Farm Beat: Experts test idea for keeping pesticides from drifting

Pesticides can drift off the edges of orchards and end up in streams that provide drinking water and fish habitat.

A promising solution: Use a fan to blow the chemical back into the trees as the spray rig moves along.

The idea was tested on almonds in the Westley area by the Coalition for Urban/Rural Environmental Stewardship, based in Davis.

“Not often I get to yell, ‘Breakthrough,’ but if this is not one, it’s very close,” Executive Director Parry Klassen said in an email to The Modesto Bee.

Klassen also manages the East San Joaquin Water Quality Coalition, made up of farmers from Stanislaus to Madera counties who pay for monitoring in lieu of direct regulation by the state. It and other coalitions around California also educate members on farming practices that protect the air and water.

Spray rigs have nozzles that dispense pesticides, along with fans that send them into the air. In the research project, one rig worked between the first two rows in the orchard and was closely tracked on the edge by another rig with just the fan running. (The test used water mixed with vegetable oil in place of an actual pesticide, which explains why the worker in the accompanying photo has no protective attire.)

The air pressure kept much of the spray mix from drifting off the orchard edge, Klassen said. He added that further testing is needed to assure control of the targeted pests.

The California Department of Food and Agriculture funded the research, which the coalition did with the University of California. It was done at an orchard owned by the Shiraz Ranch farming company.

Klassen said many growers have more than one spray rig and the technique can be used without any modifications to the equipment. The rigs do need to have the same fan capacity and “move exactly parallel to each other,” he said.

The coalition has produced videos and brochures on the technique in English and Spanish. More information is at www.curesworks.org.

This story was originally published October 7, 2016 at 3:38 PM with the headline "Farm Beat: Experts test idea for keeping pesticides from drifting."