{"id":337098,"date":"2025-12-10T03:19:43","date_gmt":"2025-12-10T03:19:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/aerospace\/whats-killing-these-oak-trees-in-the-midwest-conservationists-believe-drifting-herbicides-are-to-blame\/"},"modified":"2025-12-10T03:19:43","modified_gmt":"2025-12-10T03:19:43","slug":"whats-killing-these-oak-trees-in-the-midwest-conservationists-believe-drifting-herbicides-are-to-blame","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=337098","title":{"rendered":"What&#8217;s Killing These Oak Trees in the Midwest? Conservationists Believe Drifting Herbicides Are to Blame"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-article-body=\"\">\n<header class=\"article-header\">\n<h2 class=\"tagline article-tagline\" itemprop=\"description\">When Illinois landowners noticed tree deaths and diseases on their properties ramp up in 2017, they suspected industrial agriculture. A survey found herbicides in 90 percent of tree tissues<\/h2>\n<div class=\"article-line\">\n<section class=\"author-box by-line\">\n<div class=\"author-text\">\n<p class=\"author\" itemprop=\"author\">\n<p>          Christian Elliott, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.biographic.com\/the-scourge-of-native-oaks-is-blowing-in-the-wind\/\" target=\"_blank\">bioGraphic<\/a><\/p>\n<p>      <time class=\"pub-date\" itemprop=\"datePublished\" data-pubdate=\"Dec. 9, 2025, 4:04 p.m.\">December 9, 2025 4:04 p.m.<\/time><\/p><\/div>\n<\/section><\/div>\n<\/header>\n<figure class=\"article-image lead-article-image\">\n            <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/sTk2XDRI6ZNmnE7QszZVuUoahHg=\/1000x750\/filters:no_upscale():focal(1200x800:1201x801)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/6a\/a4\/6aa447a0-cec2-47c4-8b9d-e06e4ff76954\/header-illinois-oaks.jpg\" alt=\"a barren tree among a sparse forest\" itemprop=\"image\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>                A dead tree stands with its bare, white trunk and branches in contrast to the greenery around it.<br \/>\n              <span class=\"credit\">Prairie Rivers Network<\/span><br \/>\n            <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<div class=\"insight\">\n<div>\n<h4>Key takeaways: Herbicides and a blight of native oaks<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li>After the herbicide dicamba exploded in popularity among industrial farmers in 2017, some Illinois residents noticed curled and discolored leaves on native oak trees.<\/li>\n<li>Scientists and conservationists are gathering data in hopes of advocating for restrictions on herbicide use, such as tighter regulations on spraying in high winds.<\/li>\n<\/ul><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>The symptoms were strange. They were the same across multiple oak species\u2014white, swamp white, black, red, post, shingle, chinquapin, blackjack and pin. Leaves thickened, elongated and contorted into grotesque shapes\u2014cupping, puckering, curling and twisting until it was hard to tell one species from another. Veins bleached yellow, losing chlorophyll. Soon after, some of the trees died.<\/p>\n<p>Seth Swoboda first noticed the sickness in the spring of 2017 on his 40-acre property in Nashville, Illinois, smack in the middle of some of the United States\u2019 most productive farmland. He knocked on the door of his neighbor Martin Kemper and asked if there were some new oak disease going around.<\/p>\n<p>Kemper didn\u2019t think so, but he had an idea. A retired biologist from the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, Kemper had noticed other oaks and native trees in the area showing similar signs of injury. He suspected a culprit that\u2019s risky to blame in a state economically and politically steeped in agriculture: herbicide drift, or the movement of weed-killing chemicals onto nontarget plants.<\/p>\n<p>Swoboda\u2019s property, a cattle pasture on oak-hickory woodland, is surrounded on four sides by industrial-scale corn and soybean operations. On a hot summer evening after a neighbor has sprayed their fields, you can smell the herbicide in the air. Heat, a stiff breeze or a temperature inversion can hoist the molecules into the atmosphere and carry them far away. In <a href=\"https:\/\/pubs.acs.org\/doi\/10.1021\/es000995l\">one study<\/a>, researchers found that an herbicide had been carried in the clouds for over a hundred miles before falling as rain.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"article-image \">\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/UJdEYI1NS_WfzQ6OBjqMxmFXjyk=\/fit-in\/1072x0\/filters:focal(1200x800:1201x801)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/58\/c9\/58c9ebbb-44e5-4b55-a3dd-b4da6ba2364e\/seth-swoboda-illinois-oaks.jpg\" alt=\"a man wearing a blue Custer State Park shirt holds onto a tree branch and faces the camera\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>      Seth Swoboda first noticed signs of herbicide damage on the native oaks on his property in Nashville, Illinois, in 2017. Since then, he\u2019s lost 11 trees.