>> >  this new and hitherto unknown use of Fipronil to eradicate honey bees...

> I can never tell if the writer is being serious or not, but this use is neither unknown nor new. See

http://doi.org/10.1080/01140670709510197


The citation offered is to a very small trial, not an actual honey bee eradication program:

"In the autumn trial all 20 colonies died within 13 days of poisoning. After 6 weeks the effect of poisoned hives on the survival of newly introduced colonies was assessed. Five colonies were placed next to 10 poisoned hives in the original eradication area, five colonies were placed with 10 poisoned hives at least 4km from the original area, and an additional 10 colonies were placed at least 4km from the original area and 4 km apart."

So, the "new and hitherto unknown" aspect is the widespread use of Fipronil, not the unsurprising fact that Fipronil kills insects dead. See the map:
"https://trade.maps.arcgis.com/apps/Embed/index.html?webmap=6adf4b329aea4604bcb3ea5d25afa1e0&extent=145.9467,-34.5101,156.7957,-28.9687&zoom=true&scale=true&search=true&searchextent=true&basemap_gallery=true&disable_scroll=true&theme=light"

Red is the eradication zone, purple surveillance zone, and light blue the general emergency zone.  Eyeballing, we have at least 20 10km diameter red zones, each 78.5 sq km so about 1,500 sq km of eradication zone.   Unprecedented in scope.

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