PESTICIDES FOUL MOST U.S. STREAMS

BOSTON GLOBE - Pesticides linked to cancer, birth defects, and
neurological disorders contaminate almost all of the nation's rivers and
streams and most fish found in them, but seldom at concentrations likely
to affect people, government scientists said yesterday. Though the
pesticides were less common in ground water, the US Geological Survey's
study of data between 1992 and 2001 found them present in streams in
both urban and agricultural areas at concentrations that could affect
aquatic life or fish-eating wildlife. . .

About 40 of the 100 pesticides studied accounted for most of the
findings in water, fish, and sediment. Three herbicides used mainly on
farms -- atrazine, metolachlor, and cyanazine -- were the most
frequently detected in agricultural streams. Three used commonly in
cities -- simazine, prometon, and tebuthiuron -- showed up more often in
urban streams. The pesticides also showed up more than 90 percent of the
time in the fish tissue found in agricultural, urban, and mixed land-use
areas.

Jay Feldman, executive director of Beyond Pesticides, a national
research and advocacy group, said the data surrounding the nation's
reliance on about 1 billion pounds of pesticides a year show ''an urgent
need to strengthen policies at all levels of government and curtail
pesticide use."

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