Pittsburgh-area farmer and employee sentenced for using banned pesticide to kill migratory birds

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — A Beaver County farmer and his employee who were found guilty of using a banned pesticide to kill migratory birds were sentenced to probation, fines and community service. 

A federal judge convicted 52-year-old Robert Yost of New Galilee and his employee 27-year-old Jacob Reese of Enon Valley in January after a bench trial in 2022. Both were sentenced to a year of probation. Yost received a $21,000 fine and 100 hours of community service while Reese was sentenced to a $5,500 fine and 50 hours of community service. 

Prosecutors said evidence presented at trial showed Yost, who operates Yost Farms in Beaver County, told Reese to spread whole kernel corn coated in the pesticide carbofuran in a soybean field. The corn attracted protected migratory birds that were killed a short ways away from where they ate the pesticide-laced kernels, prosecutors said. 

Carbofuran is a registered restricted-use pesticide after the Environmental Protection Agency concluded it generally caused unreasonable adverse effects on humans and the environment and that the risks of using it were unacceptable.  

Authorities blame Yost and Reese for the deaths of approximately 17 Canada geese, 10 red-winged blackbirds and one mallard duck. 

While handing down the sentences, prosecutors said the judge noted that Yost and Reese’s crimes were serious, created a risk to the environment and harmed the public’s trust in the source of their food. The community service is a way to “redeem the public’s trust in safe and ethical farming,” the court said.