Widely Used Pesticide Is a Buzzkill for Honeybees

This article shares the results of 2 recently released reports on the effects of neonicotinoids on honeybee population. One is Canada based while another report is from the EU. The EPA review on neonicotinoids is underway in the US, though results aren't expected until 2018, according to the article..

It's good to see that the EU has banned it's use for certain plants, and Maryland has also banned it's use in it's state...

A step in the right direction IMO...

We need the pollinators!

www.scientificamerican.com

Honeybee stings ache for a good reason: This species knows how to brawl. But as it turns out, these black-and-yellow pollinators are quite vulnerable themselves—especially to neonicotinoids, a pesticide commonly used to ward off crop-munching pests. Two new studies, published this week in Science, address this question by studying large populations of bees in multiple locations for months on end. The results add substantial weight to the claim that neonicotinoids damage bee populations.

“I hope that my study kind of makes the debate go away,” says Amro Zayed, an entomologist who studies social insects at York University in Toronto and is co-author of one of the new reports. Even though honeybees are not the intended targets of neonicotinoids, any indication that the resilient insect is suffering from the chemical means less-adaptable species might be in trouble, too. The pesticide is intended to eradicate insects that chew up or suck on grain crops—which is why these substances coat almost all corn and 50 percent of soy seeds in the U.S. “It’s difficult, if not impossible, to find corn not treated with neonicotinoids,” says Shiela Colla, an ecologist also at York who is unaffiliated with the study research.

a reply to: JacKatMtn

I wrote a research paper on neonicotinoids in college several years ago. We have known about this for years but it's encouraging to see that they're conducting more recent studies on these toxic pesticides.

This is an incredibly important topic. Without the bees, the global food chain could collapse & the process of pollination + plant reproduction will face dire consequences.

Here's a Harvard study from 2014 that links neonicotinoids to the collapse of bee colonies:
www.hsph.harvard.edu...

This isn't a widely discussed topic among my peers or community here in Vermont, but it needs to be... everywhere. We need to save the bees.

a reply to: JacKatMtn

Your right. Europe has banned niconides. Then did studies on the healh of honey bees. Turns out the ban made absolutely no difference.

These niconide studies are just a way to keep the grant money coming

www.huffingtonpost.com...

So long as Monsanto profits are at stake don't expect results from our politicians.
It's that bad.
On a brighter note we left patches of white clover when we cut our yard and we've had lots of bees this year after several years of few or none.
Monoculture is one of the greatest environmental threats we face due to excessive industry influence and the slow demise of the small farmer.

Eta: since many birds and insects use the Earth's magnetic field to navigate our endless pollution of the EM spectrum is leaving them unable to find their way.

a reply to: TiredofControlFreaks

Actually, this recent study showed only the bees in Germany, where the colonies had many more species of plants and a greater variety of pollen were not noticeably affected by the neonicotinoids.

The colonies in Hungary and the UK did show significant signs of stress tied to the toxic neonicotinoids. Usually the bees have trouble surviving over the winter, especially in colder winters, and colonies that die off often have remnants of the toxic substance in their hives once found in the spring.

There is overwhelming evidence that neonicotinoids are harmful to bees. I'm not sure why you would say these toxic pesticides make "absolutely no difference" on the health of bee colonies. That is a false statement.

Posting this a 2nd time in case you didn't see it (published in 2014, 2 years after the article you posted):

[Harvard] Study strengthens link between neonicotinoids and collapse of honey bee colonies

S&F! We're "Hobby Beekeeper's". Luckily we don't have commercial farms any where near us, and we try to do what we can to keep our hives happy. Very important for people to understand that pollinators keep us alive. If they all die, we're not far behind.

Monsanto, Super Bee, sole universal supplier,patent 2457842149.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

a reply to: JacKatMtn

I guess we didn't learn our lesson with DDT all those years ago.
Now I can see bald eagles flying in my neck of the woods again since that insecticide was banned.

I guess there wasn't a Monsanto type of corporation to stop regulation years ago.

Farmers knew about this in the 1990's. The farming section of The Times had a diary article about how the "fields would be yellow from the crops, there would be a thick pungent smell in the air, and bees laden with pollen would fly dozily, crashing into walls".

They should have removed this pesticide from use when they discovered it was effecting honeybees and bumblebees a couple of years ago. Even now it will be a battle to remove it's use in agriculture. Bayer and other companies will try to gain support from farmers they BSed into believing it is perfectly safe.

They will say all pesticides have some effect and it is allowable to have casualties. The thing is that nature actually has safeguards to combat pests. The wasps and other insects and birds actually are symbiotic with plants, they watch after them and when signaled by the plants come down and eat the bugs. But pesticides also kill the wasps and effect the birds too. So nature's natural watchdogs are destroyed by the same chemicals the small plant eating pests are destroyed by.

These big companies know this is true, but they will deny it because they want people to think we need them or we will starve. I do not use any pesticides in my garden, I have little problems with bugs other than maybe some wasps that stop by when I pick the veggies once in a while. The plants cannot distinguish between me and a pest that is eating them.