<\/p>\n<p>      <span class=\"credit\">Christian Elliott<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Herbicide drift is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.investigate-europe.eu\/posts\/the-battle-over-pesticides-in-europe\">internationally recognized<\/a> as a problem for native species and closely tracked across Europe. Yet no government agency in Illinois or the surrounding states was measuring its impacts, even on the few patches of native forest left there, says <a href=\"https:\/\/prairierivers.org\/about-us\/staff\/#:~:text=KIM%20ERNDT%2DPITCHER%2C%20DIRECTOR%20OF%20ECOLOGICAL%20HEALTH\">Kim Erndt-Pitcher<\/a>, an ecotoxicologist and director of ecological health for the Illinois-based nonprofit <a href=\"https:\/\/prairierivers.org\/\">Prairie Rivers Network<\/a>. \u201cWe met with agencies, and it was just really hard to convince folks that this is an issue,\u201d Erndt-Pitcher adds. \u201cNo one was looking at the frequency of symptoms or the severity of symptoms or the distribution across the state.\u201d So, Prairie Rivers Network started a monitoring program with a shoestring budget and a handful of volunteers. One of them was Kemper.<\/p>\n<p>Over the past seven years, Kemper and Erndt-Pitcher have driven to Swoboda\u2019s farm and 279 other sites on public and private land to visually assess trees and collect tissue samples. Swoboda\u2019s samples wait alongside Dilly Bars in his farmhouse freezer until Prairie Rivers Network can afford to ship them to a lab for chemical analysis, at a cost of around $900 per sample. Twenty of 21 samples analyzed from Swoboda\u2019s land have come back positive for 2,4-D, dicamba, atrazine or other herbicides, and 53 plant species have shown herbicide exposure symptoms. Swoboda has filed formal misuse complaints to the Illinois Department of Agriculture (IDOA) each year to no avail. To prove wrongdoing, he needs evidence that\u2019s nearly impossible get: a specific farmer to blame, a time and date for the application, and a wind speed or temperature above the legal limits specified on the product\u2019s label at the time of spraying.<\/p>\n<p>In 2024, Prairie Rivers Network <a href=\"https:\/\/prairierivers.org\/hidden-in-plain-sight-a-summary-of-6-years-of-monitoring-and-tissue-analysis\/\">published the results<\/a> of its monitoring program and revealed that 99.6 percent of test sites showed drift symptoms and 90 percent of tree tissue samples contained herbicides. A separate <a href=\"http:\/\/dnr.illinois.gov\/content\/dam\/soi\/en\/web\/dnr\/inpc\/documents\/INHS%20-%20final%20report_.pdf\">survey<\/a> of 78,000 plants from nearly 200 sites, published the same year by the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, found similar results, and nonprofits and land managers in <a href=\"https:\/\/investigatemidwest.org\/2020\/06\/16\/weve-got-it-everywhere-dicamba-damaging-trees-across-midwest-and-south\/\">other Midwestern states<\/a> are likewise recording increasing herbicide damage. Scientists worry about potential cascading effects on insects, birds, reptiles and mammals, while locals like Swoboda are also concerned about human health impacts. <a href=\"https:\/\/biologicaldiversity.org\/w\/news\/press-releases\/united-states-uses-85-pesticides-outlawed-in-other-countries-2019-06-06\/\">At least 85 pesticides<\/a>\u2014an umbrella term for any chemical used to kill something, including insecticides, herbicides and fungicides\u2014that are routinely used in the U.S. have been banned or are being phased out in other countries due to potential health risks, including links to cancers and other diseases.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"article-image \">\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/Yz9j2WbnZOxbsXi5T0JoMtGvnuk=\/fit-in\/1072x0\/filters:focal(900x1200:901x1201)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/8f\/38\/8f38a2d5-8094-4048-b038-270a212f7b58\/kim-erndt-pitcher-illinois-oaks.jpg\" alt=\"a woman in a baseball cap tilts tree leaves toward the camera\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>      Kim Erndt-Pitcher, an ecotoxicologist and director of ecological health for the Illinois-based nonprofit Prairie Rivers Network, visits more than 275 sites each year to collect tissue samples and visually assess trees for signs of herbicide drift.<\/p>\n<p>      <span class=\"credit\">Prairie Rivers Network<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cThis is people\u2019s personal property rights. This is their right to a healthful, clean environment, and it\u2019s being violated on a regular basis, year after year,\u201d says Erndt-Pitcher. \u201c[The agrochemical] industry is incredibly powerful and influential. And I think if more people knew what all this meant\u2014what we\u2019re risking by inaction\u2014they would be really mad. Like, really, really mad.