POWELL: Lament for the Honeybee

[Oscar]

LAMENT FOR THE HONEYBEE

Canadian regulators fail to protect nature's priceless pollinator from a known toxin.

by Larry Powell

Dec.3, 2008

http://www.earthkeeperfarm.blogspot.com

The crop chemical, clothianidin, approved almost five years ago by the Pest Management Regulatory Agency, has since been found to be "highly toxic to the honeybee, apis mellifera." Despite knowing this for at least four years, the PMRA, a division of Health Canada, has kept the product's temporary license in place. So it continues to be used.

Clothianidin is a member of the chemical family, neonicitanoids, used, among other things, to treat canola seed to ward off flea beetles. Another "family member," imadacloprid, has been used in Canada for more than 25 years.

In 2004, the PMRA and its American counterpart, the Environmental Protection Agency, jointly reviewed data on clothianidin. In addition to their conclusion of high toxicity, they found that other studies into the question had been "deficient in design." Those studies

found the product had "no significant impact" on the bees.

Despite all of this, a PMRA regulatory officer, Iulia Popa, insisted in email exchanges with this writer, beginning last September, there had been "rigorous pre-market evaluation processes. The current scientific consensus is that residues of neonicitanoids do not pose a serious threat to honey bees or other pollinators."

Addressing this apparent contradiction, Ms. Popa explains, the PMRA also considered the amount of chemical the bees are subjected to. If used in spray form, concentrations might be a problem. But, "as a seed treatment (the registered use in Canada)

concentrations are not likely to cause acute mortality or other short-term effects."

But the 2004 report sounds another cautionary note. "Questions remain about the possibility of long-term effects on honey bee colonies. A chronic, multigeneration

field study has been requested to clarify this risk."

In recent years, honeybees have been vanishing in huge numbers, around the world.

Authorities have dubbed this phenomenon, "Colony Collapse Disorder." They paint CCD as an extremely complex problem, because it may be caused by mites, parasites, viruses, malnutrition, stress, pesticides, lack of biodiversity, or a combination of some or all of these.

Scientists and researchers far and wide have gone into overdrive, trying to solve the “mystery.” But, of all the many studies into this, those that do not implicate pesticides are rare. Last spring, Germany's Federal Office of Consumer Protection and Food, suspended use of neonicitanoids, until further notice. The move followed a huge die-off of honeybees in Germany where clothianidin had been sprayed. Up to two-thirds of the colonies in one region were lost. Tests showed the chemical present in the bodies of many dead bees.

France, Italy and Slovenia have now imposed suspensions similar to Germany's.

In North America, however, it's a starkly different story.

South of the border, The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency authorized the use of neonicitanoids about four years ago. This fall, a major U.S. environmental group, the Natural Resources Defense Council, took the EPA to court to force it to publicly release studies, which may shed more light on their effects on honeybees.

But some of those studies are already on the Agency's website. They are similar to the ones referred to earlier, but go into more detail. One reads, "Clothianidin is highly toxic to honey bees on an acute contact basis.

It has the potential for toxic chronic exposure to honey bees, as well as other non-target pollinators, through the translocation of clothianidin residues in nectar and pollen.

“In honey bees, the effects of this toxic chronic exposure may include lethal &/or sub-lethal effects in the larvae and reproductive effects in the queen."

Despite all of this, the EPA insists there's still not enough evidence to ban these products. In a news release this summer, entitled "EPA Acts to Protect Bees," it claims the incident in Germany doesn't fit the profile of Colony Collapse Disorder. For example, in typical cases of CCD, bees just disappear. In the German case, the bodies were found. The EPA also notes that the formulation in question did not contain a polymer coating, which keeps the chemical stuck to the seed.

The Agency promises, if more information comes to light, to "examine our practices with respect to label requirements for seed treatment pesticides," Scientific consensus?

Meanwhile, the internet is full of articles by credible scientists, implicating these products in the deaths of honeybees. For example, in the spring of last year, an article called "Requiem for the Honeybee" appeared online with the subtitle, "Neonicotinoid insecticides are harmful to the honeybee!"

