LETTER: Check your topsoil, gardeners
Published 8:20 am Friday, August 7, 2026
Editor,
Beware all gardeners!
A surprise and shocking situation happened to me this spring.
I purchased a substantial amount of topsoil from a reputable local White Rock/South Surrey nursery and was perplexed why my garden and potted plants were not growing.
So I searched the internet for reasons and found out the topsoil was contaminated with herbicide poison. This herbicide — mainly Grazon — is now used massively throughout farming on grains (it is in the flour we buy) and hay as a drying agent to prevent molds and fungus.
The animals feed on this and apparently (?) it doesn’t harm them, but it remains in the manure which farmers sell to growers. Farmers and nurseries are probably not aware that the manure is poisonous.
My crop this year was destroyed. It is quite unsettling to find this out and furthermore it can take up to three years or more to remove this from your garden. So when buying particularly bulk topsoil or manure (even mushroom), always ask the supplier if it is free of herbicides.
They will deny it is impure so you must test it before use. There is good information on the internet on how to test and amend your soil.
Hiring a professional will cost you so the easiest way is to plant a broad leaf plant like peas or beans and observe. If the plant is slow to germinate, looks stunted and the leaves curl, it is contaminated.
This takes time, so a quicker way is to buy a small, broad-leafed starter plant and pot it in the soil. If contaminated, it will not grow and all the young leaves will be small and curled.
Happy gardening.
Darlene Cummings, South Surrey