Thursday April 9 2:06 PM EDT
'Mad bee' disease probed in France
 
With a few added notes from the OLd Drone
 
UPI Science News
PARIS, April 9 (UPI) _ The French government today moved to combat an
outbreak of what's being called ``mad bee'' disease, which the scientific
community says is killing millions of honeybees in western France.
 
With half the money coming from the European Union, the French ministries
of agriculture and environment said today a total $1 million will be spent
to find out why the honeybees are dying.
 
A high bee kill was first reported last summer by beekeepers who said
increasing numbers of bees became disorientated and failed to return to
their hives after gathering pollen and nectar from sunflowers.
Beekeepers in the region call the malady ``mad bee'' disease and blame it
on a widely used insecticide that the beekeepers say is destroying the
insects' sense of direction.
 
They report the phenomenon has drastically affected the region's bee
population and dramatically reduced production of area's famed honey by 60
percent.
 
That's more than a third of France's total output.
 
(Well there is always Argentinean honey at rock bottom prices, including
the rocks.)
 
At issue is what the Ministry of Environment reports may be the
insecticide,Gaucho, produced by the German agrochemical company Bayer SA.
It is used to protect sunflowers from parasites.
 
Ministry spokesman Andre Lesireux said this morning, ``The research will
tell us why the bees turn crazy and die.''
 
(This symptom one reserved for old beekeepers has now been seen for the
first time in tired old bees.)
 
The beekeepers say only those insects collecting nectar from sunflowers
appear to be affected.
 
The Bayer group has agreed to contribute 5 percent of the total cost of
research.
 
(5%-- Cheep fatherless sons of goatheaded dogs, my bet is they are
connected to General Mills in the USA.)
 
Franck Allaitru of the FDSEA agriculture union said in Paris today ``A
poisoning problem from insecticide is the only explanation for the
behaviour of the bees and their systematic disappearance during the first
week that the sunflowers bloom.''
 
Regional authorities have already suspended use of Gaucho in three areas of
western and central France - the Vendee, Indre and Deux-Sevres.
 
(Good News for North American Sun Flower growers, Gaucho should be a lot
cheaper this summer.)
 
The research initiative, reported earlier in the newspaper Ouest- France,
will determine if the bees in those areas recover.
 
But the French Green Party has demanded the product be removed entirely
from the market.
 
**(That it, I swear I will never eat another whale bugger as long as I live
so help me..er, er well maybe they are like the comm me's and don't have no
God.)
 
Gaucho first went on sale in 1994. The producer says Gaucho is based on
imidaclopride, a chemical which acts on the nervous systems of a wide
variety of pests, including wireworm and aphids. Bayer SA defends the
product as the most widely used sunflower insecticide in France and insists
``the accusations have no scientific foundation.'' Bayer SA French
marketing director Bruno Feldrops says imidaclopride has been used in more
than 70 countries and was subjected to rigorous testing.
 
**(Yeh this stuff is so good he feeds it to his own family but does not to
his own bees. "Mad" bees nobody wants but Mad French men are like hairy
legs and are a dime a dozen.)
 
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