Thanks Hera;
They won't let them burn, so they have to spray! Wow! I am sure it is all linked to some idea and I believe misplaced about global warming - that was changed to global change.

They have planes in the air- that is a lot of area being sprayed.
Thank you for explaining to me how much is being sprayed out there! WOW!

Thistles die fast from round up too. But you got to get them before they go to seed or like the hemlocks, they love that bare ground. I cannot believe you have those old hemlocks too. Hate those things.
Russian knapweed, field bindweed, skeleton weed, I look forward to looking them up.
I think you live in Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, or Illinois. IF you live in Illinois please explain why the S is silent? LOL just kidding.

Hi Benedetta; |
Sorry I was thinking of something else when I said neonic sprays. They are used in most nurseries to kill aphids etc and stay in the plant a long time ( some times for years) and have been implicated in bee deaths.
Re what drifted down the hill; don't know , but am guessing it might be this:

http://www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/pest-control/herbicide-damage-zmgz13fmzsto

So called "killer compost" has been in our area, one friend got a load of it at one point. If you can grow lettuce or tomatoes okay in the soil, then its fine, which is a useful test. If you do have it , corn will still grow in it. It can take years to clear out of the soil.
By the way, checked into the horse tails you mentioned; seems like they like moist soils? Summers here are hot and dry, so probably why we don't have an issue with them. Glad they don't grow here!

Whatever it was, it sure is a) effective/devastating and b) stays around in the soil for a long time.

Hi Benedetta,
Thanks for your kind words about my apple tree:) i was kind of sad about all the shrubs, too; it used to be a pioneers farm, some old edibles had survived, and I was hoping they were one of them..

I an kind of vague about where I live for privacies sake on the internet, though I would be fine to message you more privately if you want.

I live zone 5/6, main crops around here are things like winter wheat, spring wheat, peas.Lentils I think too. Hardy stuff.
Before we moved in, the farmers had been spraying for thistles for decades on our property.. not sure what they are using, some is round up, some is stuff they have to get a special permit for.And there is the pesticide stuff too. The peas are often sprayed dead before they are harvested; huge fields of them. They used to burn the fields at the end of harvest, but now they aren't allowed to, and have to spray the fields. It is not their fault; they have to make a living, and don't know what else to do.
Because of decades of spraying , our weeds are some of the hardiest and most pest resistant around.
Mullen is a biannual; the second year it is very tall, and has medicinal uses, though not if it is soaked in herbicides and pesticides. Poison hemlock; yep , that is the stuff.
And the hemlock came back on the hill,even though the grass for the most part didn't for years. You are probably right about lack of competition, since nothing else much would grow there...The trouble is, when nothing else will grow, only weeds survive.
Horsetail isn't a problem here.it sounds nasty though. Thistles, russian knapweed, field bindweed, skeleton weed etc are our problem children.. One thing, the ground is so poisoned that when I was showing a friend a russian knapweed plant that needed to go, she said she had never seen one so stunted.
I got rid of a batch of thistles that had been getting sprayed and coming back for years.My goats took care of some, also my horses. I think the horses just mashed a big area of them into the ground in spring.

( The previous owner used to let them spray on the property. too.Been a long time since our land here was sprayed, now, but the drift still gets us sometimes. Last year was good though.I don't think they were using as many herbicides.)

When I first came here, there was lovely rich ground near the creek. I planned on planting vegies near there; a neighbour warned me that the pesticide run off down to the creek would make that a bad idea.

The trouble is decades of spray builds up to make poisoned ground. The first year they sprayed some thistles near the creek; thistles came back; the next year, the wild roses which I like still haven't moved back into that piece of land yet. I figure on hand pulling the thistles there, and hoping for the land to recover.
Hope this gives more info, will answer as best I can what you are interested in re this.

Hi Benedetta,

We have a big pesticide drift problem where I live.In fact a neighbor told us not to even try growing grapes. ( Actually though, I have a single grape surviving in a sheltered area protected by the house from the worst of the drifts.)
But we routinely loose plants to the pesticide spraying . The worst year was when it went down the hillside down from the field. A huge mass of shrubby trees ( wild hawthorns or service berries) and all the grass and weeds on the hill side died in days; ( except mullen; apparently it will survive anything.) An old apple tree partly died. And two years later, the area still wouldn't grow much, though water hemlock plants are also pretty hardy ( and deadly poisonous and extremely unwanted..)
The farmers here tend to have blinkers on; if it isn't a growing crop, then they figure it doesn't count. And even though we have asked them to let us know before they spray, so we can at least get the animals in, they forget.

They are great people, remove snow drifts from the driveway,and we really like them.
The pesticide residue has been building up in our heavy clay soil for many years. When you plant something, you dig out the soil and replace some of it. Most of my nieghbours who grow vegetables have replaced the soil. Either that or use tons of fertilizer. One friend had one of the farmers tell her that they have insurance, so let them know and they will replace plants; but most of us don't want to harass them because truthfully, what is the point? Money won't replace a huge apple tree, we just try and plant in areas further away from pesticide run off, and try and figure out what will survive.

I read Silent Spring recently and I don't think much has changed or improved since then.