Lynn Bowers founded Forestland Dwellers in 2003 to monitor herbicide use in western Oregon.  A year later she called an official at the state forestry department and asked for a map…

Bowers:  “I thought, hey, I’ll just call this guy up and i want to know where they’re spraying, give me a map—no such thing.”

So, she started making her own.

Forestland Dwellers now has an array of maps cataloguing aerial sprays over the last eighteen years.  The group is also collecting individuals’ experiences.  Bowers says the stories she’s heard are horrifying.

Bowers:  “You get sprayed, you get this uncontrollable cough, you get just about immediate muscle weakness, violent diarrhea, women start bleeding right a way, if you’re pregnant, you lose the baby, it’s really bad.”

People can subscribe to the state’s forestry’s notification system, or look at the maps on the Forestland Dweller’s Web site.  Bowers recommends that older folks and people with children evacuate the area during spraying.

Justin Waltz of the Oregon Public Health Division says that poisoning from pesticides and herbicides can be difficult to determine.

Waltz:  “Generally speaking, just about all pesticides may injure people if they’re not used as directed by the label, and the issue is that the symptoms are pretty generalized.  It could be similar to flu or other illnesses and so it’s that reason why it’s quite difficult to diagnose it.”

Some doctors say long term exposure may result in neurological diseases.  The label of one common chemical in herbicide sprays, Atrazine 4-l, states that the chemical poses risks of seeping into the soil and can contaminate groundwater .