Word: malathion
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...eradication program was immediately launched. An 81-sq.-mi. area surrounding the find was put under quarantine, and aerial spraying of the pesticide Malathion, successfully used in California's $100 million 1980-82 war against the flies, began. Farm officials believe the flies may have entered the state on a plane or boat from Central or South America...
...some New England, Southern and California communities, planes and spray trucks are now dousing large areas with malathion (which has largely replaced banned DDT). But many scientists are skeptical about the chemical's effectiveness, just as they are about such gadgetry as electronic bug zappers. The main impact, says Entomologist John Edman of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, is psychological: "It reassures people something is being done...
...year since Medflies were discovered almost simultaneously in Los Angeles and in Santa Clara County, just south of San Francisco. No one knows where they came from-perhaps in contaminated fruit from Hawaii. But farmers, recalling the devastating losses from past outbreaks, immediately clamored for aerial spraying with malathion, a mild garden-variety pesticide that kills off Mediterranean fruit flies while causing no apparent harm to humans. Nonetheless, California's Governor, who plans to run for the U.S. Senate next year, refused to allow what he called a rain of chemicals on residential areas. Instead, he opted...
Helicopters began spraying malathion the very next day. But still more flies were found. With two neighbors, Bays sent up four crop-dusting biplanes, that released clouds of Diphos, a more powerful pesticide. Next day the number of trapped flies dropped sharply. But farm officials recognized the difficulty of eliminating an insect that can produce 500 or more offspring in a month-long lifetime. In Modesto, not far from San Joaquin's lush fields, where tomato, peach and melon crops are now ripening, one had this to say about the tiny foe: "It's probably some place...
There will be havoc, however, if the Malathion does not find the flies. The 200 farm products that the flies infest account for about $4 billion each year. Expensive fumigation and cold-storage treatment could save some crops, but there is no way to salvage dates, figs, olives or almonds. California need only look across the Pacific for an example of the fly's destructive power. Hawaii has been infested since 1910. The only fruit it exports in large quantities is the thick-skinned pineapple, which is immune to the bug. Says Dr. Leroy Williamson, a DOA scientist...