It goes on to say, flatly, widespread applications of the neonicotinoids are "highly toxic to insects including bees at very low concentrations."

The author, Prof. Joe Cummins, is a geneticist at the University of Western Ontario and an adviser to the international, non-profit, "Institute of Science in Society."

Unlike the EPA, which believes the chemicals have not played a role in CCD, Cummins writes,"A team of scientist led by the National Institute of Beekeeping in Bologna, Italy, found that pollen obtained from seeds dressed with imidacloprid contains significant levels of the insesticide, and suggested that the polluted pollen was one of the main causes of honeybee colony collapse."

Not only does the PMRA continue to license the chemicals in question, it approved a similar product "Movento" (another Bayer product) just this summer. It is suspected of having the same effects! For example, the headline in the October 9th edition of the Manitoba farm paper, Co-operator reads, reads, "New systemic insecticide (Movento) worries beekeepers." Earlier this year, the Co-operator reported that commercial honey producers in Canada lost over a third of their colonies last winter!

Beekeepers in Atlantic Canada, where the neonicitinoids are used on potato crops, are among the hardest hit by these losses in Canada, so far. Honeybees – a History.

Honeybees appeared on earth more than 100 million years ago.

For centuries, beekeepers have known their value as makers of honey, the world's first sweetener that never spoils. It has even been found in Egyptian tombs.

Honeybees are the world's best pollinators of food crops, ranging from apples to blueberries to cucumbers.

Without them, these plants would simply not produce. It is believed that fully one third of the human diet comes from plants pollinated by insects, mostly honey bees.

As the bees fly from flower to flower, gathering nectar, pollen sticks to their legs and is then deposited on other plants. The fertilization cycle is thus completed.

While figures for Canada are not immediately available, the US Department of Agriculture estimates the products bees produce there are worth $15 billion dollars a year.

Recently, the annual Earthwatch debate in the UK actually voted the bee the most valuable species on the planet. In the words of one debater there, Dr. George

McGavin of Oxford University, “Bees are irreplaceable. Their loss will be catastrophic.”

Larry Powell – www.earthkeeperfarm.blogspot.com

[Oscar]

Plight of the Humble Bee

Saturday, November 21, 2009

http://earthkeeperfarm.blogspot.com/200 ... ee_21.html

Could half of our food supply actually be at risk now?

by Larry Powell - No. 15 '09

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It seems that the news about disappearing bees isn't that bad after all. It's worse!
While the sad state of honeybees worldwide has now been well-documented, much less attention has been paid to their ungainly cousins, the bumblebees!
They, too are declining at an alarming rate and have been for at least a decade, possibly longer! But only recently have details of their predicament begun to emerge.

(For fun, I've written the following section from the bumblebees' perspective. l.p.)

A Bee's Plea:

"I am a bumblebee. I'm an excellent pollinator of many different kinds of fruits and vegetables, important to you humans. In some cases (if I do say so), I'm even better at it than my more famous cousins, the honeybees. (You've probably heard more about them because they make lots of honey and I don't.)
I don't need as much light or warmth as they do to forage for nectar and pollen, the practice which fertilizes plants, allowing them to reproduce.
I also know how to dislodge pollen better by beating my wings and doing my own unique dance.
I have about 250 bumblebee relatives, (species) worldwide and some 50 here in North America. I am a native to this continent and, for the most part, live in the wild. Honeybees, on the other hand, are domesticated immigrants.
I am very docile and will sting you only in self defense. So I'm definitely not one of the insects you should worry about while on a picnic.
Honeybees have been getting most of the press because they have enemies on all sides and have been dying off in large numbers everywhere.
Terrible thing, that.
But we're in a similar pickle and need to tell our story, too!
So here it is."

