Hello all,
Is there a beekeeper-friendly resource anyone knows of that outlines the modes of action of the major pesticides, fungicides, miticides, and herbicides that bees are exposed to, and also details their possible synergistic effects, plus gives recommends for beekeepers in different situations?
For instance, if neonics are the predominant insecticide being used on your bees' crops, maybe you shouldn't use pyrethroids like coumaphos on your bees to control mites because neonics plus pyrethroids, together, are cumulative in their effects on the bees and could cause significant mortality.
I haven't seen any guide that would be useful for us in this regard...what to use in our various, particular circumstances. Is there something out there?
(http://entomology.ucdavis.edu/files/147891.pdf) "The dictionary definition of synergism is: interaction of discrete agencies or agents such that the total effect is greater than the sum of the individual effects. In other words, one plus one equals more than two. The question is, ¯Can pesticide residues, infectious agents, and/or malnutrition combine to be much worse for the bees than simply the additive effect of each alone?"
From an Alfred ppt presentation (http://www.alfredstate.edu/files/downloads/Frazier-MA-PesticideImpacts.pdf):
Outcomes of Honey Bee Pesticide Analysis
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No “commodity” has had as many detections at such high amounts in so few samples over such a short time as has bee pollen
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Highest detections were in-house miticides, fluvalinate and coumaphos, but well over 100 other pesticides and metabolites found
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Pyrethroids dominate: known to impact foraging behavior,
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No individual chemical is likely to explain CCD
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Systemic or other fungicides occur at levels that may synergize with pyrethroids, organophosphates or neonicotinoids.
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Role of pesticides and diseases like IAPV in CCD remains to be reconstituted in lab bioassays at relevant doses
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Impacts of multiple pesticide residues in bee food most likely will be via synergistic interactions at sublethal levels on key behaviors/physiology
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Thoughts on these things? For those of you who write for the beekeeping mags, how about an article on something practical like this...? If there are articles on this topic already out there I'd appreciate a posting on where to find them.
Christina...still thinking about math models to help understand all these things.
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