Ontario Canada Beekeepers question Bayer

[Michelle]

http://barrie.ctvnews.ca/beekeepers-question-bayer-cropscience-at-guelph-symposium-1.1915502?utm_content=buffer0898a&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

[LazyBkpr]

   A lot of folks are condemning Neonics, and i once did as well..
   The fact of the matter is, neonics are WAY better than what was being used before they came along..
   My hives are located dead center amids many thousands of acres of neonic treated corn and soybeans, and I have not had any issues up to this point..

   Apparently even harvard got in on the act...
   http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/press-releases/study-strengthens-link-between-neonicotinoids-and-collapse-of-honey-bee-colonies/

   Read the above, and before you start to agree or nod your head, read randy Olivers response. It will open your eyes WIDE if you didnt spot the problems in the research...

  http://scientificbeekeeping.com/the-harvard-study-on-neonicotinoids-and-ccd/

   I have held doubts about neonics being as NASTY to bees as some are claiming for some time. it is hard to continue to abhore something when you have no personal physical evidence.  I lost ONE hive last winter.. if the neonic research held any validity I would have expected to lose MOST of them, considering I am surrounded by neonic crops..  Most of my hives are less than ten steps from those crops.
   I am not claiming there is NO effect, only that the effect is VERY MUCH less than when the planes used to spray DDT among other insecticides.


A quote, link under the quote;
“When we look at the literature and the Internet, what it says is that neonicotinoids applied as seed treatments are then taken up into the plant and expressed in the pollen and in the nectar,” said primary researcher Gus Lorenz, an extension entomologist with the University of Arkansas. “Well, that’s not so much what we found.”

The researchers evaluated treated corn, soybeans and cotton. When they tested soybean flowers and cotton nectar, they found no traces of neonics at all. They did find microscopic traces of neonics in corn at what the EPA and toxicologists say are insignificant impact levels, with the highest having a mean of 2.3 parts per billion. To put that into perspective, one part per billion equals one second in 32 years. “It’s not being expressed in the reproductive parts of the plants,” concluded Dr. Lorenz.
   End Quote
   http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonentine/2014/02/05/bee-deaths-reversal-as-evidence-points-away-from-neonics-as-driver-pressure-builds-to-rethink-ban/


   I will not claim to support Neonics. i don't like how long research says it stays in the ground etc, but when i consider going back to the spraying with other chemicals, I would prefer to stick with the neonics..
   What people are throwing a fit about, is basically pitting the livelihood of beekeepers and bees against the livlihood of farmers who support a large percentage of the population of this world with the crops they produce.
   it is just my oppinion, that we should be concentrating on fixing BOTH problems with alternatives...   OR....    seeing Varoa become resistant to the insecticides we toss at them, won't bees slowly become resistant to the neonics?

[pistolpete]

That's a thoughtful answer.  I read an article along the same lines in Maclean's magazine last week.  I thing it's the synergistic interactions of multiple types of pesticides and herbicides that are the problem.  Not only for the bees but for us.

[Perry]

Not saying I agree or disagree, but I get upset when something is approved based on false and misleading information. Biased and false information goes both ways, and the studies used to get approval were no better than those now seeking to get it halted.What the EPA did was unforgivable, whether they got lucky and were right, or not.

[LazyBkpr]

I agree with you 100% Perry.  The people responsible for testing these products ar ethe same ones that make them.. the same ones that sell them and the same ones that make large sums of money in doing so..   They know what is required by the letter of the law, and go no further than required. Bayer, Monsanto etc, etc..  were NOT required do do prolonged studies, NOR were they required to test their products in combination.  This is where the EPA failed first and foremost. Failing to protect the future. Secondary failing is allowing the companies that produce these things to test them on their own, and not requiring any secondary testing by an unbiased organization..
   Future research may prove our greatest fears and worries. Then again, from the research I have seen, I have no faith whatsoever that such research will prove meaningful because the people doing the research tend to try to forward their own agenda, rather than get actual factual data..
   Until that time comes when we can be certain, I will keep hoping that neonics are better than the methods used before their arrival..   Both for the farmers, and the beekeepers.
     

[Perry]

I agree with you 100% Perry.  The people responsible for testing these products ar ethe same ones that make them.. the same ones that sell them and the same ones that make large sums of money in doing so..   They know what is required by the letter of the law, and go no further than required. Bayer, Monsanto etc, etc..  were NOT required do do prolonged studies, NOR were they required to test their products in combination.  This is where the EPA failed first and foremost. Failing to protect the future. Secondary failing is allowing the companies that produce these things to test them on their own, and not requiring any secondary testing by an unbiased organization..
   Future research may prove our greatest fears and worries. Then again, from the research I have seen, I have no faith whatsoever that such research will prove meaningful because the people doing the research tend to try to forward their own agenda, rather than get actual factual data..
   Until that time comes when we can be certain, I will keep hoping that neonics are better than the methods used before their arrival..   Both for the farmers, and the beekeepers.
   

[riverbee]

here's my concerns.....i have read these articles, and many more and it gets to the point that i don't even read them anymore with all the 'bs' flying.

it used to be, before the mites, we could keep bees relatively pretty good. when the mites came.....

even 10 or 15 yrs ago, i could keep 10-15 hives with relatively few problems and overwinter and increase those hives, now it's a darn struggle. bees dying from starvation? nosema? mites?  queens failing, supercedures in package queens, queens from suppliers not being accepted, queens just not fed properly, inferior queens..... and that's what you get sometimes.  all a crapshoot.  i don't like it.  raising our own queens is really what we all ought to be shooting for anymore.  bees dwindling down or dying from diseases and afflictions associated with mites. pesticides/herbicides in the comb and also mite treatment residue in the comb?

#1~ natural forage, pollen and nectar. NUTRITION. diminished. bees can't survive and more so, be healthy, strong colonies without either.  we can't
       control weather. The weather  has really been stinking for us all in the past 5 years.  i have seen the native/non native plants here go down to
       nothing because of the weather for the past 5 or 6 years.  blooms not happening or very little.  township spraying or whacking down the prolific
       wildflowers along the  roadside ditches. everybody spraying the natural habitat, lawns and fields with pesticides to control it.  our bees carry this 
       crap on their legs or in their stomachs and carry it back to the comb.  increase in my area of row crops, and in the city fields of what used to be 
       natural vegetation to accommodate subdivisions or some type of building.  what the heck are bees to forage on?  we as beekeepers do have
       many challenges.

#2~ mites.  and all the afflictions associated with them.  almost have to be a research entomologist/scientist to figure it out. all the treatments, and 
       how this affects  the queens, the bees and the comb.  just baffles me sometimes.

#3~pesticides and herbicide use. i am with pete on this problem, and who doesn't use them? lawns, fields, gardens, row crops etc.....kill the dandelions,
       kill the clover, kill the wildflowers. gardens~what do we use on these for the plants that produce either nectar/pollen to control the insects? row
       crops? it  all comes back to the combs in our hives.  i do rotate comb out.....lots of hard work on the bees....

at this point, yes i am concerned about neonics, but as scott said, better than what was used, and is still used in some areas in the midwest corn and soybean belt...

okay, off my soap box ................

[LazyBkpr]

Well Said Riverbee

[apisbees]

Riverbee I will give you 2 soap boxes to stand on for all the good points you brought up in your post. From global warming and the effect it is having on the environment to the incredible increase in spraying of wet lands, ponds, marshes, and ditches since the discovery of West Nile Virus in North America.

[riverbee]

thank you apis, and thank you scott.