3.2 Georgia License Categories 21–41

3.2 Georgia License Categories 21–41

A Georgia commercial applicator license is not a blanket permit to apply every restricted-use pesticide (RUP) in the state. UGA PSEP states the operational limit directly: pesticide purchases are limited to those categories in which a licensee is certified. Rule 40-21-2 lists the legal categories. GDA's public Pesticide Applicator License Categories page uses numbers 21 through 41 and publishes the hours required for recertification next to each number. Rule 40-21-2 uses letters (a) through (r) for the same family of work. Exam items may cite either system. Learn the number you will see on gapestexam and on your license, and keep the letter as the rule citation.

Private applicators are a separate category under Rule 40-21-2-.02: producers using RUPs on their own (or their employer's) agricultural or forestry commodity production, or on another producer's land only by trading personal services. Farmers, ranchers, orchardists, pecan growers, Christmas-tree growers, and comparable producers use that path through UGA Cooperative Extension county-agent training, not this commercial exam. Private recertification is 3 hours and $0. The rest of this section is the commercial map.

Number versus letter, and the full hour table

Use this table as the study sheet. Hours are GDA's published recertification hours per licensed category. Add-on and subcategory rows show 0 because those hours ride with a primary category, as Rule 40-21-4 explains for Demonstration and Research and Aerial.

Notice the numbering gap after 27. That gap is where SPCC structural credentials live on gapestexam (28 Fumigation, 29 Household Pest Control, 30 Wood-destroying Organism Control). Those are not GDA commercial applicator categories 21–41. Do not register for 28–30 when you meant 35, 36, or 38.

Agricultural and land-management primaries (21–27)

Category 21 Agricultural Plant is the crop category GDA writes with Georgia's production list: tobacco, peanuts, cotton, feed grains, soybeans, forage, vegetables, small fruits, tree fruits and nuts, plus grasslands and non-crop agricultural lands. A custom applicator covering cotton in the Coastal Plain and pecans in southwest Georgia is in 21, not in turf, and not in forest nurseries.

Category 22 Animal Agriculture covers RUPs on animals and confinement areas: beef and dairy cattle, swine, sheep, horses, goats, poultry, and livestock. It also includes veterinarians who hold themselves out as pesticide applicators for hire or who engage in large-scale pesticide use. A poultry-house insect treatment for a fee is 22 plus a contractor license, not 24.

Category 23 Forest is forests, forest nurseries, and forest seed-producing areas — pine establishment and hardwood management, not a municipal lawn.

Category 24 Ornamental and Turf is maintenance and production of ornamental trees, shrubs, flowers, and turf. Metro Atlanta lawn-care and golf-course work lands here. Landscape contracting for a fee still needs the contractor credential on top of 24.

Category 25 Seed Treatment is RUPs on seeds — hopper-box or seed-treatment plant work — not foliar sprays on the crop that grows from those seeds.

Category 26 Aquatic is pesticides purposefully applied to standing or running water, excluding public-health work that belongs in Category 31. A farm-pond herbicide is 26. A county mosquito larvicide program run by government employees is 31 or, for commercial mosquito contractors, 41.

Category 27 Right-of-Way is public roads, electric power lines, pipelines, railway rights-of-way, and similar corridors. Georgia Department of Transportation contractors and utility vegetation managers live here.

Government-employee categories (31 and 32)

GDA writes Category 31 Public Health for State, Federal, or other governmental employees using or supervising RUPs in public health programs for pests of medical and public health importance. Category 32 Regulatory is the same employee class controlling regulated pests (quarantine and official control programs). These are not the default categories for a private mosquito or crop business. A city or county employee treating mosquitoes as an official public-health program is the 31 fact pattern. A commercial firm paid to treat mosquitoes on public and private grounds is Category 41, which GDA describes as employees using or supervising pesticides to control mosquitoes and/or mosquito larvae on public and private grounds in Georgia. Recertification hours flag the difference too: 31 and 41 are 10-hour categories; 32 is 6.

Add-ons: 33 Demonstration and Research, 34 Aerial

Category 33 Demonstration and Research is not a first license. GDA and Rule 40-21-2-(k) require prior certification in one or more of categories (a) through (j) — the primary list that includes plant, animal, forest, turf, seed, aquatic, right-of-way, industrial/structural (35), public health, and regulatory. The category covers extension specialists and county agents, commercial representatives demonstrating products, public-program demonstrators, and persons conducting field research with RUPs. Rule 40-21-3 treats it as an add-on and adds competency in a broad spectrum of pesticide uses, pesticide-organism interactions, and integrating non-chemical methods.

Category 34 Aerial Methods is likewise an add-on. GDA's current category page requires FAA Part 107 and/or Part 137 and certification in one or more of categories (21) through (32), (38), and (41). UGA PSEP adds that aerial applicators must meet all FAA and Georgia aeronautical requirements and hold commercial certification in a primary category in addition to category 34. Rule 40-21-3 still tests aerial dispersal equipment, flight-safety patterns, and protection of pilots and ground personnel, and it still points to 14 CFR Part 137 proof. Do not sit 34 as your only category. An aerial pecan spray still needs a commodity category such as 21 (and 38 if the work is commodity fumigation rather than foliar work).

Category 35 is not the SPCC house-termite license

Category 35 (Rule letter (h)) covers commercial applicators using or supervising RUPs in, on, or around food-handling establishments, human dwellings, institutions such as schools and hospitals, industrial establishments including warehouses and grain elevators, other structures and adjacent areas, and stored, processed, or manufactured products. That sounds like "structural pest control," which is why it is the most dangerous mix-up on this exam.

It is not the Georgia Structural Pest Control Commission Certified Operator license in HPC / WDO / FUM. Rule 40-21-4 even parenthetically excludes pest control operators regulated under the Georgia Structural Pest Control Act when it lists the industrial/institutional/structural recertification row. A firm that inspects houses for subterranean termites, sells a baiting contract, and treats a crawl space is on the SPCC side (gapestexam categories 28–30 and the Certified Operator process). Category 35 is the GDA RUP category for industrial, institutional, and health-related sites that are not that SPCC operator credential. Category 36 Wood Treatment is narrower still: pressure treating lumber and timber with RUP preservatives against termites, powder post beetles, other wood-destroying insects, surface molds, and wood-destroying fungi — mill treating, not residential WDO contracts.

Specialty primaries and the WPS subcategory

Category 37 (GDA table: Microbial Pest Control; rule: Antimicrobial) is disinfectants, sanitizers, algaecides, fungicides, and similar products used to control algae, bacteria, fungi, and viruses in homes, institutions, medical facilities, industrial, and other sites.

Category 38 Agricultural Commodity Fumigation is fumigants on raw or processed agricultural commodities — think grain bins and processed lots — not structural building fumigation under SPCC Category 28.

Category 39 Antifoulant Paints is restricted-use antifouling paints on water-going vessels to inhibit barnacles and algae.

Category 40 Worker Protection Standard is a subcategory for those engaged in training workers and handlers as required by EPA's WPS. It is not a stand-alone spray category. GDA lists 0 recertification hours. Holding 40 means you are credentialed to deliver WPS worker/handler training; it does not replace 21, 24, or any other primary.

Choose categories from the work you will actually supervise. A right-of-way contractor who also treats ornamental beds at depot sites needs 27 and 24, each passed at 70%, each carrying its own recertification hours. An extension agent who demonstrates herbicides in peanut plots needs a primary such as 21, then 33. An unmanned-aircraft applicator over pastures needs FAA Part 107 and/or 137, a primary such as 21 or 22, and 34. Do not collect numbers you will not recertify.