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ocba - Re: [ocba] BEE Protective this Earth Day

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Subject: Orange County, NC Beekeepers

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Chronological Thread  
  • From: "Brian and Lanette Fee" <fee436 AT att.net>
  • To: "'Lewis Cauble'" <lewis AT hivebody.com>, "'OCBA'" <ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [ocba] BEE Protective this Earth Day
  • Date: Tue, 23 Apr 2013 22:01:11 -0400

Hi Lewis,

 

This is a very interesting letter and something similar, yet of a slightly different vein, has crossed my mind many times.  Sometimes I think we forget to consider the hive as an “organism” in its own right or the fact that organisms are tied to their environment.  The more we study mammals, the more we realize that they are not isolated organisms.  We are our own colonies of various organisms.  Bacterial flora live in the gut and other microorganisms live on our skin.  We need these in order to be healthy.  Killing gut bacteria in a rabbit will kill the rabbit unless you replenish them.  Bees can be no different.  A whole host of different organisms must be necessary in order to keep bees healthy and the entire hive healthy.  While the focus now is on neonics, it may well end up that something else or the total environmental load of pesticides/toxins are killing the microorganisms that play a role in bee health that then lead to things like CCD.  Things such as fungicides or a combination of various toxins may not do much harm to a single bee organism, but if these toxins kill all of a specific necessary microorganism throughout the hive, then that’s what may lead to colony decline and death.  This is all just conjecture, of course. 

 

I agree with you, that this is a very, very complicated picture.  [Personally, my biggest concern is bumbling beekeeper disease. L]  Following that, I worry about the total toxin load in the environment.  Bees gather pollen, nectar, and water from different sources.  Who knows how some of these chemicals work when mixed together in the hive.  The bees may be gathering chemicals from water, etc., that we aren’t even aware of yet.

 

Lanette

 

 

From: ocba-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:ocba-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Lewis Cauble
Sent: Tuesday, April 23, 2013 10:16 AM
To: OCBA
Subject: Re: [ocba] BEE Protective this Earth Day

 

While I agree that we should all be concerned about the neonics and their potential to harm our bees, I do not understand how they have been so singled out in the bee community as the foremost enemy to bee health.  Bee health is complicated for sure and I have no problem with folks losing some sleep over the neonics, however, for every night of sleep you lose over neonics you should also be losing a night of sleep worrying about other insecticides like the pyrethroids and chlorpyrifos, not to mention varroa, fungicides, and the myriad combinations of pesticides and diseases (virus included).  It's frustratingly complicated and the answers are not easy. 

 

As Jamie Ellis pointed out at the Spring meeting, fungicides generally get a free pass under our current method of pesticide registration.  In our current method of pesticide registration we place the compund being tested on bees (in a lab setting, not in the field)and determine at what level we see effects (short term effects of 4 to 96 hours). The compound is also fed to the bees in s sugar solution (also in a lab setting). Fungicides are designed to kill a fungus and not insects, so you can generaly put a load of fungicide on a bee and not observe any effects in the 4 to 96 hour time frame.  Great!  It's safe for bees!  How the fungicides effect the bee bread may not be investigated as the product is being registered.  In the future I hope we will see better testing procedures that will answer other questions besides "Does placing this compound on the thorax of a bee (or feeding it to the bee) kill it within 4 to 96 hours?"  It's complicated.

 

Here is a great article that sheds some (I think) good light on some of the pesticide issue. One point that they make that stands out for me is..."the hazard due to pyrethroid residues is three-times greater than that of neonicotinoids detected in pollen samples."  It's complicated. 

 

My goal is not to allay anyone's fear of the neonics, but to heighten everyone's awareness of other issues related to bee health and pesticides.  It's complicated.

 

Lewis

 




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