Purdue university study confirms neonicotinoids on maize killing honeybees

[sqkcrk]

I don't appreciate any quantity of poison in my body or in my bees, especially any that I didn't intend to put there, myself or in my bees."

I don't know about your bees, but my bees collect nectar and pollen, and concentrate these items inside their hives.

Then you'd better not let your bees forage at all. And if they do, you'd better not eat any of their honey, especially comb honey. Because, as stated somewhere above and as foiund by Dr. Mary Anne Frazier, honeybees are bringing home 135 or more pesticides, fungicides and other things, matabolites I think they are called, you don't want to eat and it ends up mostly in the wax, but also in the honey. Honeybees and beehives end up being good filters and samplers of what is in the environment.

There may come a time when honey becomes inedible, unless people still believe the benefits outweigh the risks. Because almost all of the chemicals which show up in wax and honey do so in traces of PPBs well below acceptable levels, even the miticides we intentionaly put in beehives.

[Nabber86]

I forgot to mention that bee venom is only slightly less toxic than cyanide. If you are worried about poison in any amount, you shouldnt bee keeping bees.

[slickbrightspear]

does anyone know if the plants themselves concentrate the neonics when it pulls them up into the plant. could the plants be concentrating the neonicotids from multiple plantings in the same soil as it does not always break down quickly.

[Nabber86]

does anyone know if the plants themselves concentrate the neonics when it pulls them up into the plant. could the plants be concentrating the neonicotids from multiple plantings in the same soil as it does not always break down quickly.

Neonicotids are taken up by plants, but not concentrated over the long term. The half-life in both soil and plants is on the order of days to months. There is some quantifiable residual left in the soil the following planting season, but that level is low compared to the new planting season application.

It's not like heavy metals accumulating in fish over the course of several years (the concentrations get higher and higher, because there is no breakdown mechanism), if that is what you are thinking.

[slickbrightspear]

so the residual in the soil can not be pulled into the plant increasing the amount available in the plant, in soils that have been cropped in corn repeatedly. its my understanding also that the soil type has a lot to do with how quickly the neonicitids break down.

[Scrapfe]

The corn to conduct this test on was planted in July 2011. Given that upper Indiana is not Northern Alabama or even Kansas, some if not most of the environmental factors involved in these tests have little or no relevance to the commercial cultivation of maze in other parts of the country.

Here in Alabama the 4th of July is considered the absolute latest planting date for corn, that is if you hope or expect to produce more grain than you put into the ground in the form of seed.

With corn planted by the 4th of July a farmer or home gardener here still needs to irrigate almost daily, as well as stand watch around the clock over his corn to guard against insect pests.

I realize that center pivot irrigation has somewhat changed corn production in this regard and that later plantings can now sometimes be made, but there is still the prospect if not the promise of reduced yields with late planted corn. Further South you can double crop corn, or grow a corn crop followed by a second corn crop in the same field during the same growing season. But a build up of insect pests is still a serious problem for the later corn crop.

The one incident in Indiana during the 2010 planting season involving the poisoning of honeybees is an echo of what happened in Europe during their 2007 or 2008 corn planting seasons. These incidents have and are being characterized on this forum as a total or complete ban on the planting of corn seed in Europe if that seed has been coated with neonicotiniods. This is untrue.
http://www.epa.gov/pesticides/about/...opean-ban.html
The European bans to my knowledge have all been lifted. The suspensions were made so the facts as to how, when, where, and why bees came into contact with neonicitinoids could be studied. This action is proper to insure the health of both humans and bees. But even then European corn farmers could still make foliage applications of these same pesticides to the tassels, leaves, silks, stalks, roots, and even ears of corn plants while honeybees worked the corn fields and overspray or drift areas surrounding the corn fields for both nectar or pollen. If the danger is as high as some claim this makes no sense. Since the first poster in this thread is from Europe I am mildly surprised that he did not report this fact.

It has been a while since I last saw population statistics on France. But about 20 years ago 25% of the French population still worked in what some would characterize as agriculture stoop labor, while in this country the figure was 3 percent or less. I suspect that this one fact alone has a lot to do with the more numerous numbers per square mile of managed honeybee colonies in France than here in the United States. I also suspect that the French environment or the French government is no more bee friendly than any other country is but that there are many more hard working people in France who are involved in agriculture and who seek to supplement their on farm incomes through beekeeping than there are here in the USA.

[wildbranch2007]

Neonicotids are taken up by plants, but not concentrated over the long term. The half-life in both soil and plants is on the order of days to months. There is some quantifiable residual left in the soil the following planting season, but that level is low compared to the new planting season application.