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Today, on the Fourth of July holiday, Erndt-Pitcher, Kemper and I follow Swoboda around his property. He\u2019s spent the morning cutting bush honeysuckle and multiflora rose\u2014invasives encroaching on his oaks. The afternoon sun beats down through a much-thinned canopy onto a yard that, for generations, was so shaded the Swobodas didn\u2019t have to mow. He points out the places where oaks used to be; out of 104 mature native hardwoods, he\u2019s lost 11 since 2017, their trunks and branches now a pile of firewood on the gravel driveway. He plants new oaks, but they show the same signs of damage. Kemper bends down and beckons me over to look at the garden phlox planted next to the patio where Swoboda\u2019s kids play. The plant\u2019s leaves are cupped, too.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"article-image \">\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/dq8Bm_CldTJchKwPiRJFFBppauc=\/fit-in\/1072x0\/filters:focal(1200x800:1201x801)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/13\/fa\/13fa9d2b-3efe-41cb-b2bd-08d09e7e04ed\/transition1-illinois-oaks.jpg\" alt=\"an oak forest in fall\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>      Oak trees, native to Illinois and much of the U.S., offer habitat for insects, fungi, birds and mammals.<\/p>\n<p>      <span class=\"credit\">Hank Erdmann \/ Alamy Stock Photo<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>For the past 1,000 years, much of the Midwest looked something like Swoboda\u2019s property. The region was a mosaic of mesic oak-hickory woodland, tallgrass prairie and seasonal wetlands maintained by rejuvenating fires set by Indigenous peoples. In less than a century, nearly all of these native ecosystems were <a href=\"https:\/\/yaleclimateconnections.org\/2025\/07\/how-americas-prairie-was-nearly-destroyed-and-why-it-should-be-restored\/\">plowed<\/a>. Rich prairie soil was converted to monocultures of corn and soy sustained by government subsidies, fertilizers and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.usgs.gov\/news\/national-news-release\/pesticides-prevalent-midwestern-streams\">over 100 million pounds<\/a> of synthetic pesticides each year. The grain produced by these crop factories mainly feeds livestock and fills fuel tanks.<\/p>\n<p>Before World War II, farmers largely relied on mechanical tilling to control weeds. With the birth of the pesticide industry, though, they started using weed killers like <a href=\"https:\/\/www.efsa.europa.eu\/en\/topics\/topic\/glyphosate\">glyphosate<\/a>, the active ingredient in Monsanto\u2019s signature Roundup herbicide. Farmers initially sprayed the soil before planting, to avoid damaging their crops, but in the 1990s Monsanto debuted Roundup Ready corn and soybeans, genetically engineered to tolerate the herbicide. Soon, larger tractors with 100-foot boom arms were spraying chemicals faster and in greater volume, directly onto crops for the first time. Between 1990 and 2022, pesticide use per cropland area <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fao.org\/statistics\/highlights-archive\/highlights-detail\/pesticides-use-and-trade-1990-2022\/en\">increased by 94 percent<\/a> worldwide.<\/p>\n<p>But by the early 2010s, weeds that had evolved resistance to glyphosate had become widespread. Farmers then pivoted to a different class of herbicides known as <a href=\"https:\/\/turf.cals.cornell.edu\/pests-and-weeds\/plant-growth-regulators\/\">plant growth regulators<\/a>. One was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.epa.gov\/ingredients-used-pesticide-products\/24-d\">2,4-D<\/a>, one of several ingredients in Agent Orange, the infamous chemical weapon of the Vietnam War. Another, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.epa.gov\/pesticides\/dicamba\">dicamba<\/a>, exploded in popularity in 2017, a year after dicamba-resistant soybeans hit the market. Dicamba is <a href=\"https:\/\/extension.umn.edu\/herbicides\/uncovering-dicambas-wayward-ways\">particularly volatile<\/a>\u2014days after it\u2019s sprayed, molecules can turn into a gas and drift away, particularly in the heat of summer. Plants can \u201cbreathe in\u201d the toxicant through <a href=\"https:\/\/knowablemagazine.org\/content\/article\/food-environment\/2025\/manipulating-stomata-could-help-crops-withstand-drought\">pores<\/a> on the underside of their leaves.