OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — A Nebraska farmer has sued herbicide manufacturers, saying his neighbors’ use of the company products damaged his soybean crop last summer.
Shane Greckel filed the federal lawsuit last week against Monsanto and other companies whose products contain the herbicide dicamba.
Experts say problems have arisen with dicamba as farmers began to use it to kill weeds in soybean and cotton fields where specially engineered seeds had been planted to resist the herbicide. Because it can easily evaporate after being applied, the chemical sometimes settles on neighboring fields planted with seeds that are not resistant to dicamba.
Greckel says that’s what happened on his fields near Bloomfield.
Monsanto spokesman Jeff Neu told the Journal Star that the company hadn’t yet been served with the lawsuit but would review it.