Posted on 04/08/2015 9:23:32 PM PDT by yuffy
PARIS — An influential European scientific body said on Wednesday that a group of pesticides believed to contribute to mass deaths of honeybees is probably more damaging to ecosystems than previously thought and questioned whether the substances had a place in sustainable agriculture.
The finding could have repercussions on both sides of the Atlantic for the companies that produce the chemicals, which are known as neonicotinoids because of their chemical similarity to nicotine. Global sales of the chemicals reach into the billions of dollars.
The European Commission in 2013 banned the use of three neonicotinoids — clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam — on flowering plants after a separate body, the European Food Safety Authority, found that exposure to the chemicals created “high acute risks” to bees.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Should be banned merely because they are unpronounceable!
I want to know,, BY NAME, who were the a-holes that sold the world on using these pesticides. Let them stand beside their arguments publicly and account for their poor prognostication. They’re probably off giving bad advice on some other unrelated govt project.
Bureaucrats should be held to account for their policy disasters.
Imidicloprid is the active ingredient of lots of Bayer flower, rose, plant sprays. It has residual actio and kills Japanese beetles.
It also kills bees and wasplike insects. Since we have no more honeybees, it killed a largish black wasplike insect; correcrion, stunned, disoriented. I think the other may have been a bumblebee about 4 days after use on a rose bloom and after a rain.
I used mine all up and don't plan on buying any more but that won't help the many unknowing people who are buying it at the big box or hardware stores. Also I'm not sure about farmers what they use on the beetles when they have to spray for them and other applications for living pests.
Gaucho is bad, too, used on GMO seeds; I believe it's a neonicotinoid (sp?). So is Merit (not sure of actuve ingredient), you spray it on the ground around a bush, like a rose bush, and it gets wicked up into the whole plant. Then bad bugs and good bugs chew on it and get zapped. It also has residual action, maybe 1 to 3 months.
Bayer Germany is one, may be the only one, patented. France successfully sued Bayer over the use of the subject chemical(s) on their grape vines and loss of bees (pollinators). It’s been awhile since I read up on a lot of this, and there may be multiple vectors in the loss of honeybees plus there may have been more direct damage to the grape vines.
Merit is Bayers’ trade name for imidicloprid. Used at the high label rate as a soil drench on Hemlocks it kills Hemlock woolly adelgid for 2+ years. Also quite useful against Emerald Ash Borer and Asian Longhorned Borer.
The neonics are wonderful materials when used properly. They devastate Aphids, Adelgids and lace bugs. They do not kill caterpillars, and will cause mite outbreaks.
“I want to know,, BY NAME, who were the a-holes that sold the world on using these pesticides.”
Sometimes there are TWO SIDES and I don’t trust the “scientific community” ONE BIT. No different than Global Warming - more often the have an agenda when they put out “warnings” like this.
I’ll wait and see until I hear from BOTH SIDES before name-calling.
Leave it to the NYT to report half the story.
I remember last year (2014) there was info coming out that showed the worries of 2013 might be unfounded. I quickly searched and found a sample article (above).
NYT only mentions the ban in 2013, not subsequent findings.
Yea, I saw FReepers TAKING THE BAIT. It was very sad...we need to be STRONGER.
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