Those who ignore history are condemned to repeat it. Here's a little blast from the past (1977) by Bill Wilson


> A revealing but not surprising difficulty with the survey was the general confusion caused by the similarity between the symptoms of pesticide poisoning and DD. Why are pesticides so often listed as the primary cause of dwindling / disappearing - bee problem? In the past, people have been inclined to "think" pesticides, often without thoroughly investigating all aspects of the bee losses. In fact, if an inspector's repertoire of bee experience does not contain information on DD, the DD/ dwindling or loss would be diagnosed as pesticide-related on the basis of general signs and symptoms. One inspector commented, "If you haven't heard of DD, what else fits the situation except pesticides?" Certainly with both pesticide-related and DD-caused bee losses, the adult population of a colony may be reduced rapidly to a "handful" of bees or, in some cases, the entire population may be lost. 

> However, in the case of pesticide poisoning, there is usually evidence of pesticide application - a known airplane spray application to a specific crop or actual chemical residues found on plants. According to Atkins ( 1975 ), pesticide kill may be suspected when weather has been warm, dry, and pleasant for any length of time and the colonies are located in or near a field with a crop in bloom. The worker bees either die in the field or in or near the hive depending on the type of pesticide. When the field force is killed and they "disappear," many dead or dying bees may be seen on the ground in the field or on the ground between the treated field and the apiary with the nurse bees remaining in the hive. If the foraging bees bring poison into the hive, then the nurse bees either die in the hive or at the entrance so one can see many crawling and tumbling adults and large amounts of neglected brood. Exposure to pesticides over an extended period results in very weak colonies, and some die out. 

> In the case of DD, the situation is quite different. The colonies frequently have gone through a period of nectar and pollen collection with active brood rearing. Then the weather has turned unseasonably cool and damp and remained adverse for from about 3 to 14 days. Such a situation usually occurs in early spring. During the inclement weather, the bee populations dwindle because the worker bees disappear from the hive leaving a "handful" of bees and the queen.

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