Archives – October, 2014
Editor’s Note: The Alberta bee keepers are right. The scientific record demonstrates that varroa destructor, not neonics, is responsible for bee health decline.
From: PRRecordGazette
A proposed class action suit against two farm chemical giants by Ontario honey producers has suffered a major setback with the announcement that the Alberta Beekeepers Commission doesn’t support the action.
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The Alberta group, which accounts for 45 per cent of the Canadian honey industry, says it doesn’t endorse the class action suit because the seed treatment technology “significantly reduces honeybee exposure to pesticides.”
October 8, 2014
From: University of Maryland/College of Computer, Mathematical and Natural Sciences
WAMU 88.5
UMD Researchers Seek to Understand Bee Deaths By Building ‘Sentinel Hives’
If you’ve read about honeybees recently, you’ve probably come across the term “Colony collapse disorder,” or CCD. It hit the mainstream lexicon a few years ago, but bee researchers started talking about it back in 2006.
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October 6, 2014
From: The Guardian
Bugs devour rapeseed crop in Britain as EU ban on pesticide to save bees comes into force
Louise Gray
Peter Kendall surveys his crop of oilseed rape. At this time of year, he should usually be looking at healthy green cotyledons (young shoots), but the leaves are full of holes.
The driest September on record has meant a plague of flea beetle. The pest is normally controlled by coating the seeds in a systemic pesticide called neonicotinoid.
The chemical, related to nicotine, is absorbed by the plant as it grows, making it resistant to bugs and viruses.
October 3, 2014
From: ABC/Catalyst
The world is experiencing a global bee crisis, and with bees responsible for almost a third of the food on our plate, this is a crisis that could affect us all. In the winter of 2013, areas of Europe lost up to 53% of their bee population. Similar decline has been recorded in the US. Astonishingly, Australia is the only country in the world where the bee population continues to thrive. As commercial beekeepers are pushed out of business abroad, Australian bees are exported to pollinate foreign farmlands. However, the fate of Australian bees hangs in the balance. It seems that the bee crisis is intricately tied to the way we have changed our planet. Catalyst investigates how modern agriculture methods, increasing diseases and the impending threat of the deadly varroa mite could destroy the last safe-haven for bees on the planet.
October 1, 2014
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