Please Help Save the Bees Pt 2

Last month I discussed the threat to bees from the commonly used pesticide Spinosad that despite its OMRI label of approval, is highly toxic to bees. Now we get to the worst health problem facing bees: CCD or Colony Collapse Disorder, a worldwide sickness of bees in which they become confused so they cannot find their way back to their hives and cannot function properly in other ways. Some accounts attribute CCD to cell phones, but my research indicates that cell phones are not the cause of CCD. According to European research, CCD results from exposure to pesticides, especially imidacloprid produced by Bayer Crop Science. Imidacloprid is also the active ingredient in Merit, contained in Season Long Grub Control made by Bayer Advanced, and other products. Imidacloprid is also an ingredient in many big-name commercial lawn fertilizers used to feed lawns while at the same time controlling white grubs. Imidacloprid, Merit, or whatever else you call it, is long lasting so it gets into groundwater and stays there a long time. It is systemic so plant roots pick it up, not just the roots of grasses, and of course bees visit the flowers on these plants.

European gardeners, growers, and beekeepers have been fighting the Bayer company about this problem through the courts for ten years, but up until now the Bayer people have refused to admit that imidacloprid harms bees. On the side of the Europeans is one undisputed fact: Imidacloprid is claimed by Bayer not to kill white grubs outright,  but to get rid of them by confusing them so that they cannot function in a normal manner, which in turn interrupts their life cycle and prevents their proliferation. Does that sound familiar? This is exactly what is happening to bees when they are afflicted with CCD. They cannot find their way back to the hive and they cannot perform tasks in a normal manner. As you can see, lawn owners, golf course managers, and agriculturists using commercial fertilizers containing grub control may be unwittingly killing bees. And whatever is killing our domestic bees is also killing the many species of wild bees, including carpenter bees, mason bees, and four local species of bumble bees. All these are disappearing along with feral European and Africanized bees and domestic European honeybees.

Please help save the world’s bees by your own actions and by spreading the word. Please never spray with Spinosad (discussed last month) unless in the evening hours and in very small quantities while using a small hand sprayer (the kind sold for moistening laundry), and then only moistening the leaves of plants at a distance from flowers or only on geranium blossoms, since bees never visit them. Never purchase or use Spinosad in a broadcast spray container. Never use Sluggo Plus in moist spots visited by bees, because it contains Spinosad. Above all, please stop using all products containing imidacloprid, including Merit and Bayer Advantage, and use organic controls instead.

Beneficial nematodes and products containing milky spore disease will control white grubs in organically grown lawns. (Synthetic fertilizers may kill live organisms, such as beneficial nematodes and milky spore.) Never use Bayer Advantage to control giant white fly. Instead, spread a layer of worm castings over the roots of affected plants. Earthworm castings will get rid of giant white fly completely, as proved in my own garden. Earthworm castings over rose roots seem to be controlling rose slug also, and they certainly control ants. Releasing delphastus beetles can also help control giant white fly. Eschew chemical sprays, release beneficials to control pests, and provide beneficials with pollen-bearing plants plus water to drink in a fountain, or at least a birdbath.