The Evidence:

In a 2007 report on "The Status of Pollinators in North America," the prestigious *National Academy of Sciences was among the agencies sounding the alarm.
In a report which obviously didn't get much attention, the NAS stated, "Long-term population trends for several wild bee species (notably bumblebees), are demonstrably downward."
The agency added, both individual researchers and groups have provided evidence that both local and global populations of bumblebees are declining, with some species even being declared endangered and extinct.
More Evidence:
From '04 to '06, Sheila Colla was part of a team which went on a search for one species, B.affinnis. Ms. Colla is a Ph.D candidate in biology at Toronto's York University. She has done extensive field studies of bumble bees (genus Bombus) in both Canada and the US. The species she set out to find, used to be common in its range from southern Ontario into the 'States. Her team found one bee! No, not one species. Not one sub-species. A single bee! (It was foraging on a sunflower in an Ontario's provincial Park.)
In the 'States, they weren't even that lucky. There, they found not a one! Notta! Zilch!
And More:
The news from yet another quarter is no better. (I warned you!) The non-profit, US-based Xerces Society has been working for more than 30 years to save bumblebees through habitat preservation. About a decade ago, it noticed three different bumblebee varieties (western, rusty-patched - we'll call her "Rusty" - and yellow-banded), began dwindling in western North America. Rusty was once commonly distributed throughout the east and upper US Midwest, but has steeply declined in recent years.
It's feared that another, Franklin's bumblebee, may now actually be extinct. Why? Because a Xerces entomologist at the University of California, Davis, Prof. Emeritus Robbin Thorp, like Ms. Colla, also found only one. No, not one species. Not one sub-species.... (Did I already say that?) It was a worker bee he found near the Pacific Crest Trail in Oregon. That was at least three years ago, in 2006. Thorp notes, when he first started tracking the pollinators during the 60s, their numbers were "robust."
And More:
Two British scientists who spend much of their lives reviewing data on world bumblebee populations, have made similarly gloomy findings.
Bumblebee vulnerability and conservation world-wide
Paul Williams, of the Department of Entomology at London's Natural History Museum and Juliet Osborn of the Department of Invertebrate Ecology at Rothamsted Research Station in Hertfordshire have found bumblebee species in decline in Europe, North America and Asia. In eastern Europe and Russia, the news is even worse. They describe those areas as having "the largest concentration of species categorized as endangered, or worse."
Why all the Fuss?
Well, here's why. And this is the important part.
Bees are critical pollinators for both Mother Nature and we humans. As I've stated in previous writings, the kind that make honey account for up to one third (33 1/3%) of human food crops! But bumblebees can't be overlooked for the critical role they play, either. Overall, they account for another 15%! So, do the math! Taken together, we can thank these wondrous creatures for practically one out of every two spoons-full of food we put in our mouths!
Then there's their monetary value. French and German scientists place the economic value of insect pollination, worldwide at U.S. $217 Billion. The Canadian Pollinator Initiative estimates insects pollinate around $1 billion worth of agricultural crops each year in this country. Based at the University of Guelph, CANPOLIN looks at "all aspects" of pollination, including the health and conservation of pollinators themselves. It notes, "This decline poses a serious threat to natural ecosystems and crop production."
Ms. Colla describes bumble bees as key to the production of tomatoes, cucumbers, and sweet peppers.
Meanwhile, Xerces notes that Rusty, in particular, is (was?) also an excellent pollinator of wildflowers, cranberries, plums, apples, alfalfa and onions. It should also be noted that countless wildflowers (important food, both for the bees and other wildlife), not to mention possible sources of fibre and medicines for us, will vanish if they do!
So surely the bar is now rising from the serious to the potentially catastrophic! Need any more convincing?
What About Intrinsic Values?
But isn't more than just food, (as critical as that is), at stake if the bees disappear from this earth?
Surely many, if not most of us have marveled from time to time as these fascinating creatures forage intently in our gardens.
The air is filled with their soothingly monotonous drone.
With their over-sized bodies and tiny wings, the bumblebees especially have surely put smiles on the soberest face, as they take on an ever-larger cargo of pollen, defying all the known laws of aerodynamics as they go!
The Hand of Man Again?
So, just what is behind this disturbing decline, you may ask? Well, us, pretty much. You and me.