I have bees near corn and don't worry much about it but I do worry when they are getting ready to plant the follow on crops of alfalfa etc. I have looked for a study on the residuals in follow on crops and can't find a thing. I also find very little studies have been done other that the one from this tread since the early 2000's. I went looking for the label change thata was made some time back because of the length of time it stays in the soil. I always have fun and find out more facts that cause me more consternation.
I'll give my take and then copy in some of the datat found. one that surprised me was the flea stuff used on dogs and cats contains neonicitds. the good news if you want is that the bugs are showing resistence to this class of pesticides, the bad/good news is that dupont and that german company have the next class coming out. I also would like to thank C.A., seems they are the only ones that I could find doing any newer studies. I also found when they are trying to get a product registerd the longevity of the product is downplayed, when trying to sell it however they give different figures on how long it lasts. one note says no studies have been done for longer than 1 yr, one of my questions is what happens the the stuff left in the plant as the plant breaks down, does it then add back into the amount in the soil?

http://www.cdpr.ca.gov/docs/emon/pub...clprdfate2.pdf
There were 131,394 pounds of imidacloprid active ingredient applied in California in 2004 with the highest statewide commodity use for structural pest control (39,538 pounds).
Field dissipation half-life
26.5 – 229 days
There is evidence that imidacloprid residues can drift off-site on plant debris. Greatti et al. (2003) detected imidacloprid residues on plants growing adjacent to a field sown with seed-treated corn. Plant samples were analyzed using gas chromatography and found to contain imidacloprid and imidacloprid degradates at concentrations ranging from 14–54 ppb. The imidacloprid-treated seeds were sown using a pneumatic corn seed drill, so it is likely that seed debris was lost through the fan exhaust system.
Detections in corn plants that were seed-treated at a rate of 0.7 mg/seed ranged from an average of 2.1 ppb in pollen to 6.6 ppb in the flowers (Bonmatin et al., 2005

The majority of toxicity studies have focused on the parent compound, imidacloprid. It should be noted that two imidacloprid derivatives (olefin and nitrosimine) occur as metabolites in treated plants and have greater insecticidal activity than the parent compound (Nauen et al., 1998). The guanidine metabolite of imidacloprid does not possess insecticidal properties, but has a higher mammalian toxicity than the parent compound (Tomizawa and Casida, 1999).

http://www.cdpr.ca.gov/docs/emon/pubs/fatememo/imid.pdf


But in a recent study
conducted in 1997 to 1998, Bayer Corporation found imidacloprid in ground water, 18
feet below ground surface (sandy loam soil). Concentrations ranged from < .1 ppb to 1
ppb.
Degradation on soil via photolysis has a t
1/2 of 39
days. In the absence of light, the longest half-life of imidacloprid was 229 days in field

studies and 997 days in laboratory studies (Miles Inc., 1993). This persistence in soil,
without the presence of light, makes imidacloprid suitable for seed treatment and <------- so the longer halflife is more feasabile?
incorporated soil applications because it allows continual availability for uptake by roots

as part of the study where they pulled imidacloprid from almonds calif. said

http://www.cdpr.ca.gov/docs/registra.../ca2011-10.pdf
This reevaluation is based on an adverse effects disclosure
regarding the active ingredient imidacloprid. The disclosure included twelve ornamental plant
residue studies and two combination residue, honey, and bumble bee studies of imidacloprid use
on a number of ornamental plants.
DPR’s evaluation of the data noted two critical findings:
(1) high levels of imidacloprid in leaves and in blossoms of treated plants, and (2) increases in
residue levels over time. Data indicate that use of imidacloprid on an annual basis may be
California Notice 2011-10


additive, in that significant residues from the previous use season appear to be available to the <---so its over a year and its still there and possible significant and I'm guessing
treated plant. <---- it's folliar applied and not seed treated

[wildbranch2007]

an aside to my previous post I also found the following:

Research shows this class of chemical (neonicotinoid) stimulates egg production by female
plant-feeding mites. Therefore do not use imidacloprid or other neonicotinoid product
more than twice per season on plants susceptible to mite injury

I wonder if its doing the same to the varroa? couldn't resist.

[Nabber86]

I have bees near corn and don't worry much about it but I do worry when they are getting ready to plant the follow on crops of alfalfa etc.

Thanks for posting a lot of good information. I will try to respond to some of the info without parsing too much (gets really hard to follow that way)

I'll give my take and then copy in some of the datat found. one that surprised me was the flea stuff used on dogs and cats contains neonicitds.

