Bees dying throughout the planet

I just read a story that may offer the BEST explanation about the loss of bees...

It seems beekeepers have been plying their hives with chemicals, antibiotics and pesticides for years.

http://www.gov.mb.ca/agriculture/crops/honey/bha01s00.html

This has made some bee diseases MORE RESISTANT to everything, and now bees have a weakened immune system to disease after relying on antibiotics.

This would not have been such a big deal, but it's those very California Almond Orchards that have been mentioned, that might be responsible for spreading diseases among bees AROUND THE WORLD!

It turns out that the demand to pollinate the almond orchards is so great that bees must be brought in from around the country and around the WORLD to do the job.

In 2006, one million bee hives were brought into California just for the almond harvest. That's 25 BILLION bees! Perhaps they all got dosed good with chemical while here, and picked up the diseases and spread them elsewhere.

Bee keepers now believe that its this intermingling of bees from around the world that has caused the disease(s) to spread everywhere.

So you can blame the chemcial and pharmaceutical companies for promoting the use of these things for the demise of the bees.

That is the best explanation I have seen so far...

Regardless of the reason, you can be SURE the industries that caused it will insist the real cause be covered up to protect their business.

 

Here's a list of chemicals now being used on crops in Europe that bees frequent. And this is only in the EU!

1. The European Commission has decided to allow use of a number of doubtful pesticides. Some of these were banned in Sweden for many years such as Amitrole, 2,4-D, Linuron, Mecoprop, Paraquat, Propineb, Thiram and Bromoxynil. Some of these are extreemly hazardous to man but the objections from our government chemistry authority had no effect on the descision makers in Brussels. These pesticides are mainly herbicides and fungicides and most likely we will not find one of them that is used all over the affected region.

2. The European Commission has authorised a large number of new pesticides for an even larger number of different uses without adequate hazard testing. The new generation of pesticides can be generalised as: 1. Low dosage, 2. Long persistence, 3. Systemic action, 4. Difficult to detect in laboratory tests. The swedish government authority is also complaining in their annual report (KI, 2003) that it is difficult to keep track of the different pesticides due to many changes of ownership within the private sector.

3. The aphid pests (Megilethes spp.) on oil-seed rape has developed resistance to the most popular pyretroid pesticides. Therefore the chemistry authority again approved use of the extreemly bee poisonous insecticide Fenitrothion (Sumithion or Folithion) from year 2001. This pesticide was banned more than 20 years ago due to its enormous risks for bees, other insects and aquatic life.

4. The use of insecticides increased in Sweden 2001-2002 by 250 %. A possible reason is that the warm summers (global warming?) caused heavy growth of aphid colonies in many grain crops.

5. A new range of pesticides has enterred the market the last 5 years. These are all based on the active ingredient Imidakloprid, a chemical that affect the digestive neurosystem of insects. Popularly we can say that insects that get in touch with these products loose their apetite and stop being harmful to crops. These insecticides have long persistence and a systemic effect. It is therefore possible that the harmful effect will occur over a long period and only slowly in a bee colony consuming its stored reserves of plant material during winter. The treeted seed will for instance germinate in august 2004, the plant will flower in June 2005 and bees will collect and store contaminated nectar and pollen that can cause indistinct symptoms during the winter 2006, one year and a half after! Here is a list of Imidakloprid products being registered in Sweden:
Chinook for seed dressing of oil-seed rape seed.

Gaucho and Montur for seed dressing of sugar beet seed.

Prestige for dressing of potatoe seed before planting.

Confidor for treatement through irrigation water in green houses (ornamental plants, tomatoes, cucumber and sweet pepper).

Merit Forest for treatment of forest plants against insect attacts.

Some products are also registered for indoor plant use in homes as dip sticks.



Commercial representatives also confirm that these products have been tried as seed dressing on wheat and oats. They are however not willing to disclose to what extent farmers are using seed treated with these chemicals. In France Imidakloprid pesticides have been banned for use on sunflower crops after heavy protests from beekeeper groups.

6. Pesticides in sugar cultivation or industrial manipulation of white sugar may be another foreseen problem for bee colonies. Use of the above mentioned systemic seed dressers on sugar beet seed (point 5.) or insecticides on sugar cane fields can be a hidden problem. Also new techniques for extraction or bleeching of white sugar may cause a possible hazard to bees. An increasing trade with sugar products has also been noted.

7. Extensive use of desciccants (Glyfosat, Rambo, Roundup) for total kill of weeds instead of mechanical cultivation. The total usage of these herbicides has increased four years in a row. This is remarkable since the increase of Glyfosat products used took place at the same time as the acreage of ecological farming also increased. This must imply that the intensity of Glyfosat usage has increased on the farmland that is still cultivated with chemicals. Several Glyfosat products are also registered for use by laymen in ordinary gardens.