<\/p>\n<p>The year that dicamba-resistant soybeans ramped up was the same year that Swoboda noticed oaks on his property starting to wither and die. The IDOA was simultaneously <a href=\"https:\/\/agr.illinois.gov\/pesticides\/pesticides-uses-misuses.html\">inundated with reports<\/a> from farmers who hadn\u2019t planted dicamba-resistant soybeans and whose crops were dying from herbicide drift. Tensions between farmers who planted dicamba-resistant soybeans and those who did not were so fraught that one farmworker in Arkansas <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/86aaf3f7b0a742c78628dad0f74741a6\">shot and killed<\/a> a neighbor who confronted him about drift.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"article-image \">\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/fnw1oDLXxGfZ4E__j5kp5v0eJCk=\/fit-in\/1072x0\/filters:focal(1200x663:1201x664)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/37\/1e\/371efe6c-419d-4cfc-a12c-701b8540c9e1\/pesticides-complaints-graph-illinois-oaks.png\" alt=\"a bar chart showing reports of pesticide complaints in Illinois, with a large spike in 2017 followed by elevated levels for the rest of the time, and another spike in 2019\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>      After farmers began planting soybeans engineered with a resistance to the herbicide dicamba in 2016 and 2017, allegations of pesticide misuse in Illinois jumped.<\/p>\n<p>      <span class=\"credit\">Data by Illinois Department of Agriculture, design by Mark Garrison<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cEvery extension weed scientist throughout the Midwest knew what was going to happen,\u201d says <a href=\"https:\/\/cropsciences.illinois.edu\/directory\/hager\">Aaron Hager<\/a>, a weed scientist at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. \u201cWe knew there was going to be an effect on trees. There\u2019s no way there couldn\u2019t have been an effect on trees.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The fields around Swoboda\u2019s property have been actively farmed since before he was born 45 years ago. Only the chemicals have changed. \u201cBy the time I realized, it was too late, really,\u201d he says. Crops are often engineered to resist multiple herbicides. Native species aren\u2019t. The oaks, Swoboda says, \u201cwent fast.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"article-image \">\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/QyyWwd-fj5Cf_pCCVrGMO6hPTeQ=\/fit-in\/1072x0\/filters:focal(1200x800:1201x801)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/52\/d5\/52d51bf0-8918-4cf3-a194-777023644404\/transition2-illinois-oaks.jpg\" alt=\"a road with the setting sun behind it and a pink sky\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>      A road near agricultural fields<\/p>\n<p>      <span class=\"credit\">Charles O. Cecil \/ Alamy Stock Photo<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Since they took root some 50 million years ago, oaks have played an outsize role in North American ecosystems. The continent\u2019s 250 or so species of oaks together <a href=\"https:\/\/www.scientificamerican.com\/article\/how-oak-trees-evolved-to-rule-the-forests-of-the-northern-hemisphere\/\">make up more tree biomass<\/a> than any other woody genus, and they shelter and feed a breadth of insects, fungi, birds and mammals. They grow slowly, adding just millimeters of girth each year, and what they lack in speed they make up for in strength and bulk. Some species can reach seven feet in diameter; others reach 100 feet into the sky. And while many native trees of North America have succumbed to introduced <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aphis.usda.gov\/plant-pests-diseases\/eab\">pests<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/extension.umn.edu\/plant-diseases\/dutch-elm-disease\">diseases<\/a> in the past century, oaks seemed largely impervious, their gnarled limbs often stretching so high overhead that early signs of damage are hard to notice.<\/p>\n<p>Once you learn to see the signs, though, you notice the destruction everywhere\u2014even far from the nearest farmland.<\/p>\n<p>Leaving Swoboda behind, Kemper and Erndt-Pitcher take me on a whirlwind tour of state parks and nature preserves. At <a href=\"https:\/\/dnr.illinois.gov\/parks\/park.eldonhazlet.html\">Eldon Hazlet State Recreation Area<\/a>, Kemper stops so frequently to point out native trees with signs of herbicide damage\u2014sweet gum, American elm, tulip poplar, shagbark hickory, persimmon, redbud, river birch, box elder\u2014that Erndt-Pitcher begins to feel carsick in the back seat. She jokes he needs a pointer on a yardstick for Christmas and asks him to please, <em>please<\/em> turn on the air conditioning.