Randy, this court case makes for very interesting reading.  It's freely available, thanks to the Hiawatha Trust.





You asked about the wind.  I will copy what the transcripts say.  But first, I'll copy what Wilburt said about the behavior of the bees in the yards.  Vol. 2 of 10, p. 381.





Q.  If I recall correctly, Mr. Wahl, when we left off with you Monday, you had just told us about the things you observed on May 20 in a couple of your bee yards; is that correct?





A.  That's right.





Q.  Can you identify that on Exhibit 13 for identification?





A.  That's the yard right there, No. 7 (indicating).





Q.  It's the yard right by the Village of Clayton; is that correct?





A.  That's right, sir.





Q.  Containing 59 hives?





A.  Yes, sir.





Q.  What did you do and what did you observe in that yard?





A. Well, when I came into the yard I noticed my wife and older son very much disturbed.  The one thing that hit me first was the amount of bees in the air, milling around.  The world was just full of bees, thick, and there didn't seem to be any end to it.  They'd bump into you and they'd mill around, and they were high up in the air, and they extended over a wide area beyond the confines of the bee yard.





(excerpted State lawyer objection and other legal side issues)





Q.  And then you went to the George yard?





A.  Yes.





Q.  And did you notice a similar thing in the George Yard?





A.  No, sir.  In this yard the bees were all on the ground, twitching and crawling and rolling around, cleaning their antennae, and the wings at different angles.  We did pick up some to see what was the matter with them, and we noticed, the first thing, that they didn't seem to be able to stay on the palm of the hand, they just sort of rolled off and dropped straight down.  And the condition inside the hives was the same as in the Sand Pit Yard; not many bees in the lower brood chamber.





(Now the questions went to location of the yards...after some back-and-forth between lawyers, here is what happened next)





Q.  Will you describe in detail just what you observed about the hives, then in the Sand Pit Yard?





A.  I lifted up the upper super, the upper brood chamber, and looked in between, which gave me a good bird's eye view of the contents of the lower super and the contents of the upper one.  I could see there was brood down in the lower brood nest, but no bees.  By glancing up at the bottom bars of the upper super, which was tipped up at an angle, I could see that the numbers up above had also been depleted, that the brood was exposed.  I mean, I would look in between the frames and see the brood.





Q.  And what color was the brood?





A.  Well, the brood was normal there.





Q.  In all the hives?





A.  In all the hives, yes sir.





Q.  Now, the bees that were in the hives, did you form an opinion at that time as to whether they were so-called old bees, young bees, or nurse bees, or what?





A.  Well, as far as I could.   They were predominantly young bees.  None showed any....that I could see...showed any frayed wings, which is always an indication of age.





Q.  And what is the characteristic of a field worker bee to the naked eye?





A.  When she gets old, you can see that the wings are frayed.  The wings do not grow any more, the same as a chicken does.  Once the wing is frayed, that's a sign that the bee is old; it's done a lot of field work.





(here is a lot more exploration of basic bee biology)





Now some testimony about timing of the spray (vol. 1 p 158:)





Q.  Do you recall, Mr. Masterson, when this program was first devised, that is, when the program was first formulated, for the spraying in the spring of 1953?





A.  Now let me get this clear.  Do you mean when the final plans were made for the actual spray operations?





Q.  No.  I mean when did they formally decide to accomplish the program in the spring of 1953.





A.  I would say some time during the month of December, 1952.





Q.   In fact, that's one of the dates on Exhibit 17 or 18, is it not, which include instructions to pilots on the spray program?





A.   That would be the 4th of December, 1952.





Q.  So, on or before that day, it was determined that a program for the control of tent caterpillar in Jefferson, St. Lawrence, and Lewis counties was determined upon?





A.  I would say, yes.





Q.  Do you know when your plans and your arrangements were completed?





A.  Well, that is a rather difficult thing to say, because in the planning of an operation of this kind it's begun over a period of, say, many months, there are many factors to take into consideration, your equipment has to be brought together, your material planned for, and so on.  In fact, this....the actual spraying was under operation before all of the material had been secured. The material for Lewis County was not available.  The State furnished the material from their own supply and later were re-paid by the County of Lewis.





Q.  When you're speaking of material, I take it you mean spray material?



A.  Spray material, that's right.





Q.  This is as good a point as any, I suppose, to describe the type of material which was being sprayed.





A  It is a six per cent DDT-oil solution.





Q.  Do you know what kind of oil it was?





A.  Yes, sir.  It consists of a hydrocarbon solvent.  In this particular case it was a Socony Mobil product, PD544B.





(condensed)





Q,  And did it have a trade name?





A.  Sovacide, and that is used to dissolve DDT.





(more condensed)





Q.  Do you know what the vehicle was that was used?





A.  The carrier?





Q.   Yes.





A.  That would be kerosene.





(established that it was No. 1 fuel oil)





(Mixture explained, p. 163):





A. Four pounds of technical grade DDT is added to a gallon of Sovacide, and the resulting product is approximately a 35% DDT...from 33 to 35% DDT.  You have five quarts in that, because of the expansion of adding the four pounds.  There is approximately 5 quarts.  To that, to make the solution we use, a 6% solution, we add six gallons of kerosene or No. 1 fuel oil.  You could also add No. 2 fuel oil.





(Spray details, p 197 Vol 1)





Q.  ...in preparing for your spraying in that spring, you already knew that you were going to spray some eleven thousand acres or so in Jefferson, St. Lawrence, and Lewis Counties?





A.   That's true.





Q.  And that you also knew that from your previous experience that you would have a minimum loss of time in days of twenty-five per cent; during the period you were going to spray, is that right?





A.  That's true.





...





Q.  Were you aware at the beginning of May, when the spraying was being done in Lewis County, that the spraying was being done at a time that the dandelion fields were in bloom?





A.  No, sir.​





(more on bloom periods excerpted)





Q.  Did you realize that in Lewis County there were beekeepers in the area which you were spraying?





A.  I would assume that there would be beekeepers in most areas that we would spray in some place.





Q.  And did you make any investigation to determine whether there were, as a fact, or not, beekeepers in the area or near the areas which you were intending to spray that spring?





A.  At the time that the survey was made during the winter months, property owners, of course, were contacted...the property owners who had shown some desire, through county officials, that they wanted spraying done.  We contacted these property owners, made a survey of their areas, prepared maps, told them exactly what the spray program would consist of, questioned them whether they had any bees, whether they run perhaps a fur farm of some kind, which have to be very careful of ; and as far as I know, each property owner was asked those same questions.





Q.  Did you recognize, then, in the winter, in addition to the fur farms, that you had to be careful of bee yards?





A.  If they were in....we would assume that, if they were within our spray area.





Q.  Supposing they were a mile from your spray area?





A.  We would have no reason to do anything about that.





Q.  You didn't recognize a danger as to that?





A.  Absolutely not.





Q.  Did you realize in the winter of '53 that bee owners by and large did not own the land where their colonies and yards were located?





A.  No.





Q.  Did you go on the assumption that the land owner, fi there were bees, there, would be the owner of the bees?





A.  We would assume that, yes.





Q.  You didn't make any investigation to determine whether or not that was in fact the case up here in these three counties?





A.  No.





___







There is a lot more testimony.  Ten volumes of it.  In brief, experts on upper atmospheric phenomena showed that the wind on the day of the spray would have caused pesticide drift over the bee yards that were affected.



But!  The state had "alternate explanations" for the bee kills.  And, Roger Morse (among others who were also not there) said that pesticides, applied appropriately, do not kill bees!



Christina

















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