I am sorry but it is
now becoming clear that the pesticide background loading is now impacting the
whole insect population in North America to some degree or the other. The problem is persistency which with each
annual application makes insect avoidance less likely. Right now both our bee populations, both
domestic and wild are in a downward trend and in the adjacent article we are
now seeing the same thing happening with the monarch butterflies.
This means that the
pesticide problem has certainly entered the fence rows and is making the
milkweed toxic. At least that is the
first place we look because the monarch consumes nothing else. In short this is indirect confirmation of
what is becoming a major agricultural disaster.
Worse it will mean
limited fertility in the general ecosystem until the system sheds these toxins
even if we suspend the practice tomorrow.
Since that will not happen soon it likely also means that we are at
serious risk at seeing a number of our core crops fail with a serious drop in
yields. The most vulnerable right now is
the California almond crop. However all
fruit crops are at serious risk.
As usual the industry
proponents are in complete denial and cannot afford to admit something is
wrong. In the meantime the pattern is
unfolding in a manner similar to the global amphibian die off that was triggered
by the application of Round Up. Again an
exercise in inadvertent agricultural application not been properly understood.
No honey, more
problems: A ‘catastrophic’ year for bee colonies
VIDYA
KAURI AND PAUL WALDIE
Jul.
31 2013,
Freezing
temperatures, killer parasites, toxic chemicals: The plight of honey bees is
getting worse in many parts of the world and no one seems to know precisely
why.
This
past winter was one of the worst on record for bees. In the U.S., beekeepers
lost 31 per cent of their colonies, compared to a loss of 21 per cent the
previous winter. In Canada, the Canadian Honey Council reports an annual loss
of 35 per cent of honey bee colonies in the last three years. In Britain, the
Bee Farmers’ Association says its members lost roughly half their colonies over
the winter.
“It
has been absolutely catastrophic,” said Margaret Ginman, who is general
secretary of the Bee Farmers’ Association. “This has been one of the worst
years in living memory.”
“There
are some beekeepers that have lost 70 per cent over the last winter, and you
can’t even make that up in one season,” says Dan Davidson, president of the
Ontario Beekeepers’ Association. “That’s a disaster.”
Just
why so many bees have died is far from clear. In Britain, many blame a wetter
than usual fall and winter. Queen bees typically mate while flying and the wet
weather kept them from moving around, resulting in lower colony populations.
In
the U.S. and Canada, scientists have different theories, with some blaming the
Varroa mite, which burrows into bees and feeds on their blood, and others
pointing to disease and an increased use of pesticides by farmers. “The decline
in honey bee health is a complex problem caused by a combination of stressors,”
the U.S. Department of Agriculture said in a report released last month.
There’s
no doubt bees are critical to humans. By some estimates, bees and other
pollinating insects, such as butterflies and moths, contribute $200-billion to
global agriculture every year. Almost one-third of the food we eat has been
pollinated by bees and some crops, such as broccoli and almonds, are entirely
dependent on bees for pollination.
David
Schuit, a honey producer in Elmwood, Ont., had plans last year to expand his
family’s honey business when disaster struck. He runs 35 bee yards under the
name Saugeen Country Honey with his wife and seven children in Elmwood, Ont. He
says he had a healthy, robust crop of bees that had survived the winter, but
one spring day in May of 2012, he found his bees in “terrible agony,” going
around in circles, venom dripping from their back sides. The bees were either
staying away from their hives or unable to find their way inside.
“It
hurts deep inside when you see your hives dying in this manner,” he says.
The
family ended up losing 90 per cent of the bees on their home yard alone. All in
all, Mr. Schuit said they lost around 37 million bees, and the family produced
barely half the honey they make each year. They were forced to give up their
100-acre organic cash crop farm because they could no longer continue making
mortgage payments on it.
The
loss of bees was difficult to recover through the following winter, a time when
bee populations generally decline because of the freezing temperatures, and
this year, Mr. Schuit says bees are continuing to die en masse. “It’s hard on
us. We need help,” he says. “I’m ready to throw the towel in.”
