Posted on 07/03/2013 6:37:49 PM PDT by chessplayer
Shortly after 50,000 bees were found dead in an Oregon parking lot (read more here), a staggering 37 million bees have been found dead in Elmwood, Ontario, Canada.Dave Schuit, who runs a honey operation in Elmwood has lost 600 hives. He is pointing the finger at the insecticides known as neonicotinoids, which are manufactured by Bayer CropScience Inc.
The loss comes after the planting of corn. Neonicotinoid pesticides are used to coat corn seed with air seeders, which result in blowing the pesticide dust into the air when planted. The death of millions of pollinators was studied by Purdue University. They discovered that Bees exhibited neurotoxic symptoms. They analyzed dead bees and found that traces of thiamethoxam/clothiandin were present in each case. The only major source of these compounds are seed treatments of field crops. You can view that study here (1).
(Excerpt) Read more at myscienceacademy.org ...
Do not eat the Canadian corn.
“Damn. Without honeybees, agriculture is toast.”
People who don’t think that this is important, or that we need to get rid of the EPA entirely, need to consider that a good number of experts believe that our civilization would fall without bees.
I really suggest dropping myscienceacademy.org as an information source. Their article is propagandistic with several factual distortions. Sad that they are misinforming children on science.
In other words, they are socialist/pinko/commie/muzzy running dogs trying to take your guns away?
Well, I don’t know that I’d go that far, but they are clearly ignorant and confused in their article, which is strange since this particular event is well reported and the facts are easily found.
Typical of the anti-GMO camp, they seized on an unrelated event to bang the Monsanto drum. None of the pesticides used in either die off were Monsanto products.
Then the explanation about coated seed, which just didn’t add up. I’ve never seen bees working a fallow field or a just seeded one, or following a seeder. It’s a patch of dirt, why would bees be working a patch of dirt? So I looked for other articles. Sure enough, it was aerial spraying of products whose label clearly indicated it was deadly to bees and cautioned the user.
I’m thinking the beekeeper has a clear cause of action against a careless farmer who should have known better.
From article - “Neonicotinoid pesticides are used to coat corn seed with air seeders, which result in blowing the pesticide dust into the air when planted.”
Maybe the bees don’t have to work a just seeded field, or follow a seeder. I wonder how far the wind will carry the coated dust? Bees might not even have to be close to a field to get coated with the neonicotinoid’s.
Except the actual die off was related to aerial spraying of growing crops, so why explain with what didn’t happen instead of what did?
Drift from aerial spraying goes farther than dust from seeding. Seeding around here usually occurs between rains or in the rain, dust is minimal to non existent. Most dust occurs from fall plowing, not spring seeding.
Why mention Monsanto when all the pesticides sprayed were products from other companies?
It’s a crap propaganda site.
(and if you are the writer, shame on you for pimping your poorly and dishonestly written drivel).
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