One Third More Dead Bees

Let it be said that the battle of the reports is well under way and it is been fought out in the middle of my old stomping grounds in Ontario.

Last year Bayer ran an expensive exercise in Ontario in which the selected hives were exposed for exactly two weeks before removed to pristine conditions to show no effect. That should have worked perfectly save for the obvious avoidance of continuing exposure driving accumulation levels that kill. In fact prior work readily predicts just this result.

This is a far more deadly set of statistics simply because it proves that proximity is directly linked to CCD. We are no longer going at it backwards.

One-third more dead bees: Researcher looks at insecticide impact

By Fanny Arnaud, The Canadian Press June 24, 2013

http://www.montrealgazette.com/technology/Onethird+more+dead+bees+Researcher+looks+insecticide+impact/8568994/story.html

Seeding is over for this year on Canadian corn and soy farms. But a student's research suggests the consequences on bees could last a long time.

He has collected data that showed apiaries installed less than three kilometres from insecticide-treated fields had a three times higher rate of mortality.

Human beings should take note. Pollination is responsible for 70 per cent of cultivated plants, and for 35 per cent of humans' overall food consumption. Fewer bees means fewer plants - notably apples, strawberries, cucumbers - and could ultimately mean a drop in the food supply.

The Quebec master's student, Olivier Samson-Robert, had attempted to put a figure on the noted decline in bee populations and determine how much of it was linked to a certain type of insecticide.

The Laval University student released the first part of his study about bees' mortality around fields treated with neo-nicotinoid insecticides, one of the most widely used insecticides worldwide.

"The neonicotinoid insecticide causes a higher mortality rate," Samson-Robert said in an interview.

Neonicotinoid insecticides have been allowed in Canada since 2004.

They are chemically similar to nicotine, which has a long tradition in agriculture. Tobacco has been used as an insecticide since at least the 15th century, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Samson-Robert said that insecticide is ubiquitous, with 99 per cent of corn seeds and 50 per cent of soy seeds in Quebec coated with it.

Particles from that insecticide escape into the air when the seeds are planted, Samson-Robert said.

He said particles from insecticides fall onto bees, or onto the flowers that bees are visiting. Particles are present as well in the water that bees drink.

Health Canada's Pest Management Regulatory Agency announced an evaluation of the situation in 2012 after bees' increased mortality was reported.

"Health Canada is closely monitoring treated-seed planting and conducting analyses of bee incidents that are occurring this year," spokesman Sean Upton said in an email.