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"article-image left_diptych\">\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/SoeA2ibxpJZAExTvOgeCmtpbiDU=\/fit-in\/1072x0\/filters:focal(748x502:749x503)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/eb\/e8\/ebe81aa6-d4a7-4974-8c2f-978980b763f8\/redbud-illinois-oaks.jpg\" alt=\"redbud leaves curled up\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>      In 2024, Prairie Rivers Network published the results of its monitoring program and revealed that 99.6 percent of test sites showed drift symptoms and 90 percent of tree tissue samples contained herbicides, resulting in cupped, puckered leaves, like those of this redbud.<\/p>\n<p>      <span class=\"credit\">Prairie Rivers Network<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<figure class=\"article-image right_diptych\">\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/q0aaOhBMnQhHUkzwEPOjHhPt0nU=\/fit-in\/1072x0\/filters:focal(749x500:750x501)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/7b\/2d\/7b2d84ce-824b-40f5-889b-dfc2e8569dfe\/post-oak-illinois-oaks.jpg\" alt=\"curled leaves of a post oak\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>      Even if herbicide effects aren\u2019t directly lethal, some researchers believe that curled leaves, like these on a post oak, likely won\u2019t photosynthesize as efficiently as regular leaves.<\/p>\n<p>      <span class=\"credit\">Prairie Rivers Network<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>In the park campground, at capacity on this holiday weekend, hundreds of RVs and tents sit in the dappled light of a sparse canopy. Some oaks sprout leaves from their branches and trunks in a last-ditch effort to photosynthesize, but many limbs are already dead. It\u2019s easy to imagine this place in another few decades with no trees\u2014or campers\u2014left.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cLots of us that work on this issue, we\u2019ll say we used to love the summer and the spring, and now it\u2019s become a dreaded time of year, because it\u2019s just this persistent series of wounds all around us that we have to observe,\u201d says Erndt-Pitcher.<\/p>\n<p>Later, at <a href=\"https:\/\/dnr.illinois.gov\/parks\/park.washingtoncounty.html\">Washington County State Recreation Area<\/a>, we stop at a spit of land overlooking a lake. Kemper has come to this spot since he was 10 years old to watch Carolina chickadees, white-breasted nuthatches, tufted titmice, blue jays, woodpeckers and the occasional barred owl, along with other migratory and resident bird species. \u201cThis was a fantastic white oak-canopied area \u2026 and now it\u2019s a disaster,\u201d says Kemper. \u201cAnd it\u2019s scary, because what I see is a progression that\u2019s slowly getting worse. We\u2019re seeing a gradual decline in the health of the forest, and the chances that this doesn\u2019t have ecological cascades, in my estimation, are zero.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Erndt-Pitcher points out that the state is legally obligated to protect designated nature preserves. But while years of environmental activism have left many people aware of how pesticide overuse harms pollinating insects and can contribute to cancers, <a href=\"https:\/\/investigatemidwest.org\/2024\/10\/23\/herbicide-paraquat-sygenta-legal-troubles-parkinsons-disease-health-claims-lawsuits\/\">Parkinson\u2019s disease<\/a>, birth defects and endocrine problems in humans, the dangers to native plants have made fewer headlines. In the 1970s, the state passed the <a href=\"https:\/\/ilga.gov\/Legislation\/ILCS\/Articles?ActID=1596&amp;ChapterID=36\">Illinois Pesticide Act<\/a> to protect people and the environment from pesticide misuse. But Erndt-Pitcher argues the act doesn\u2019t do enough to address drift. And it\u2019s enforced by the IDOA, which she sees as a conflict of interest. (Weeds can cut corn yields by 50 percent or more, and it\u2019s in the state\u2019s interest to maximize farm production.) The state Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) defers to the IDOA on pesticides, while the federal EPA\u2014which regulates 16,800 different pesticides\u2014relies largely on studies conducted by<em> <\/em>agrochemical companies for its safety assessments. Agrochemical companies also spend tens of millions of dollars annually to lobby lawmakers and <a href=\"https:\/\/theintercept.com\/2021\/06\/30\/epa-pesticides-exposure-opp\/\">reportedly employ<\/a> many former federal EPA employees.<\/p>\n<p>This year, Prairie Rivers Network <a href=\"https:\/\/extension.illinois.edu\/blogs\/pesticide-news\/2025-03-11-pesticide-related-bills-being-considered-now\">proposed bills<\/a> in the state legislature to ban a particularly volatile formulation of 2,4-D and to require herbicide applicators to notify nearby schools and parks before spraying. Neither passed.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve been calling attention to this for over ten years,\u201d says Kemper. \u201cAnd those regulatory agencies that have this responsibility have not, to our knowledge, done enough to have an impact on the issue.