Are pesticides behind disappearing honey bees
More clues have been found in the case of the disappearing honey bees.
Powdery waste blown off from seed planters
was found to contain up to 700,000 times the bee's lethal dosage of neonicotinoid insecticides in a Purdue University study. The study also found the insecticides clothianidin and thiamethoxam in dead bees laying in and around hives in Indiana.
"We know that these insecticides are highly toxic to bees; we found them in each sample of dead and dying bees," said Christian Krupke, associate professor of entomology at Purdue and a co-author of the study published in PloS One, in a press release.
The waste dust is mostly harmless talc, which is used to help coat corn, soy and cotton seeds with insecticides. Without the talc, the polymers used to bind the chemicals to the seeds clog up the seed coating machine and in the planters.
But the excess talc brings some of the pesticide with it when it gets blown off into the air when mechanical planters put the seed in the ground. The talc, along with the pesticides, then settles on nearby vegetation.
"Given the rates of corn planting and talc usage, we are blowing large amounts of contaminated talc into the environment. The dust is quite light and appears to be quite mobile," Krupke said.
"Whatever was on the seed was being exhausted into the environment," Krupke said. "This material is so concentrated that even small amounts landing on flowering plants around a field can kill foragers or be transported to the hive in contaminated pollen. This might be why we found these insecticides in pollen that the bees had collected and brought back to their hives."
The research also consistently found the pesticides at low levels in soil, even up to two years after treated seed was planted. Corn pollen also showed traces of the chemicals.
Greg Hunt, a study co-author, noted that the contaminated talc isn't the only threat to the bees. Parasites, pesticides, and other factors are pummeling the pollinators.
"It’s like death by a thousand cuts for these bees," Hunt said.
GMT 14:48 2018 Wednesday ,17 January
The Romanian sheep nibbling away at US securityGMT 13:45 2018 Tuesday ,16 January
China races to prevent environmental disasterGMT 13:59 2018 Sunday ,14 January
Sea levels off Dutch coast highest ever recordedGMT 17:34 2018 Saturday ,13 January
Dozens still unaccounted for in California mudslidesGMT 12:35 2018 Friday ,12 January
Campaigners slam UK plans on cutting plastic wasteGMT 14:12 2018 Wednesday ,10 January
Alpine air at work? Delhi eyes novel ways to battle smogGMT 15:37 2018 Tuesday ,09 January
2017 the costliest year in US history for natural disastersGMT 15:30 2018 Tuesday ,09 January
Power stacked against SE Asia's poor as China dams MekongMaintained and developed by Arabs Today Group SAL.
All rights reserved to Arab Today Media Group 2021 ©
Maintained and developed by Arabs Today Group SAL.
All rights reserved to Arab Today Media Group 2021 ©
Send your comments
Your comment as a visitor