The
Schuits are among a growing number of beekeepers who are blaming sudden and
massive bee deaths on neonicotinoid pesticides. These are nicotine-like
substances that attack the nervous system of insects. They are also water
soluble, meaning they can be added to the soil and taken in by the entire
plant, making every part of it lethal to bugs.
Corn,
soybean and canola farmers coat their seeds with the insecticides using a
machine that needs to be lubricated with talc to push the seeds out. The talc
absorbs some of the pesticide and bees get exposed to this toxic mixture when
the machine blows the talc out.
Health
Canada’s Pest Management Regulatory Agency noticed that honey bee deaths in
about 250 bee yards in Southern Ontario and Quebec coincided with the corn-planting
season. They found neonicotinoids in 70 per cent of bee samples taken from
these regions.
In
April, the European Union passed a two-year ban on neonicotinoids because of
the risk they pose to bees. Beekeeper associations in Ontario and Quebec are calling
for a similar ban in Canada, but they will likely face an uphill battle against
grain farmers, who say the pesticide has been crucial to their business since
it was approved for use in 2004.
In
July, the Grain Farmers of Ontario mailed out 28,000 postcards urging their
members to call their local political representatives and oppose any kind of a
ban on the neonicotinoids.
“A
knee-jerk reaction shouldn’t happen until we find out more about what is
actually happening from a bee-health perspective because there are are other
issues that affect the bee populations,” says Barry Senft, chief executive
officer of Grain Farmers of Ontario. “If we start to move away from a
science-based approval process, everything then is subjective.”
The
group says that a ban on neonicotinoids would result in a loss of three to 20
bushels per acre for Ontario farmers. For the average farmer with a 500-acre
field, this would translate to a loss of two to 13 per cent of their gross
income, making it difficult for them to compete with farmers in Western Canada
and the United States, Mr. Senft says.
Health
Canada says that more research needs to be done and continues to collect
samples of affected bees this year. It says regulatory action to protect bees
against neonicotinoids may be taken, if warranted, at any time during this
review process.
Ernesto
Guzman, head of the Honey Bee Research Centre at Guelph University, says the
Health Canada data points to a definitive link between neonicotinoids and bee
deaths, but says the pesticides are not the only cause of declining bee
populations. It is also not known if the pesticides are the major cause of bee
deaths. Mr. Guzman says that, during the winter, Varroa mites are the main
cause of bee deaths. They came from Asia about 20 years ago and are found on
virtually all bee colonies.
On
average, bee keepers expect to lose about 10 to 15 per cent of their numbers in
the winter because the cold makes it harder for the bees to survive. Paul
Vautour, the Maritimes director for the Canadian Honey Council, says a drought
last fall made it even harder for his bees to withstand the prolonged winter,
causing him to loss 85 per cent of his bee colonies. He had 238 colonies at the
start of winter, and by May, this number was down to 36.
Mr.
Vautour says this was a “big loss” as a relatively small commercial beekeeper,
and he had to spend $24,000 to buy 100 new colonies.
Many
beekeepers say they know how to manage their Varroa mites, however, and insist
that they don’t cause as much destruction as the neonicotinoids.
Mr.
Guzman says it is important for the government to invest in independent
research to help beekeepers facing significant losses.
“The
beekeepers need help and they need help immediately,” he says. “Research to
find answers to the problem and to answer the question of how much pesticides
are killing bees relative to other causes might take many years.”
HONEY
BEES BY THE NUMBERS
7,000: Number
of beekeepers in Canada, according to the Canadian Honey Council
15
per cent: Industry-standard acceptable loss of honey-bee colonies during
the winter, also known as “wintering loss”
35
per cent: Annual average loss of honey-bee colonies in Canada during the
last three years
12
per cent: Wintering loss in Ontario in 2012, the lowest by province
27.9
per cent: Wintering loss in New Brunswick, the highest by province
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