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"article-image \">\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/t-c9XF9QWAtLoVTJK-A4ZTYWKlg=\/fit-in\/1072x0\/filters:focal(750x500:751x501)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/81\/73\/81733619-7a0d-4c24-b407-9f68ec191f8f\/martin-kemper-illinois-oaks.jpg\" alt=\"a man with a white shirt and brimmed hat looks at a binder in front of greenery\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>      Martin Kemper, a retired biologist from the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, volunteers with Prairie Rivers Network to monitor trees for signs of herbicide drift.<\/p>\n<p>      <span class=\"credit\">Prairie Rivers Network<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>In response, the IDOA says it operates \u201ca training, certification and licensing program to ensure pesticide applicators are properly licensed and knowledgeable regarding pesticide use,\u201d and that all \u201ccomplaints of pesticide misuse are investigated by plant and pesticide specialists.\u201d The IDOA also has the authority to implement state-specific regulations for individual pesticides like dicamba and supports a nonprofit, voluntary mapping registry. The Illinois Department of Natural Resources did not respond to a request to comment.<\/p>\n<p>In one small win for activists, a U.S. District Court in Arizona in 2024 <a href=\"https:\/\/biologicaldiversity.org\/w\/news\/press-releases\/federal-court-halts-spraying-of-monsantos-dicamba-pesticide-across-millions-of-acres-of-cotton-soybeans-2024-02-06\/\">overturned<\/a> the federal approval of dicamba, essentially banning it across the U.S. for the 2025 growing season. But overall herbicide use <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/ncomms14865\">is still increasing<\/a>, and the Trump administration is considering reversing the ban on dicamba, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.epa.gov\/pesticides\/epa-announces-proposed-decision-approve-registration-new-uses-dicamba-outlines-new\">citing<\/a> confidence that if users apply the product as directed, it will \u201cnot pose an unreasonable risk to human health or the environment.\u201d Additionally, the federal EPA\u2019s scientific research arm, which serves as its foundation for assessing toxic chemicals, including herbicides, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/07\/18\/climate\/epa-firings-scientific-research.html\">will likely be disbanded<\/a>. To Erndt-Pitcher, that puts the onus on states.<\/p>\n<p>Yet while the IDOA and lawmakers have done little to solve the problem in activists\u2019 eyes, Prairie Rivers Network\u2019s small, volunteer-staffed monitoring program has helped convince other state agencies and universities to study the problem. Now, peer-reviewed lab experiments and field studies are beginning to show what landowners like Swoboda have been observing for years.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"article-image \">\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/2m2vcWF47BHydzAnfzHxrAKGSJ8=\/fit-in\/1072x0\/filters:focal(1200x800:1201x801)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/e7\/86\/e786a3d6-96de-4e37-a43c-98c7438ccfe9\/transition3-illinois-oaks.jpg\" alt=\"overhead view of forest and farmland\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>      A forest borders agricultural land in Illinois<\/p>\n<p>      <span class=\"credit\">Prairie Rivers Network<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>One of the scientists conducting lab experiments is wildlife ecologist <a href=\"https:\/\/sib.illinois.edu\/directory\/profile\/tjbenson\">T.J. Benson<\/a>, whom I meet in a small room in the Illinois Natural History Survey lab at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Opening a white cabinet, he shows me tiny moth larvae wriggling in dozens of clear plastic deli containers. They\u2019re black cutworms, a common native caterpillar and crop pest. Each container has a little flan-like cube of caterpillar food spiked with one of several pesticides. Benson buys the eggs and food from a company that presumably also sells to pesticide producers for insecticide testing. \u201cThe Insects You Need, When You Need Them,\u201d reads the empty cardboard box. But Benson\u2019s goals are different; he specializes in birds. He started this experiment after tracking declining eastern whippoorwill populations, which generally thrive when caterpillars are abundant.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBirds migrating through right now are very dependent on caterpillars that are feeding on these really young [tree] leaves,\u201d he says. Yet when the federal EPA evaluates new herbicides for impacts to insects, it typically only considers non-native honeybees, Benson says\u2014which don\u2019t eat leaves. And the only birds considered in the agency\u2019s models are usually mallard ducks and quails, which are not exclusively insectivorous and are larger-bodied, which could make them less susceptible than smaller species.