North Carolina Christmas tree growers are closer to being able to continue using an insecticide on which they depend with the receipt by North Carolina Cooperative Extension’s Avery County Center of grants to be used in developing an insecticide applicator.

In March, Jerry Moody, Avery County horticulture agent, accepted a $14,000 grant from the North Carolina Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services to help develop an applicator that Christmas tree growers may use to dispense an insecticide called Di-Syston. More recently, Moody said, Region IV of the federal Environmental Protection Agency provided a grant for $21,800 to finish the development and field testing of the unit.

Successful development of the closed-system applicator for Di-Syston may persuade the EPA to allow Christmas tree growers to continue to use the insecticide on their trees, Moody said. EPA has been considering changing the label that describes how Di-Syston may be used on Christmas trees. Such a change could effectively ban use of the insecticide on the trees. Christmas tree growers use Di-Syston to control mites and aphids.

Moody said EPA officials are concerned about the safety of workers applying the chemical and about Di-Syston harming small animals. Christmas tree growers now use a spoon to apply Di-Syston, placing a spoonful at the bottom of each tree.

If growers apply Di-Syston using a device that protects them from the chemical, that could persuade EPA to allow growers to continue to use the insecticide. The only trouble is, such a device doesn’t exist.

At least it didn’t until Moody and other Extension specialists and agents began working on the problem. They arranged with a company called Select-A-Feed in Johnston County to adapt a device used to apply fertilizer for use with Di-Syston.

“This project is a cooperative effort among the EPA, NCDA&CS, North Carolina Cooperative Extension Service, N.C. State University, Bayer and the Christmas Tree growers, along with Select-A-Feed and New Perspectives design,” said Moody.

Moody said it will cost approximately $50,000 to tool up to manufacture the adapted applicator. The grants will be used to help defray this tool-up cost, as will $5,000 from the North Carolina Christmas Tree Association and $2,800 from grower associations in five tree-growing counties.

Christmas tree growers are a relatively small market, Moody explained, and without the funding, it probably would not be economically feasible to make applicators. The $14,000 provided by NCDA&CS was made available through the Pesticide Environmental Trust Fund.

—Dave Caldwell