Saturday Short Subjects: Scott’s Settles

It’s lawn reseeding season for many in the Northeast. The best time of year for starting a new lawn in Connecticut is August 15-September 15, which means that as soon as I finish this post I am off to the back yard. I am going to use a blend of fescue to overseed the densely shaded portions in the hopes that I will be able to get grass to grow there. I won’t, however, be using Scott’s seed this time around.

On September 7 the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a press release stating that Scotts Miracle-Gro Company (Scotts) will pay $12.5 Million in Criminal Fines and Civil Penalties under a settlement that resolves violations under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA). This is the largest civil settlement under FIFRA to date. 

Scotts pleaded guilty in February 2012 to including illegally applying insecticides to its wild bird food products that are toxic to birds (to protect its bird foods from insect infestation during storage), falsifying pesticide registration documents, distributing pesticides with misleading and unapproved labels, and distributing unregistered pesticides. By the time it voluntarily recalled the products in March 2008, Scotts had sold more than 70 million units of bird food illegally treated with pesticide. Both the criminal and civil cases were investigated by the U.S. EPA. Read more here. 

Why Saturday Short Subjects? Some readers may recall  being dropped at the movie theater for the Saturday matinee — two action-packed feature films with a series of short subjects (cartoons or short movies, sometimes a serial cliffhanger) sandwiched in between. Often the short subjects were the most memorable, and enjoyable, part of the morning. That explains the name. The reason behind these particular posts is that we are all short on time. My Short Subject posts should not take me as long to write or you as long to read (or try).