Are neonicotinoid pesticides responsible for the demise of bees and other wildlife?

[Jon]

The most outrageous comment by a country mile is the insinuation that people are being paid to act as stooges of big corporations.
It is also a laugh to suggest that the debate is some sort of a David and Goliath contest with all the cards being held by Bayer and its ilk.
For a start the entire UK mainstream and tabloid press is publishing articles claiming that Neonicotinoids are killing bees and causing CCD.
This happens because the anti pesticide campaigners are feeding lazy journalists with inaccurate press releases which get printed almost verbatim in some cases.
If you read the likes of beekeepingforum it seems that the vast majority of posters have already decided that neonicotinoids are a big problem for bees.
How much of this is based on hearsay and internet forum comments as opposed to diligent reading and research, I could not possibly comment.
The main issue here is that one camp wants to ban neonicotinoids irrespective of best available evidence and the rest are digging for the truth, sometimes with a pin!
As I have said many times, if the evidence were there I would be first in line calling for a ban.
I love my beekeeping hobby and would not knowingly take decisions which were detrimental to my bees.
My colonies are beside oil seed rape and my colony numbers just keep increasing. 26 including nucs at the last count. No swarms yet either. Last year I got 110 native queens mated. The number will be lower this year because of the weather.
I suspect that some of those complaining about the effect of oil seed rape on bees have no experience at all of having bees anywhere near it.

[Johnthefarmer]

The most outrageous comment by a country mile is the insinuation that people are being paid to act as stooges of big corporations.
It is also a laugh to suggest that the debate is some sort of a David and Goliath contest with all the cards being held by Bayer and its ilk.
For a start the entire UK mainstream and tabloid press is publishing articles claiming that Neonicotinoids are killing bees and causing CCD.
This happens because the anti pesticide campaigners are feeding lazy journalists with inaccurate press releases which get printed almost verbatim in some cases.
If you read the likes of beekeepingforum it seems that the vast majority of posters have already decided that neonicotinoids are a big problem for bees.
How much of this is based on hearsay and internet forum comments as opposed to diligent reading and research, I could not possibly comment.
The main issue here is that one camp wants to ban neonicotinoids irrespective of best available evidence and the rest are digging for the truth, sometimes with a pin!
As I have said many times, if the evidence were there I would be first in line calling for a ban.
I love my beekeeping hobby and would not knowingly take decisions which were detrimental to my bees.
My colonies are beside oil seed rape and my colony numbers just keep increasing. 26 including nucs at the last count. No swarms yet either. Last year I got 110 native queens mated. The number will be lower this year because of the weather.
I suspect that some of those complaining about the effect of oil seed rape on bees have no experience at all of having bees anywhere near it.

I hope this link works.I'm not very skilled at these things. It's one of many studies suggesting that the special effect of neonics is that, in social insects, its main lethal effect is not on those creatures which ingest it, but on the general colony health and defensive systems, once they return home. Exactly the same claim made by Bayer relating to the efficacy of Imidacloprid against Termites.
The link is http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/1...9.02123.x/full .I will attempt to give a more user friendly link later.
Look,Jon, I don't really think we're on different sides. I certainly hope not. But to suggest that Bayer, Sygenta, Monsanto etc. do not resort to underhand behaviour to protect their products is naive. It's like saying 'trust your bank/ insurance company/pension fund to look after you'- experience surely suggests not.

[Jon]

I agree. We should not be on different sides. We are both worried about the state of beekeeping and agriculture.
I trust the likes of Bayer as far as I can throw them but that does not mean all the science relating to neonics over the past 20 years is a lie. For that to be true you have to invoke a massive conspiracy that most of the scientists and researchers are paid stooges and I do not believe that to be true.

There are some papers which suggest that neonicotinoids could be a problem for bees but there are dozens if not hundreds which have looked at field realistic doses in pollen and nectar and found no signs of ill health - sub lethal effects or otherwise. With a product like imidacloprid, pollen and nectar usually have pesticide residue levels of 1-5 ppb and problems do not seem to kick in until levels of 50-100ppb, ie there is a fair margin of safety. the LD 50 is higher still but I agree with those who point out that LD50 is not a particularly useful concept when problems could occur at sub lethal levels.

I can only reiterate what I see in my own bees and I manage a reasonable number of colonies.
I had problems with nosema in nucs the winter before last but this seems to have disappeared after adding thymol to the winter feed last October.
My bees have never looked healthier which in a way is a surprise given 3 months of solid rain.

Guys like Murray Mc Gregor who manage thousands of colonies sing the praises of oil seed rape.
Why would he do that if it was economic suicide?

There are certainly some problems with neonics but they really do not seem to apply to the UK.
Planter dust during maize drilling, soil injection around fruit trees, chemigation etc.
We don't really go in for that but the Americans do bigtime.

As someone above pointed out, crying wolf by overstating the damage will lead to beekeepers losing credibility.

[Johnthefarmer]

I agree. We should not be on different sides. We are both worried about the state of beekeeping and agriculture.
I trust the likes of Bayer as far as I can throw them but that does not mean all the science relating to neonics over the past 20 years is a lie. For that to be true you have to invoke a massive conspiracy that most of the scientists and researchers are paid stooges and I do not believe that to be true.

There are some papers which suggest that neonicotinoids could be a problem for bees but there are dozens if not hundreds which have looked at field realistic doses in pollen and nectar and found no signs of ill health - sub lethal effects or otherwise. With a product like imidacloprid, pollen and nectar usually have pesticide residue levels of 1-5 ppb and problems do not seem to kick in until levels of 50-100ppb, ie there is a fair margin of safety. the LD 50 is higher still but I agree with those who point out that LD50 is not a particularly useful concept when problems could occur at sub lethal levels.

