Founded in 2008. The Landscape Juice Network (LJN) is the largest and fastest growing professional landscaping and horticultural association in the United Kingdom.
LJN's professional business forum is unrivalled and open to anyone within within the UK landscape industry
LJN's Business Objectives Group (BOG) is for any Pro serious about building their business.
For the researching visitor there's a wealth of landscaping ideas, garden design ideas, lawn advice tips and advice about garden maintenance.
Replies
duty of care to not poison myself 1st... i know 2-4D is in many products, but didnt know it was the same as 'Agent Orange'. ! do you know what that does Mr Milne?
TCDD has been described as "perhaps the most toxic molecule ever synthesized by man".(Galston 1979,[13] cited in[14])
The National Toxicology Program has classified TCDD as "known to be a humancarcinogen", frequently associated with soft-tissue sarcoma, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, Hodgkin's lymphoma and chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL).[17][18]
2-4D is present in many common selective herbicides - it was only a PART of Agent Orange, of which the other component part was a chemical 2,4,5-T, which was dioxin contaminated and therefore unstable. The TCDD to which you refer was the dioxin that was caused by degrading 2,4,5-T under extreme heat and was unrelated to the 2-4-D component.
I suggest you check your facts, the majority of which are freely available from various sources before wholly decrying a commonly available and highly regulated herbicide as a not produced since the 70's aerial applied defoliant.
Obviously if you are concerned, I am sure your supplier will be able to supply ALL necessary information appropriate to your application and situation.
More info:
"About Agent Orange: Agent Orange was one of a class of color-coded herbicides that U.S. forces sprayed over the rural landscape in Vietnam from 1961 to 1971 to defoliate trees and shrubs and kill food crops that were providing cover and food to opposition forces. It was a 50/50 mixture of two herbicides: 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T. It remained toxic for only days or weeks and then degraded,[i] but it had a toxic contaminant, dioxin, that did not degrade as readily and is still causing health problems in Vietnam.
About Dioxin: Its chemical name is 2,3,7,8-tetrachloro-dibenzo-para-dioxin, or TCDD. It is a persistent organic pollutant that contaminated Agent Orange and some of the other color-coded herbicides when the production of one of their components (2,4,5-T) was accelerated during wartime.[ii] TCDD is the most toxic of about 419 types of similar toxic compounds, which include PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls). The chemical companies that produced the Vietnam-era herbicides say they were unaware how toxic the dioxin contaminant was."
The following may be of interest:
http://www.aspeninstitute.org/policy-work/agent-orange/history
Having looked into the components of 'Enlist Duo',I quickly found the following:
1. What is Enlist Duo?
Enlist Duo is a combination product of two previously registered herbicides:
2,4-D and glyphosate are two of the most widely used herbicides in the world to control weeds. Dozens of countries including the United States, Canada, Mexico, Japan and 26 European Union members have approved these pesticides for use on numerous crops and residential lawns. Last year, Canada approved the use of Enlist Duo for the same uses that EPA is authorizing.
One difference is that Enlist Duo contains a variation (the choline salt) of 2,4-D that is less prone to drift and volatilization than its other forms.
Glyphosate is already registered for use on genetically engineered corn and soybeans. 2,4-D is registered for use on corn and soybeans.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agent_Orange
i wouldn't worry, as i recall (without the aid of wikipedia) it was 245T that was the major issue and that went a long time ago (although i remember being told when i was starting out that it had only recently been removed from sale - seem to recall it may have been in the original sbk? but that might just be an over active imagination or bad info).caution (and your training) are good enough reasons to avoid spray drift and inhalation though ;)
You should get a job at the Daily Mail with a headline like that Robin! Never let the facts get in the way of a good story.
Agent Orange is comprised of a number of chemicals. 2 4 D has been around since WW2 as people had to leave the land to fight leading to a form of mechanization.