until they are served papers. Everything short of taking them to court is a waste of time and effort.

You can talk to the farmer or the duster and what difference does it make? Will it replace your trees? I have never sued or been sued but in a case like yours I'd find a lawyer who would get beyond the disgruntled talking stage and take real action.

If I could I'd get affidavits from anyone who could attest to the condition of the trees before being sprayed. Document any and all conversations with the farmer and duster. Find and preserve any pix of your place with trees in full leaf. Consider getting a temporary restraining order or injunction denying them the right to spray until or unless they can present a plan to the court stating how they intend to proceed safely and not spray on you. The way to get this is to show what they recently did and ask why it is reasonable to think they are going to do differently in the future without intervention.

Don't get cute and ask the duster if his plane has armor around the cockpit to deflect "stray" bullets. Don't wait for the wind to blow like stink toward the cotton and test your Roundup broadcast ability. YOu want to start out on the moral high ground and truy to get the court "on your side." Don't be afraid to try to interest any news reporters in the plight of the little man against the big powerful cotton magnates.

I can think of lots of other things but they aren't used in phase one like the above suggestion could be.

Pat

[Michael]

Ditto what Pat said, I would start on a no-fly injunction ASAP, make the farmer invest in a ground spray rig and put the crop-duster out of business. I am no environmental nut nor do I condone many of their activities, but if you have a local Sierra Club chapter, contact them and they will really take the fight to your neighbor and probably save you tone of legal fees.

[flyinlo]

Perhaps you should contact, as you put it, the stupid crop duster directly, he(the so-called stupid crop duster), is the one liable for any misapplication of pesticides not the cotton producer. If that doesn't help resolve things with the so-called stupid crop duster, call the Texas Department of Agriculture, tda.gov, thus saving the EPA or Home Land Security calling them for you (the Feds like for the state to handle stuff like this).

In 28 years of crop dusting I have never heard of a mature, healthy tree killed by drift from cotton defoliate.

As far as you breaking the law spraying your weeds, have you read the label on the product you're using. Most hormone herbicides can not be applied legally within one mile of cotton.

[archangel]

Well, you could wait until the wind is blowing his way and hire the same crop duster to defoliate your and the neighbors land between you and him (those also effected), and act as he did.