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"article-image \">\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/tSZXYRLdQ6sSbxFymH49-sq1jOI=\/fit-in\/1072x0\/filters:focal(1200x800:1201x801)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/f1\/51\/f151c2e0-9e67-4df7-81a0-dce0a5f5b505\/bumblebee-illinois-oaks.jpg\" alt=\"a bumblebee\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>      When the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency evaluates new herbicides for impacts to insects, it typically only considers non-native honeybees rather than bumblebees, says wildlife ecologist T.J. Benson.<\/p>\n<p>      <span class=\"credit\">Prairie Rivers Network<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Benson regularly weighs individual caterpillars to study the effects of pesticides on their growth. He and his graduate student <a href=\"https:\/\/studentengagement.illinois.edu\/studentsustainability\/ssc\/team\/Witynski\">Grant Witynski<\/a> have found that caterpillars exposed to field-realistic concentrations of atrazine and 2,4-D have up to a 26 percent lower probability of surviving to adulthood than controls. If caterpillars in the wild are regularly eating leaves contaminated by these herbicides, it could be harming whippoorwills and other insectivorous birds, as well as species that depend on oaks for habitat.<\/p>\n<p>Activists hope that such science will eventually give them the evidence they need to convince lawmakers and regulators to take action. For now, though, landowners who complain to state agriculture employees are often told that they can\u2019t prove the visual symptoms they\u2019re seeing on leaves are caused by herbicides in the plant tissues and not something else. And despite anecdotal evidence of tree death across the Midwest, controlled studies haven\u2019t yet proved that the long-term effects of herbicides are deadly.<\/p>\n<p>Hager, the weed scientist, is among the skeptics. He knew that changes to herbicide use would result in greater drift, and that once people started noticing plant growth regulator symptoms in trees back in 2017, they\u2019d eventually start looking for pesticides in leaf samples. But based on the available data, he doesn\u2019t buy that drift is as big a crisis as some claim for the long-term health of trees, or that visual symptoms necessarily correlate with widespread tree mortality. \u201cWe could have pulled tree leaf samples any year in the last 50 years and found pesticides,\u201d he tells me. \u201cAnd we still have trees on the landscape.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"article-image \">\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/XsHHvVEJrdvzwc0_N46NC9H5mIU=\/fit-in\/1072x0\/filters:focal(640x411:641x412)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/d9\/31\/d9317c5a-d09e-4343-991e-9c0b6cb58cb0\/monarch-illinois-oaks.jpg\" alt=\"a monarch butterfly\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>      Animals large and small depend on the few remaining native plants in a region dominated by industrial-scale agriculture.<\/p>\n<p>      <span class=\"credit\">Prairie Rivers Network<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>And while some advocates believe that the only answer is banning certain herbicides or even radically changing the way land is farmed in this part of the world, Hager and others argue that a statewide ban on any individual herbicide would put Illinois farmers at a competitive disadvantage. He\u2019d like to see an amendment to the Illinois Pesticide Act that bans spraying when winds exceed a certain speed. But the state would need more staff and money to enforce a rule like that.<\/p>\n<p>At the Illinois Natural History Survey complex, Benson and botanist <a href=\"https:\/\/experts.illinois.edu\/en\/persons\/edward-p-price\/\">Ed Price<\/a> lead me to a greenhouse. Inside, little potted oaks and redbuds sit in lines on tables. Some have been sprayed with herbicides multiple times in a year, others only once or not at all. So far, plants seem to be most vulnerable when they\u2019re young, just as their buds swell and their leaves unfurl. Price and Benson are looking for residual damage\u2014whether leaves regrow \u201cwonky\u201d in subsequent years after a lab-simulated drift event. The University of Missouri is running a similar study on ornamental and fruit trees.