Here is some more relevant excerpt -
PMRA could also have drawn upon previous studies, including three major field investigations on neonicotinoid pesticides in 2002, 2005 and 2012 by environmental biologist Cynthia Scott-Dupree of the University of Guelph and entomologist Chris Cutler of Dalhousie University. The researchers noted residues of neonics in ailing bee hives, but at levels hundreds of times lower than scientists believe would have any impact on bees. Their conclusion echoed recent findings by DEFRA, USDA and EPA: many factors contribute to bee deaths, but neonics in particular had “no effects” on their poor performance. (end excerpt)
I remember the European groups against the pesticides argued that residual pesticides even at such low level weakened the bees so much that they eventually succumbed to other factors (fungus, mites, other environmental factors, etc.)
My former boss is into bee keeping and specifically sending SE Idaho bees to Cali almond groves. No crop insurance down thee unless they have bees on site.
He reports mite infestation as their main problem.
Hey, Napper,
The older I got, the longer the nap.
OTH, been an apiary guy since I was a kid, and that was a LONG time ago.
I will read the article. I’m deeply concerned about the plight of the honey bee.
They ARE integral to the health of agriculture and orchards.
so much of science has been perverted by the mindset in “sociology” and its related “social sciences” and their “studies” and in that genre of what I will call “soft” science an increasing tendency to accept correlation as though it was causation
and so, in keeping with an anti-scientific attitude, among some of the scientists studying the issues with bees, it was not a stretch for them to conclude - pesticide bad, pesticide levels “high” when adverse beehive conditions found, ergo the pesticide is the cause
yet true science knows that correlation is not causation, no matter what the heavily politicized fields of science today say
all the worker bees from a colony abruptly disappeared without a trace—no dead bodies to be found.
who is John Galt