That is a classic example of a chemical exposure scenario (flea meds on dogs) that is presented often to help people understand chemical risk and exposure. The amount of flea chemical that you put on your dog is tiny and does not represent acute exposer (your dog doesnt immediately fall over dead when you treat him). However, there is chronic exposure over the lifetime of the dog from repeated treatments that can cause problems. OK so big deal, most prople understand the difference between acute and chronic exposure. But here is the kicker - It has been determined that it take years of chronic exposure to flea meds on dogs to cause any health problems. More years than the life of a dog. IOW, your dog is dead long before chronic exposure causes problems. Neat huh?

There is evidence that imidacloprid residues can drift off-site on plant debris. Greatti et al. (2003) detected imidacloprid residues on plants growing adjacent to a field sown with seed-treated corn. Plant samples were analyzed using gas chromatography and found to contain imidacloprid and imidacloprid degradates at concentrations ranging from 14–54 ppb. The imidacloprid-treated seeds were sown using a pneumatic corn seed drill, so it is likely that seed debris was lost through the fan exhaust system. Detections in corn plants that were seed-treated at a rate of 0.7 mg/seed ranged from an average of 2.1 ppb in pollen to 6.6 ppb in the flowers

Not sure if I am reading that correctly, but it looks like they are saying that the plants in the adjacent field had levels of 14 to 54 ppb and the treated seed corn plants had levels of 2.1 to 6.6 ppb. - That is physically impossible. Anyway, I find that exposure through drifting plant debris is questionable. From the standpoint of how far do the plant debris really travel? Probably not very far. I would like to see the results of several samples from a downwind adjacent field, taken at regular intervals along the axis of the wind direction, and then plotted on a graph. I bet the graph would fall off like a rock.

Of course I can already hear the people claiming that debris can travel miles downwind. Sure individual particles can travel long distances, but you have diffusion working and the concentration of the debris decreases with the distance traveled. It's kind of like the inverse square law: the exposure from a spherical source is decreased to 25 percent of it's original level if you double the distance from the source. Of course the source is more of a 3D parabola flattend along the vertical axis than a sphere, but you get the idea.

But in a recent study conducted in 1997 to 1998, Bayer Corporation found imidacloprid in ground water, 18 feet below ground surface (sandy loam soil). Concentrations ranged from < .1 ppb to 1 ppb.
Degradation on soil via photolysis has a t 1/2 of 39 days. In the absence of light, the longest half-life of imidacloprid was 229 days in field studies and 997 days in laboratory studies (Miles Inc., 1993). This persistence in soil, without the presence of light, makes imidacloprid suitable for seed treatment and <------- so the longer halflife is more feasabile?
incorporated soil applications because it allows continual availability for uptake by roots
as part of the study where they pulled imidacloprid from almonds calif.

Admittedly chemical degradation half-lifes are all over the place and are completly dependant on the environment in which they are studied. Half-life range is best used to qualify a chemical as persistance in the environment, or relatively quick to decay. IOW - are we talking days to months, or years to decades? Of course the greenies always pick the highest value that they can find (degradation rate measured in a sealed test tube, in complete darkness, and in the the vacuum of space) and the big bad chemical corporations select the one that was calculated by dumping the pesticide on a compost heap, applying a fresh load of cow manure, then probably setting the whole thing on fire after a couple of weeks.

This reevaluation is based on an adverse effects disclosure regarding the active ingredient imidacloprid. The disclosure included twelve ornamental plant residue studies and two combination residue, honey, and bumble bee studies of imidacloprid use on a number of ornamental plants.
DPR’s evaluation of the data noted two critical findings:
(1) high levels of imidacloprid in leaves and in blossoms of treated plants, and
(2) increases in residue levels over time. Data indicate that use of imidacloprid on an annual basis may be California Notice 2011-10

Of course the levels may increase in ornamental plants. They live forever (compared to seasonal crops) and have time to accumulate more.

[Duck1968]

I planted sweet corn for the first time last year, 3 rows, not a lot, and was back at the feed store asking whether my seed had been treated after I read last year's report on clothianidin. I still have the seed. The only way I'll really know if it is clean is to send it to Texas A&M I suspect. Gypsi

All the treated seed I have planted was easy to tell that it was treated. The treatment has a dye in it so the seed is stained, my field corn is usually pink or purple and soybeans bright green. Plus federal law requires treated seed to be labeled with what it has been treated with.

