Dear John,
The numbers are in from this season’s butterfly count: once in the millions, barely 29,000 western monarch butterflies were found in California last year.
Glyphosate -- a.k.a. the active ingredient in Bayer-Monsanto’s Roundup® -- is wiping out milkweed, the only food source for monarch caterpillars. This has contributed to monarchs declining by 90% in the past 20 years alone. They could vanish within our lifetimes.
Home and garden stores like Lowe’s and Home Depot can play a huge role in ending the use of this toxic pesticide in our backyards and across the country. They could stop selling Roundup®. But we need you to urge them to act!
Ask Home Depot and Lowe’s to get Roundup® off their shelves and help save the monarchs!
Companies like Lowe’s & Home Depot could be leaders by removing products containing glyphosate from their physical stores and online -- following the example of their competitor, Costco. This would send a powerful message to Bayer that it must phase out this harmful chemical.
Instead of replacing Bayer-Monsanto’s Roundup® with other toxic products, garden retailers can increase offerings of organic and other safer alternatives.
We need garden retailers to act -- because the Trump Administration is failing to. Despite plummeting monarch populations, Trump’s Fish and Wildlife Service failed to list them as endangered, a move that protects Bayer’s profits and leaves these iconic butterflies vulnerable.
Glyphosate isn’t just impacting monarchs -- researchers have found that it may impede the growth of bee larvae, impact bees’ ability to navigate and find food, and disrupt their gut microbiome, which could make them more vulnerable to diseases.
Friends of the Earth members like you played a key role in convincing Home Depot and Lowe’s to protect pollinators by committing to stop selling plants grown with bee-killing neonic pesticides. Now, you can push them to take another vital step in pollinator protection.
Urge Home Depot and Lowe’s to stop selling Roundup®!
Glyphosate is also harmful to our health. It’s a probable carcinogen and has been linked to increased risk of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
Last year, a jury ordered Bayer to pay $2 billion to a couple who used glyphosate on their lawn for decades and who both suffered from non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Over 52,000 similar court cases are pending. But instead of removing this product from store shelves, Bayer-Monsanto is trying to settle the lawsuits and keep selling this toxic pesticide. Under the terms of the deals, Roundup® would continue to be sold in the U.S. without any safety warning.
In short -- Bayer-Monsanto isn’t likely to protect butterflies, bees and our health on its own. Garden retailers can help shrink the market for this pesticide and help keep it out of our backyards and communities.
Remind garden retailers they have an important role to play -- Let them know our health is more important than Bayer’s profits!
Standing with you,
Kendra Klein, PhD,
Senior staff scientist,
Friends of the Earth
