>But if the USDA bothers to run a test lab for food, I'm going to conclude
> that their tests are "authoritative", and that they will read the all
> papers, and decide what the state-of-the-art needs to be every year. I am
> sure they read everything you cited, and as I sold my HPLC/MS years ago,
> I'm
> going to take their word for it on the appropriate nature of their tests in
> determining food purity.
>
I am not disputing the words above, but would like to add an additional
comment of interest. The person who makes that decision sought me out at
the Hershey recent conference to discuss whether changes should be made to
that arbitrarily-determined list, as far as testing for residues relevant
to bee health issues. I invited the EPA crew as well as other pesticide
researchers to join us to discuss it over dinner, which we did. We found
ourselves in a sort of Catch-22. Unless you're testing for it, you really
don't know what bees are being exposed to. And unless serious research has
already been done, we don't know which pesticides are truly contributing to
bee health problems, so no testing for those residues is being done.
For example, recent research* suggests that the herbicide paraquat
negatively (and strongly) affects the formation of the crucial oenocyte
cells in bee larvae, at concentrations below the level of detection by
LC/MS. But if we look at the list of pesticides tested for in the exhibits
mentioned in this thread, one will note that USDA isn't even testing for
paraquat residues, despite it being a widely-applied herbicide.
FWIW, I forwarded the study to the appropriate party.
*Cousin M, Silva-Zacarin E, Kretzschmar A, El Maataoui M, Brunet J-L, et
al. (2013) Size changes in honey bee larvae oenocytes induced by exposure
to paraquat at very low concentrations. PLoS ONE 8(5): e65693.
doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0065693
http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0065693
--
Randy Oliver
Grass Valley, CA
www.ScientificBeekeeping.com
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