Remember those British bug experts, Williams and Osborne? High on their list of things causing this trend; "Land use changes." That, of course means human development; logging (as above), urban sprawl, livestock overgrazing, intensive farming practices and pollution. All of these destroy plants which are the bees' food source.
But that's not all.
Pathogens are hitting some species especially hard. Interestingly, according to Xerces, "The dramatic decline in wild populations of these species coincided in the 90's with a disease outbreak in populations of commercially-raised bumble bees distributed for greenhouse pollination in western North America." Given this timing, the Society believes that an exotic disease organism escaping from these greenhouses may have been the cause of this widespread loss in wild bumblebee populations.
And, as in numerous other studies on declining bee populations, agricultural pesticides are once again implicated.
The same NAS study mentioned earlier, also states, "Ground-nesting bumble bees, however, are uniquely susceptible to pesticides applied to turf or lawns for grub control. Effects can be sublethal; for example, imidacloprid and clothianidin (two chemicals banned in parts of Europe, but not North America) can hamper foraging and pollinating."
NAS quotes research suggesting that pesticides can disproportionately affect bumblebee numbers if they occur early in the season when queens are still foraging and when colonies are very small.
It was noted way back in 1978 that one chemical (fenitrothion), brought about severe bumblebee reductions in New Brunswick, Canada.
As well, Williams and Osborne state, "Pesticides could affect bumblebee populations either directly, as insecticides that kill bumblebees, or indirectly, as herbicides that kill their food plants. It is likely that incidents of honeybee poisoning from insecticides will also have affected wild bees. Studies suggest pesticide toxicity is similar for bumblebees and honeybees. The use of herbicides to kill flowering plants in intensively managed grassland and crops may be an important driver of bumblebee declines on a global scale."
CANPOLIN lists other causes, too, including "malnutrition and climate change."
Has Our Food Supply Been Hit Yet?
At least as long as eight years ago, in 2001, researchers were noticing evidence of this. In 2001, Peter G. Kevan of the Department of Environmental Biology at the University of Guelph, Ontario, helped prepare a report entitled, "The economic impacts of pollinator declines."
In part, it stated, "We conclude that there is ample information to suggest the existence of pollinator declines that have affected, and are affecting, agricultural productivity. Adverse economic effects of pollinator deficits on food prices have extensive ramifications for world food supply, security, and trade."
Xerces refers to evidence that some insect-pollinated plants in England and the Netherlands are declining. There, multiple bumblebee (and other bee) species have gone extinct.
NAS says plant species, especially rare ones, could also become increasingly vulnerable to extinction.
So What Can be Done?
One group which believes it can answer that question is the Soil Association of Scotland. The Association, which promotes organic farming, says "The lack of pesticides in organic production, provides a haven for the bee. Wild spaces at field margins and in hedgerows, provide a diversity of flowers and habitats for bees to nest and shelter. Organic farming supports both bio-diversity and the bee."
What About the Future?
No one is suggesting that the news is universally bad; or that all populations are under imminent threat. But the trends are there. And they are disturbing.
And few of us would be naive enough to believe that bees are somehow unique in the panorama of endangered species. We are, after all, living in what smarter people than I have called a time of greatest species extinction since the dinosaurs!
Sadly, there's also no evidence that our own relentless assault on the planet will let up any time soon. Nor is there a lot of hope that the fate of other pollinators will be any brighter.
According to CANPOLIN, 28 species of butterflies and moths are also known to be at risk in Canada.
So, sadly, the final chapter in this tragedy has yet to be written.
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* "Of the multitude of ways humans could be harming the planet, one that has largely been ignored is the "pollinator crisis," the perceived global decline in the number and viability of animal species that facilitate reproduction of flowering plants.
"Despite its lack of 'marquee appeal,' pollinator decline is one form of global change that actually does have credible potential to alter the shape and structure of the terrestrial world." National Academy of Sciences - US
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Please also read - "If the Bees Disappear, we'll all be Stung" - by David Suzuki