Random thoughts thread
- Thread starter rhino3382
- Start date
- Status
Last summer a jackwagon didn't have his load secured, goes over a bump and dumps an enormous amount of rock on my car. Cracked windshield and pelted hood. I called the Polk County Sheriff and reported unsecured load and followed the truck to the school construction site by Alleman and watched as he quickly unloaded before the cops showed up. We exchanged words. Many words. In the end, the drove away sans ticket. My hate for gravel trucks and dump trucks in general that are rolling accidents is a deep, deep, seething hate.
I don't know if I'm happy or sad that I missed a discussion on bees and neonics. Seems like I already spend an inordinate amount of time on that very subject.
The last one is the best
[video=youtube;F_0wjFP3YsQ]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_0wjFP3YsQ&index=5&list=PLrEnWoR732-CN09YykVof2lxdI3MLOZda[/video]
[video=youtube;F_0wjFP3YsQ]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_0wjFP3YsQ&index=5&list=PLrEnWoR732-CN09YykVof2lxdI3MLOZda[/video]
I don't know if I'm happy or sad that I missed a discussion on bees and neonics. Seems like I already spend an inordinate amount of time on that very subject.
I would actually be rather interested to hear your take on it.
Does anyone else have to have all the light switches in the house all pointing the same direction?
YES! If it is a 2-way switch it the "odd" one has to the the one I would use the least amount of time.
Also- if the wife fills the dishwasher and does not start it because it isn't a full load (heh, heh) and I add something later I will have to take everything out of the dishwasher because I will always find something wrong with the way that she put everything in.
Last edited:
My succinct, for the non-entomologist/beekeeper, is that pollinators are in the middle of a perfect storm.
The witches brew is made up of many issues. Lack of bee forage (flowers for bees to work, for nectar and pollen) is greatly lacking in quality and quantity. I once heard an expert say that corn pollen is as nutritionally useful to bees as cardboard. How much clover is out there today? Ah, none. Yes, soybeans bloom and bees do work them - - and then we hit them with applications of fungicides and insecticides. - Note that I said insecticides and didn't just single out neonics. Which brings me to insecticides…I feel like agriculture AND homeowners have taken a major step backward with the prophylactic application of a cocktail of fungicides and insecticides not because an economic threshold has been reached, but because industry has convinced growers that they need to apply them for optimum plant health/yield - or the homeowner that can't stand the sight of one insect in their yard... Even if the application(s) don't cause acute/immediate death of bees, the pesticides compound in the hive, causing chronic issues which generally mean the colony doesn't survive the winter. And then there's the varroa mites. And the inability to control the mites because first, we're trying to kill off a tiny insect (hits aren't true insects, but I'll not go nuts with that level of detail here) on a small insect. That' requires a delicate balance. And there is a general lack in number of active ingredients that can do this, and the mites have developed resistance. Big picture, many experts believe that the varroa mite is the number one issue facing beekeepers. The varroa mite weakens the colony - and once again, the colony does not make it through the winter. Because of the lack of good controls, beekeepers get desperate and sometimes make up stuff up = use insecticides off-label, and that can compromise the health of the bees exposed. There are viruses and something called nosema (formerly called a microspordian, not called a fungus) that affects the bees' digestive track - essentially, bee diarrhea. We lost a colony over the winter of 2012-13 from nosema, and pulled another back form the brink of death. What causes it to flare in a colony is a point of contention - but if you have a colony with compromised health, this kind of thing kicks up. Some people believe that bee genetics need to be improved/more varied.
Put all these things, and more, together in varying levels, and pollinators are in trouble, but it's never the same exact thing that causes mortality across the board. But there definitely are repeating themes.
Are the nemonic insecticides as big of an issues as some people make out them to bee? Sometimes. However, their persistence in the environment = long lived. That's not good. And, I think this is a pretty balanced look at neonics.
I had the opportunity to participate in the National Honeybee Health Stakeholder Conference in late 2012 - . The report is available here. There is an executive summary at the beginning, which is well worth a read.
