Pesticide Use in Texas

"Pesticide" is a broad word. It covers herbicides that kill weeds, insecticides that kill insects, fungicides, and a range of other products used to control unwanted organisms. Across the United States, herbicides make up the largest share of agricultural pesticide use by volume, and Texas — with its enormous acreage of cotton, corn, sorghum, wheat and hay — follows that pattern.

The scale follows the scale of Texas agriculture, which is among the largest of any state. A long growing season, large fields, and crops like cotton that have historically required heavy pest management all push usage up. But farming is not the whole story.

Who applies pesticides

• Agriculture is the largest user by far — row crops, orchards and rangeland across the producing regions, from the High Plains to the Rio Grande Valley.
• Urban and residential use is widespread and often overlooked: lawns, gardens, golf courses, and structural pest control in homes and buildings across the state's big metros.
• Rights-of-way and public land — highway shoulders, utility corridors, rail lines and parks — are treated to control brush and weeds.

Why it matters environmentally

Most pesticide applied stays where it is intended and breaks down over time. But a fraction moves — and where it moves is the environmental concern:

• Into water. Rain carries pesticide residue off fields and lawns into streams; it is one of the nonpoint sources tracked in our profile of surface water pollution.
• Into the air, through spray drift and volatilization, sometimes affecting neighboring crops and communities.
• Through the food web, where some compounds affect non-target species — pollinators, birds and aquatic life among them.

How use is regulated

Pesticides in Texas are governed by a layered system. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency registers pesticides and sets the terms of their use under federal law. The Texas Department of Agriculture licenses commercial and private applicators, regulates agricultural use, and investigates complaints, while the Structural Pest Control Service oversees pest control in and around buildings. The most hazardous products are "restricted use," available only to trained, licensed applicators.

Toward more targeted use

The long-term direction in Texas, as nationally, is toward applying less and applying it more precisely. Integrated pest management — using monitoring, biological controls and crop rotation to spray only when needed — has cut some chemical use. Genetically modified, pest-resistant crop varieties changed which products are used and how much. And precision-agriculture tools now place pesticide more exactly, reducing waste and drift. The trajectory is real, but in a state that farms on the Texas scale, the totals remain large.