I can only reiterate what I see in my own bees and I manage a reasonable number of colonies.
I had problems with nosema in nucs the winter before last but this seems to have disappeared after adding thymol to the winter feed last October.
My bees have never looked healthier which in a way is a surprise given 3 months of solid rain.

Guys like Murray Mc Gregor who manage thousands of colonies sing the praises of oil seed rape.
Why would he do that if it was economic suicide?

There are certainly some problems with neonics but they really do not seem to apply to the UK.
Planter dust during maize drilling, soil injection around fruit trees, chemigation etc.
We don't really go in for that but the Americans do bigtime.

As someone above pointed out, crying wolf by overstating the damage will lead to beekeepers losing credibility.

It seems to me that you think that neonics, when used responsibly, are fairly innocuous to honeybees, bumbles, ladybirds, butterflies, moths, worms,and nice beasties in general.
I refute that. The concept of farmers creating green deserts yielding only their cashcrop is very flawed. The only way to go in such a scenario it to continually compensate one excess with another one.

[Jon]

If you think neonicotinoids are more harmful than other types of pesticide sprayed over plants you would need to provide proper evidence.
I don't think that anyone denied that pesticides can be harmful to non target species but the exaggerated focus on neonicotinoids is not healthy imho.

I think the real problem is monoculture, as you say green deserts, and lack of diversity in modern farming. That is not solely a pesticide problem although it is clearly a factor
There are many ways that modern agriculture could create better and more diverse habitat without necessarily having to ban neonicotinoids.
Hedgerows, forage strips, heritage varieties of crop, etc.
The roundup ready type of agriculture lends itself to monoculture and that is herbicide rather than pesticide.
The focus on neonicotinoids masks some of the wider issues about keeping a species rich environment.

[Stromnessbees]

Just like to point out that my own most outrageous insult on this thread has been 'limited perspective'.

Gavin, our illustrious admin, has used 'bollocks', 'bonkers',' fantasy','garbage'etc. in his analysis of the article in question.

I agree that insults and aggressive comments are rarely effective.

The yellow bar which displays the forum guidelines says

... Like all internet discussion fora it can contain humour and banter that may not be appreciated by all. The only rule is not to be abusive. ...

I don't know who wrote it, but Gavin seems to be oblivious to it.

Having met Rosemary Mason while she was up in Orkney I have to say that she is a wonderful person who knows exactly what she is talking about and who hasn't come to her conclusions lightheartedly.

For anybody to hurl such insults at her is outrageous and that this should come from the administrator himself, who is supposed to assume a neutral position, is indicative of a major flaw in the setup of this forum.

[Jon]

You might need to re-read what Gavin wrote as it was directed at the ridiculous statements and claims rather than the person who made them who I am sure we can all agree is probably a very nice person. Rubbish claims though. No evidence. Wonder if someone spoon fed her that nonsense. Has a familiar ring to it.

[gavin]

Thanks for the 'illustrious' tag, Doris! Didn't know that Jon was writing something similar while I was drafting this, but here goes anyway.

I have no doubt that Rosemary is a lovely person to sit and have a cup of tea with. The trouble is that she is in cloud cuckoo land regarding bees. Doris claims that to 'hurl such insults at her is outrageous'?!! Doris, my strongest words were reserved for the blog, not the person. Calm down dear, calm down.

As for 'major flaws in the setup', ah yes, I am aware of the trouble being fomented by, erm, troublemakers so your return to the forum is most timely. All I want to say is that anyone coming relatively fresh to this thread really must inform themselves of Doris' earlier behaviour and be aware that 'JohntheFarmer' is Doris' partner.

She made accusations in one late-night posting spree all across the subfora here and on other UK national and international bee fora that there was some sort of secret conspiracy with discussions behind the scenes suddenly revealed for the world to see (?!) and that the forum was being abused by 'shills', paid propagandists. I tidied the mess she'd made and put a single copy of her post into this thread:

http://www.sbai.org.uk/sbai_forum/sh...sbees-outburst

If you didn't click the Beesource link in that thread above and wish to see how her accusations were received there (Beesource is a US-based beekeeping forum, probably the largest internationally), here it is again.

http://www.beesource.com/forums/show...ekeeping-Forum

Quite an insight to what was going on in Doris' head.

I really don't know why we tolerated Doris on here after that. Looking back on it, it doesn't make sense. However we did, and she continued to divert threads, blogs and the News front page comments to the neonic issue until we restricted her activity to the main forum.

So, for those being directed to this thread with no experience of the history of this forum, Doris, currently secretary of the Orkney Beekeepers Association, has shown herself to be not just robust but aggressive and - how can I put this politely - somewhat bizarre in her conclusions. Just go and read it folks. Read around some of the other threads too, and remember that we have tidied some of this but not censored anything that has been said.

So for those who care to object to me being passionate about things I feel passionate about (like the misuse of science to prove a point) then, too bad. Passion is what you'll get.

[Stromnessbees]

You might need to re-read what Gavin wrote as it was directed at the ridiculous statements and claims rather than the person who made them who I am sure we can all agree is probably a very nice person. Rubbish claims though. No evidence. Wonder if someone spoon fed her that nonsense. Has a familiar ring to it.

incorrect again, Jon:

look here

Here's some more of that quality blog that Doris loves so much.

Originally Posted by The Mason and Thomas fantasy bloggers

Immune suppression associated with the neonicotinoids ...

and here:

If you have issues with the way I reacted to the blog by Mason and Thomas, I stand by my comments that they are bonkers and the content is fantasy.

Pretty insulting I would say.

Maybe Gavin wants to apologise for that?

[Jon]

The comments are bonkers Doris and the blog is pure fantasy.

Lighten up. You have made more personal comments against other posters than the rest of the forum combined.
maybe you should re-read some of your own posts.