- - -
I swear this is as short as I can do on the subject.
- - -
I also spend a good portion of my life thinking about emerald ash borer. Itty bitty pieces of my soul die when I'm at a public meeting and an angry audience member demands to know how much 'stuff' do they need to dump on their ash tree to save it. Not long ago during a session where environmental risks and tactics to reduce risk were being discussed a lady loudly interrupted the speaker and told him to 'can it' and just just down to brass tacks about how much insecticide to mix up, because she was putting on double the amount to save her tree. From the back of the room I wondered to myself if she also cussed out farmers for killing all the bees and butterflies...
The witches brew is made up of many issues. Lack of bee forage (flowers for bees to work, for nectar and pollen) is greatly lacking in quality and quantity. I once heard an expert say that corn pollen is as nutritionally useful to bees as cardboard. How much clover is out there today? Ah, none. Yes, soybeans bloom and bees do work them - - and then we hit them with applications of fungicides and insecticides. - Note that I said insecticides and didn't just single out neonics. Which brings me to insecticides…I feel like agriculture AND homeowners have taken a major step backward with the prophylactic application of a cocktail of fungicides and insecticides not because an economic threshold has been reached, but because industry has convinced growers that they need to apply them for optimum plant health/yield - or the homeowner that can't stand the sight of one insect in their yard... Even if the application(s) don't cause acute/immediate death of bees, the pesticides compound in the hive, causing chronic issues which generally mean the colony doesn't survive the winter. And then there's the varroa mites. And the inability to control the mites because first, we're trying to kill off a tiny insect (hits aren't true insects, but I'll not go nuts with that level of detail here) on a small insect. That' requires a delicate balance. And there is a general lack in number of active ingredients that can do this, and the mites have developed resistance. Big picture, many experts believe that the varroa mite is the number one issue facing beekeepers. The varroa mite weakens the colony - and once again, the colony does not make it through the winter. Because of the lack of good controls, beekeepers get desperate and sometimes make up stuff up = use insecticides off-label, and that can compromise the health of the bees exposed. There are viruses and something called nosema (formerly called a microspordian, not called a fungus) that affects the bees' digestive track - essentially, bee diarrhea. We lost a colony over the winter of 2012-13 from nosema, and pulled another back form the brink of death. What causes it to flare in a colony is a point of contention - but if you have a colony with compromised health, this kind of thing kicks up. Some people believe that bee genetics need to be improved/more varied.
Put all these things, and more, together in varying levels, and pollinators are in trouble, but it's never the same exact thing that causes mortality across the board. But there definitely are repeating themes.
Are the nemonic insecticides as big of an issues as some people make out them to bee? Sometimes. However, their persistence in the environment = long lived. That's not good. And, I think this is a pretty balanced look at neonics.
I had the opportunity to participate in the National Honeybee Health Stakeholder Conference in late 2012 - . The report is available here. There is an executive summary at the beginning, which is well worth a read.
- - -
I swear this is as short as I can do on the subject.
- - -
I also spend a good portion of my life thinking about emerald ash borer. Itty bitty pieces of my soul die when I'm at a public meeting and an angry audience member demands to know how much 'stuff' do they need to dump on their ash tree to save it. Not long ago during a session where environmental risks and tactics to reduce risk were being discussed a lady loudly interrupted the speaker and told him to 'can it' and just just down to brass tacks about how much insecticide to mix up, because she was putting on double the amount to save her tree. From the back of the room I wondered to myself if she also cussed out farmers for killing all the bees and butterflies...
one of the interesting things I saw in this latest article, is that this class of pesticides is more harmful to earthworms than it is to bees. That just seems like a very, very bad situation.
If it makes you feel better, I plan to have lots of flowers and use my childrens' labor instead of anything from a bottle for weed control. Though is it ok to keep my can of Raid that I use very sparingly on wasps? Not bees! I promise.
- Status
