SCARY New study on pesticides.....

Not really new info, but scientifically validated:

http://www.mnn.com/your-home/organic-farming-gardening/blogs/popular-pesticide-may-hurt-bees-epa-warns

Please be aware, folks!

Thank you. Good info, good read.

Scorpio Rising wrote:Not really new info, but scientifically validated:

http://www.mnn.com/your-home/organic-farming-gardening/blogs/popular-pesticide-may-hurt-bees-epa-warns

Please be aware, folks!

 I read the article in The Times newspaper a few days ago .   It's almost the same as appeared this time last year .
 It seems that in our annual silly season when politicians and movie stars go on extended holiday that these sort of articles get recycled again & again after a few bits of wild guesses and assumptions have been added to flesh the article out  more .

It struck me that it may also be a spurious correlation , for here where I live , virtually no nicotinoids or  bug controls other than the odd gardener using over the counter non nicotinoid  approved stuff  have been used within a 30 mile radius as there is only hill grass , trees & meadow land . Yet the local be keepers have lost a lot of hives in the last ten years.
 It is the same in many third world countries where they can't spell the word let alone buy them

 What has happened is the world has had a massive amount of sunspot activity for the last 12 years or so , this has all manner of effects up on nature .
 There has also been a tremendous amount of nitrogen  oxide pollutants from traffic .. When companies like VW cheated the world levels rose dramatically in the last 15 years since catalytic converters became main stream car fitments .  Perhaps minute traces of these excessive exhaust gas  discharges pushed out have as much if not more chance of affecting bees for the fumes are also said to be killing humans &animals .

 One thing for sure , is we need a lot more unbiased well funded intelligent research into it , not as it appears from the article a lot of biased guess work by those with an anti big Pharma agenda .

Something else I've noticed in my locality , people are feeding their bees to an old rigid system of seasons previous . Due to the erratic weather in this period of high sunspot activity the seasons have moved about and most keepers would have far higher survival rates for their stocks  if they actually fed the bees what they need when they need it .

 Varroa precautions .... Here they seem to be largely non existent or people being stupid and treating several hives with the same strip designed for a single usage in a single hive for a period of three days or so . No wonder we are getting highly resistant to pest control varroa eating/ drinking  the local bees into extinction.
( But varroa are not thought to attack all species of bees ?? )

 I had hoped to meet up with some of the professional / commercial bee keepers from the area at the annual  Pembroke show to see how they have fared this year  ..unfortunately I was away on holiday in Stouthern Ireland when the show took place .  I might met up with some in a few weeks time ... it will be interesting to se what they have to say about it all .