According to an Associated Press story, poppies grown on the Australian island state of Tasmania for the pharmaceutical industry are causing controversy by producing positive opium tests in racehorses. Six horses have been disqualified in the past year for positive test results, and it has been suggested that the poppies were either blown or deposited into a field where field where horses were grazing, or either the poppies were contained in the horses’ feed.

The article said that in other cases, farmers suspect that fields once used for poppies but now used for other crops in rotation may still be yielding traces of the plant. One horse trainers’ representative said that no Tasmanian feed supplier can guarantee that their feed is free of the poppies.

While the tiny amounts of opium in the horses would not have any effect on their behavior, Racing Tasmania’s zero-tolerance policy means that any trace of a drug means disqualification. Apparently in the cases of the disqualified horses, the doping was accepted as inadvertent, and no action beyond disqualification of the horses in a particular race was taken.

Poppies are lucrative in the international painkiller industry. More than 16,000 hectares (64,750 acres) of poppies were planted in Tasmania this year, and the state industry is estimated to be worth about US$30 million annually