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SCIENCETuesday 24 November 2015
Pesticide-makers point to other culprits in bee die-offs
EMERY P. DALESIO ics are beneficial and safe ers and other plants bees try’s efforts to confound could face extensive crop
AP Business Writer when used correctly, and need to feed. Their repre- people by highlighting in- losses since old pesticides
RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, that bees face greater sentatives are speaking at conclusive science. have been phased out be-
North Carolina (AP) — In peril from parasites, patho- beekeepers’ conferences “I call it a red herring. You cause of the hazards they
a Nordic-inspired building gens and poor diets as wild and visiting agricultural re- claim that ours isn’t the posed to humans and wild-
tucked in a corner of the flowering plants diminish. search universities. only problem, so therefore life, said Dominic Reisig, an
Bayer CropScience North Bee die-offs could disrupt Besides inviting visitors to it isn’t a problem,” said insect researcher at North
American headquarters, the human food chain, bee centers on its corpo- Massachusetts beekeeper Carolina State University
high school students wan- with a third of the foods rate campuses outside Dick Callahan, a retired who advises farmers.
der through 6,000 square consumed by Americans Raleigh, North Carolina, executive with a doctor- “I think the final verdict
feet (more than 550 square and Europeans dependent and Monheim, Germany, ate in entomology who co- is still out there” on how
meters) dedicated en- on pollinators like them. Bayer offers teachers a authored a Harvard study large a role neonics play
tirely to the specialness of Researchers suspect ne- downloadable digital sci- on the effects of neonics in bee deaths, Reisig said.
bees. Children taste dif- onic pesticides play some ence lesson about bees. A on honeybees. The com- “I would say clearly there’s
ferent types of honey and something there, but is
examine the differences St. Thomas More Academy student Maggie McGrath, right, is reflected in a window between it one percent? Ten per-
between honeybee and cent? Ninety percent? We
carpenter bee specimens. her and a tray of bees held by Sarah Myers, a manager at the Bayer North American Bee Care don’t know.”
The pesticide maker high- Bayer produces three of
lights its work to foster the Center, during a student tour of the center in Research Triangle Park, N.C., Tuesday, Sep. 15, the world’s top five ne-
insects around the world, onic pesticides in a world-
welcoming school-age 2015. Associated Press wide market estimated to
children at the site built be worth about $3 billion,
apart from plant research role in reported die-offs company Twitter feed pro- panies blame a parasitic with Bayer’s two top-sell-
labs and executive offic- and the mysterious Colony motes the benefits of neo- mite as the biggest bee- ing products taking about
es. Amid the displays are Collapse Disorder. But they nics and studies that refute killer. Callahan said while half the market, said San-
bottles of Bayer pesticides, don’t know how much. their link to bee deaths, the mite may be the great- jiv Rana, editor-in-chief of
something that struck Cara A comparison of more than often using the hashtag est adversary of his honey- Agrow, a trade publication
Garrison, a student at Ra- three dozen pesticides #FeedABee. bees, it doesn’t explain why for the agricultural chemi-
leigh’s St. Thomas More found neonics produced A global agro-chemical mite-free bumble bees are cals industry. Syngenta’s
Academy, as odd. by Bayer CropScience trade magazine recently also disappearing. best-selling neonic is worth
“I thought it was a little and Syngenta among the honored Bayer’s pro-bees Neonics were a break- about $1 billion in annual
weird to see some of that chemicals most toxic to campaign for what judg- through because they sales, Rana said.
among all the bee-related bees, according to a Sep- es said was its effort “to can be used to coat seeds Becky Langer, the Bayer
things,” Garrison said. “I tember study by USDA re- broaden understanding rather than sprayed over CropScience manager for
was like, is that supposed searchers. and shift conversation from plants. As the plant sprouts, U.S. bee health, denied
to be there?” Bayer, Syngenta and Mon- blaming solely pesticides the chemical is incorporat- the company’s 4-year-old
That display in that building santo — which coats its towards a multiplicity of ed into every part of it — campaign is related to the
captures Bayer’s multi-bil- seeds with neonics — are factors.” from roots, to stalk, to the company’s neonic sales.
lion-dollar balancing act. encouraging nonprofits, Critics say that is all little flowers that attract bees It grew out of decades of
Some of those pesticides landowners and govern- more than propaganda and butterflies. research on the interaction
contain tobacco-derived ments to plant more flow- akin to the cigarette indus- Without neonics, growers of chemicals and the cru-
chemicals called neo- cial pollinators, she said.
nicotinoids that many re- “One didn’t pop up be-
searchers say play a role in cause of the other,” said
declining bee populations. Langer, whose center
Bayer spent $12 million last oversees bee field re-
year, when it earned prof- search locations in North
its of more than $3.6 bil- Carolina, California and
lion, promoting bee health Ontario, Canada. She said:
as the world’s top neonic “Bee numbers are actually
maker and No. 2 Syngenta not declining.” But that de-
fend off suggestions the pends how you count. On
chemicals are bee-killers. the one hand, figures from
Both companies are fight- the U.N. Food and Agricul-
ing pressure from regula- ture Organization and the
tors in the U.S. and Europe U.S. Department of Agricul-
with publicity campaigns ture show there are more
and lobbying aimed at bee colonies now than 30
telling people that neon- years ago.q