<\/p>\n<p>Price shows me a curled oak leaf. Even if herbicide effects aren\u2019t directly lethal, he explains, curled leaves likely won\u2019t photosynthesize as efficiently as regular leaves do. Trees face multiple stressors\u2014higher temperatures, shifting seasons, more rainfall, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kcur.org\/news\/2025-08-04\/bur-oak-trees-dying-acre-great-plains-drought-pests-disease\">drought<\/a>, competition from invasive species. Herbicides are one of the few compounding stressors we have any immediate control over. And they could push stressed trees over the edge.<\/p>\n<p>As we walk back to the lab, Benson smells the medicinal odor of 2,4-D in the air. The facilities crew has just sprayed the landscaping for weeds.<\/p>\n<p>Back in Nashville, Illinois, American flags and firework stands line the streets for the Fourth of July holiday. Driving through, I notice curled, stunted leaves on redbuds in front of old Victorian homes decorated with red-white-and-blue bunting. Kemper is right\u2014once you\u2019ve learned what to look for, you see herbicide injury everywhere.<\/p>\n<p>Down the road from Swoboda\u2019s farm, Kemper pulls his Ford Ranger pickup into a pasture. Just ahead is an imposing tree with a 17-foot circumference. Known as the Harper post oak, it is the largest post oak in the state. Using binoculars from my perch in the truck bed, I look up at the thickened, cupped leaves. The post oak has contained at least six types of herbicides from an average of three exposures per year since Prairie Rivers Network began sampling it.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"article-image \">\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/th-thumbnailer.cdn-si-edu.com\/AgoOQfxvdPo3cXAiWUstB0kHpo4=\/fit-in\/1072x0\/filters:focal(780x442:781x443)\/https:\/\/tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/filer_public\/9e\/c7\/9ec78708-e233-40f4-819e-37ed4c66ccc1\/big-post-oak-illinois-oaks.jpg\" alt=\"drone view of people standing beneath an enormous oak tree\" loading=\"lazy\"\/><figcaption class=\"caption\">\n<p>      With a 17-foot circumference, the Harper post oak is the largest tree of its species in the state of Illinois.<\/p>\n<p>      <span class=\"credit\">Prairie Rivers Network<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Larry Harper, the property owner, pulls up in a golf cart, sweating through his American flag T-shirt. He tells us that he had to cut down the last pin oak on his property this spring. With each year, as his only remaining post oak declines further, Harper gets increasingly mad. A state employee comes to his property regularly, responding to reports that go nowhere.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI just don\u2019t know when it\u2019s going to register,\u201d he says. \u201cChestnut trees have been gone for a while. \u2026 Elm trees are gone. You\u2019re going to lose all the oaks before you decide, \u2018Hey, maybe we\u2019ve got a problem?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>For now, though, the post oak still stands\u2014gnarled, centuries old, towering over a pond on a pasture hilltop. We pause in its shade, bearing witness to yet another dying tree while everyone else in the county seems to be celebrating the Fourth of July with barbecues, fireworks and beer. Everyone, that is, except the farmworkers, who are out spraying pesticides even on the holiday, releasing a fine mist onto rows of corn and soy that stretch to the horizon.<\/p>\n<p><em>This story originally appeared in <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.biographic.com\/the-scourge-of-native-oaks-is-blowing-in-the-wind\/\">bioGraphic<\/a><em>, an independent magazine about nature and regeneration powered by the California Academy of Sciences.<\/em><\/p>\n<div class=\"in-article-newsletter science\">\n<div class=\"leade\">\n<h3>Get the latest <strong>Science<\/strong> stories in your inbox.<\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<section class=\"tag-list\">\n<nav class=\"nav-tags\">\n<\/nav>\n<\/section><\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When Illinois landowners noticed tree deaths and diseases on their properties ramp up in 2017, they suspected industrial agriculture. A survey found herbicides in 90 percent of tree tissues Christian Elliott, bioGraphic December 9, 2025 4:04 p.m. A dead tree stands with its bare, white trunk and branches in contrast to the greenery around it. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":337099,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12024],"tags":[12831,70376,6241,162014,5089,14848,2362,12668,5614],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-337098","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aerospace","tag-blame","tag-conservationists","tag-drifting","tag-herbicides","tag-killing","tag-midwest","tag-oak","tag-trees","tag-whats"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>What&#039;s Killing These Oak Trees in the Midwest? 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