Police are investigating the use of harmful herbicide on seedlings
By Martha Quillin - McClatchy Newspapers

LEE COUNTY, N.C. –In a quarter-century of farming, John Gross has taken his licks from weather and the markets, but this is the first time he has felt personally under attack.

Gross said someone broke into his Lee County greenhouse last month and sprayed herbicide on his tobacco seedlings, killing the entire crop of nearly 1 million tiny plants. The loss is not covered by insurance.

“It may have been done out of jealousy, I don’t know,” said Gross, a fifth-generation farmer. “I do know I haven’t made nobody mad - nowhere near mad enough to do something like that.”
Besides his tobacco crop, Gross also raises strawberries and attracts hundreds of visitors to his farm south of Sanford each fall with a pumpkin patch and corn maze.

The Lee County Sheriff’s Office and the N.C. Department of Agriculture are investigating the incident.

Gross said he and his family took a rare weekend trip in early March, and when they returned, he saw the back door to the greenhouse standing open.

He said he didn’t think much about it until, over the next week, his 1-inch- to 2-inch seedlings began to wither.

He called N.C. State University’s crop science department, and extension specialist Loren Fisher came down for a look.

At first, Fisher said, he and Gross thought there might have been a problem with the gas heaters in the greenhouse, but as the plants began to yellow and die, it looked more like chemical damage.

Gross paid a lab to test the plants, and said the tests showed traces of 2,4-D, an herbicide used to treat broad-leafed weeds such as dandelion and wild mustard.

“That type of chemical I don’t even keep on the farm,” Gross said.

Gross said it would have taken someone less than 15 minutes to spray the plants using a backpack sprayer.

He thinks it was someone familiar with chemicals who mixed the 2,4-D with something else, because alone, the herbicide has a distinctive smell, and he never noticed an odor.

He also thinks it was someone who knew when he and his family would be away.

Typically, Gross said, he grows about 130 acres of tobacco and sells an additional 20 acres worth to other farmers.

Gross said he has spent $40,000 to $50,000 buying new seedlings from other farmers to have enough to plant 130 acres. He will start setting those in the field today, he said.

“With fuel prices and fertilizer prices like they are, profit margins were real low already,” he said. “And we’re starting out 40 or 50 thousand dollar in the hole.”

John Dalley, eastern district manager for the pesticides section of the N.C. Department of Agriculture, said his office has investigated cases in which a tree or shrub had been intentionally poisoned, and he has seen agricultural crops inadvertently damaged with herbicides. But he could not recall a case in which a crop was killed on purpose.

“It’s very difficult to prove,” Dalley said.

He said he could not discuss Gross’ case specifically until the investigation is complete.

The Sheriff’s Office is offering a reward for information in the case.

It asks anyone with information to call 919-775-5531. Tips will be kept confidential.