I have only kept bees for two years. All my hives are on the sides of my fields that rotate between corn and soybeans. Most are less than 30 feet from the crop. Last year I installed 2 4lb. packages on the 15th of April and then planted treated corn with an 8 row vacuum planter on the 18th of April. Both hives drew out 2 deeps and filled 2 med with honey. I don’t see dad buying untreated seed any time soon and I don’t have any other place to keep my bees. So I will just have to watch them and see how they do.

Brian

[Gypsi]

Thank you Brian - I hope your bees do well. Yours is the first straight answer I feel like I've had on this - how to tell if seed is treated. (other being the feed store) It was kinda nice having fresh corn, but corn is a lot cheaper than new bees.

Gypsi

[rwurster]

Brian is correct. All our corn seeds are usually 'stained' pink and the package is marked what they have been treated with.

[Gypsi]

My sweet corn seed is for "candy corn", and it is stained pink. Bulk seeds, feed store said no pesticide treatment on it. I hand plant - it doesn't smell bad. Any clue if the feed store is lying? I still have maybe half a pound.

Googled it.

Your role in growing ATTRIBUTE® sweet corn
http://www.rogersadvantage.com/pdf/A...Guide1.pdfFile Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - Quick View
ATTRIBUTE® insect-protected sweet corn varieties from Syngenta Seeds Inc. are a viable ... of insecticide sprays, growers can aid in slowing down or ... To clearly identify ATTRIBUTE insect-protected sweet ... blue color to distinguish it from traditional sweet corn, which typically is covered in a bright pink coating. Please ...
Sweet Corn Production

[Scrapfe]

... I installed 2 4lb. packages on the 15th of April and then planted treated corn with an 8 row vacuum planter on the 18th of April. Both hives drew out 2 deeps and filled 2 med with honey. I don’t see dad buying untreated seed any time soon...

Before today’s’ modern pest control methods came along, 10 or more applications of insecticides per growing season were required here if a farmer here expected to earn enough from a crop of cotton to buy a plain pair of shoes for each of his children at harvest time.

Now if you and your dad had to fly on 10 or more aerial applications of insecticides, or else spray each of your corn crops ten or more times using a High Cycle boom sprayer, do you think your bees would have lived through the summer?

[jim lyon]

Scrapfe: I haven't heard of spraying on the scale you describe up here but your point is one I have been trying to make for some time. Whether or not neonics are harmful to bees is a point of some debate, on the other hand there has never been a debate on whether the alternative which is foliar spraying kills bees and unlike neonics it isn't selective to insects that feed on the plant....virtually all insects are killed good or bad.

[Acebird]

Before today’s’ modern pest control methods came along, 10 or more applications of insecticides per growing season were required here if a farmer here expected to earn enough from a crop of cotton to buy a plain pair of shoes for each of his children at harvest time.

This brain washing occurred with the first applications of insecticides because an immediate gain was observed. The long term losses were not known until later when the minds of the farmers were well pickled to believe in chemical solutions. So, a little was good and then came a lot was better. Chemical warfare on insects is not sustainable in any form. Chemicals come from oil dependency and the price will only increase. It has already past the cost of not using them at all. In a balance ecosystem the loses due to insects is fixed. The loses due to chemical warfare is not.

[Scrapfe]

This brain washing occurred with the first applications of insecticides because an immediate gain was observed... a little was good and then ...a lot was better...

Thank you Ace. You just proved Jim's, Nabbler's, Barry D's and my case for us. Yes, a lot proved not so good, but a little applied in a smart and a sustainable manner proved so much better for both the farmer and the bees. Way to go there pal! Keep up the good work!!!

[Acebird]

You can parse out the phrases to change the meaning of my post but I am sure most people read all of what I wrote.

[Duck1968]

[QUOTE=Acebird;744236 So, a little was good and then came a lot was better.[/QUOTE]

I'd go broke in a hurry if I used "a lot is better" aproach. Chemicals are too expsensive when you are dealing with 800+ acers

Brian

[Scrapfe]

We all should remember that the first chemical pesticide, (actually an insecticide) is a pesticide that is still employed today on organic farms everywhere. The active ingredient in this pesticide is Pyrethrum. Remember that Pyrethrum was first discovered by the Chinese and that Pyrethrum has been in commercial agricultural use for 400 years or longer. I don't believe anyone who has ever had the privilege of working (or dying) on a 14th or 15th Century peasant farm would describe the experience as making a living as much as describe it as fending off death.

So please, if you are repelled by the idea of living by employing insecticides or other pesticides, by all means live your life without them. A good way to start is for you and your extended family to go somewhere where pesticides are not widely employed, then swoop down on the local population and either murder or enslave the people already living there. This is how we humans have eked out an organic living for most of our history.