One year we had no bees here, I was depressed I like bumble bees and honey bees around. But the big black jointed hornets were fertilizing the tomatoes and other plants. I was amazed that I got so many tomatoes. The ants were all over the apple tree, they were crawling in and out of the flowers and the whole tree was full of small apples that year. It was too early for that little tree to have apples of that amount so I picked them and tossed them into the woods. It was only the first year. What we consider bad is often good for this world. We do not look at the whole picture, we are focused on what benefits us the most.

These big chemical companies are deceiving us. It is all right to use some pesticides if necessary but a farmer can not afford to lose a crop so they overdo it to be safe. If the price of food was higher, they could grow them better, but people would rather spend money on what they want instead of what they need. We waste so much money on things we really do not need that we buy inferior foods and our growers are always on the verge of bankruptsy except the big corporations who use lots of chemicals and overtax the environment. Some of the organic pesticides and treatments are just as bad as the chemical ones. I know enough about organic farming to know that they may not be any safer. Also, when using chemical pesticides, the plant produces less of it's own natural pesticide and sometimes it is safer for someone to eat the chemicals than the actual plant chemistry. The taste of the plant chemistry in real food is evident, the organic carrots and celery taste much better than the chemical farming ones. Those two are in the same family, Apiaceae, their chemistry can help fight some cancers if eaten organic because the pleasing taste is actually helping us.

Sometimes pesticides are important, but we have overused them too much in our society and this is really hurting the earth's ability to provide for us.

a reply to: JacKatMtn

One word

Profits

I saw something similar where a county was spraying for mosquitos..... apparently this is a known thing by local beekeepers and they are on a list to be notified ahead of time to safely move their bees.....

Well one couple didn't get the notice..... they saw the chopper.... they went home to see piles of dead bees on their roof, and bees struggling to get the dead off the roof. Horrifying for them and sad I'm sure, but this made me think.....

This means all the honey bees in that area were exposed to this and who knows how many times a month, a year, they do this.......

They are killing the honeybees to kill the mosquito..... It all makes sense now.

-Alee

a reply to: FamCore

This year has been bad from what I see, tough winter as well, so that didn't help. My bud a few miles away is a beekeeper and confirms that the #s are down.
I hope the study brings the needed attention to this serious issue.

a reply to: FamCore

Actually, you haven't linked a study at all.. Your link is to a press release. Enuff said. You don't sell newspaper without exaggerated headline.s

Further, I see the results are expressed as percentages. Gosh, can you ever hide a lot with math.

Not trustworthy at all

a reply to: JacKatMtn

The earth has 8 million people to feed. Niconids are extremely useful in increasing crop yield and there is little credible science that bans on niconids are effective in protecting honeybees.

Is it not time to stop with "feel good" environmental measures and start rejecting sloppy science.

Peer review means nothing and journals will publish anything to stay in business. It is estimated that almost 50 % of scientific studies cannot be replicated by fellow scientists.

I am beyond sick and tired of the fear industry. I will not be condemned to starvation and bankruptcy so that some ivy tower dweller can get tenure.

a reply to: TiredofControlFreaks

Actually, if you read the very first sentence, that Press Release is citing a Harvard Study

...according to a new study from Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH)

But you can deny and split hairs all you want.

Do you really believe insecticide chemicals are in no way harmful to bees?

a reply to: FamCore

Insecticides have been in use since the 1950s ir 1960s. Honeybees have been at risk of hive collapse for about the last 10 years or so.

How do you explain the time discrepancy?

Insecticides have been in use since the 1950s ir 1960s. Honeybees have been at risk of hive collapse for about the last 10 years or so. How do you explain the time discrepancy?

I'm glad you asked! Neonicotinoids didn't start entering the market until 40-50 years after that, which is why we've noticed especially devastating effects since their fairly recent use in the agricultural industry:

Shell and Bayer started the development of neonicotinoids back in the 1980s and 1990s. Since this new group of pesticides came to market, the bee population has been devastated in regions where they have been widely used.

Not only are these chemicals more deadly than other insecticides, but bees seem to actually prefer pollen that is laced with neonicotinoids, exasperating the damage

source

a reply to: FamCore

Honeybee hive collapse started in 2007. Again why the time gap? There is still 10 to 20 years unaccounted for.

There are many reasons for hive collapse including the varro virus. Hive collapses of this nature have been recorded in history BEFORE niconids were developed.

mentalfloss.com...

Are you seriously going to try to convince me that niconids are retroactively toxic?

Stop with the feel good environmentalism. Its a marketing ploy.

Dow has a new pesticide in the pipeline called Active to replace niconids

www.theguardian.com...

We have seen this before.

The fungicide Boscalid makes it worse too:

www.sciencedaily.com...

It's not just the plants that are treated with insecticide that are the problem, the insectide washes off and goes into the groundwater then into the pollen of adjacent plants.