Govt allows Bee killing Pesticide banned by EU

[Turn7]

As someone that keeps their garden entirely for Birds and Bees to flourish, I read this article with huge disappointment....

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/be...

[768]

Looks like the Independent need to invest in their comment moderation.

[Dr Jekyll]

It's really not an issue. Bee populations have increased while neonicotinoids have been in use, if anything they are less harmful to the bees than alternative pesticides.

[Turn7]

Dr Jekyll said:

It's really not an issue. Bee populations have increased while neonicotinoids have been in use, if anything they are less harmful to the bees than alternative pesticides.

Do you have a source for that ?

[55palfers]

https://www.soilassociation.org/causes-campaigns/b...

Maintain the ban please.

[Dr Jekyll]

https://geneticliteracyproject.org/2019/11/01/glob...

http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/bad-for-bees/

[rxe]

We currently have 20 hives, and up to 2 million head of bee in the summer. If we didn’t actively manage colonies down, we’d be overrun with bees.

Hives die all the time. Starvation, damp, Varroa load are the biggies, and then there is the random “we just offed and died” in the winter. Most hives that die in the summer are because the bees kill the sodding queen, and then kill the replacement that we’ve put in there.

We’ve had an insecticide strike that killed 10 hives stone dead in the middle of summer - a local farmer got in serious st for that one. Silly tt sprayed his field at midday when everything was out.

I’m dubious of this campaign. Farming is hostile to bees, full stop. Pinning it on neonics is a stretch. If you plant a filed full of wind pollinated plants (grain), don’t be all surprised when the local insects view it as a desert.

[Turn7]

rxe said:

I’m dubious of this campaign. Farming is hostile to bees, full stop. (grain), don’t be all surprised when the local insects view it as a desert.

Hi RXE, I get where you are coming fron, but not sure what you mean by dubious about the campaign ?

I have read the links above, and can almost undrstand the seed treatment vs spraying, but its not something Im scientific enough to grasp.

I do love bees and fully understand their importance however....

[Louis Balfour]

Turn7 said:

As someone that keeps their garden entirely for Birds and Bees to flourish, I read this article with huge disappointment....

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/be...

Bees were remainers. Who knew?

[hidetheelephants]

[rxe]

Turn7 said:

Hi RXE, I get where you are coming fron, but not sure what you mean by dubious about the campaign ?

I have read the links above, and can almost undrstand the seed treatment vs spraying, but its not something Im scientific enough to grasp.

I do love bees and fully understand their importance however....

“Dubious” = I think people have latched onto something (like they always do) and once the campaign starts, it has little basis in reality.

Basically farmers can do two things:

- they can kill stuff eating their crops by spraying a short duration insecticide on it.
- they can treat the seeds to make the leaves of the plant a bit toxic to stuff that eats it.

Spraying, when done properly, is OK from a bee POV. Spray in late evening when the bees are tucked up in bed - no problem. Spray in the day when they are working - carnage. Seed treatment - well, if the stuff transfers into the nectar and pollen, then there is potentially an issue, but I’m buggered if I can see systemic issues in my hives. If this stuff really was in pollen, then it would be in honey, which is probably more of an issue for us than the bees (we live much longer than the average bee.

The biggest issue is that farms are effectively deserts. A massive field of grain has absolutely nothing for bees, or any other insect. It IS good for mice and Owls. We have 15 acres of meadow that is cut for hay once a year. It is heaving with insects, when we send the dog in, you can see where it is in the long grass by the cloud of butterflies it is sending up. The wheat field next door - dead. Nothing for insects to eat.

[Jambo85]

Such a complex issue this which - as a small scale beekeeper - I have tried to look in to a few times.

The problem as I understand it is that the chemical does not break down, or at least takes a long time to do so. Although first applied as a seed dressing, residues of it are left in the soil and it then makes its way into the nectar and pollen of other plants years later.

Because of this micro-dosing, the effect is not outright killing of colonies which is why amateur beekeepers don't notice any issue, along with the fact that neonicotinoids have been in use longer than most of us have been keeping bees so what change would we expect to observe, particularly for something which is so persistent? The effects are neurological and there's a scientific study on bumblebees here: https://phys.org/news/2015-02-neonicotinoid-insect...

I think also with no disrespect intended to rxe or any other beekeepers, this isn't really about domestically kept honey bees, as they are fed and replaced when required - it's about wild bees who don't get any help.

There is another side to this of course - which is that oil seed rape is one of the most important nectar crops in this country for domestic and wild pollinators alike. If it can't be grown economically - which some argue is the case without neonicotinoids - then less of it will be grown, replaced no doubt with some other monoculture with no nectar yield whatsoever. Will the net impact to pollinators be positive?

[rxe]

Wild honey bees are mostly dead - varroa did for them. Pretty much every wild colony out there is a swarm from a Beekeepers apiary. I would return to the lack of diversity in agriculture as a much bigger issue.

[Stick Legs]

I know little of the science behind this, and accept that there is probably ore than one side of the story.
As posted above, thoughtfully I may add, by RXE and others there are many issues, mono-culture farming being one big one.

The cynic in me predicts that this has been quietly allowed so it can be banned again later once farming subsidy rules are changed and the government can use it in horse trading between various lobby groups.

Unfortunately I think any perspective of factual analysis will become impossible once the usual anti-everything-we-need-a-cause mob get involved and a fat woman with purple hair in a bee costume throws (organic) eggs at the Prime Minister.

[Jambo85]

rxe said:

Wild honey bees are mostly dead - varroa did for them. Pretty much every wild colony out there is a swarm from a Beekeepers apiary.

I agree - I didn't say wild honey bees though

I'm honestly not sure where I stand on this - I'm just bringing some other facts to the discussion because like most things it is far from black and white. Indeed I have actually just been on my local facebook wildlife page arguing the opposite with a bunch of people like Sitck Legs refers to who think this is all Tories looking after farmers post Brexit. The reality being it has nothing to do with Brexit as France - the second biggest producer of sugar beet in the world and the largest in Europe, and still in the EU - has also had this ban overturned.

Also I better state that I may be somewhat confusing the debate by mentioning oil seed rape (OSR) as the story is about sugar beet, but the same discussions are - I believe - ongoing for OSR.

I found this thread on twitter interesting and reasonable, posted by a farmer so it's clear what his angle is but worth a read -
https://twitter.com/Tom_Clarke/status/133773707878...

[Longwool]

There is so much emotion on this issue that the reality of this authorisation for uses of neon's on Sugar Beet is lost. If you have time read this series of tweets. It is an excellent summary of the situation and why the authorisation was granted.

https://twitter.com/Tom_Clarke/status/133773707878...


Ah, the danger of making a reply before getting to the end of the thread

Edited by Longwool on Wednesday 13th January 21:43