> The problem I saw in posts about "problems" in Alberta, such as 50% bee
> kills and somehow those losses and neonics (seed treated) are related is
> the classic "correlation does not imply causation".

Just to be perfectly clear, there was no mention of 50% bee kills that I 
can recall.  There was mention of 50% winter losses and poor surviving 
colonies.

Here is what went down.  Some on this list were using Alberta as an 
example of a region where bees are thriving in spite of widespread us of 
neonics.  That observation was used to "prove" that neonic seed 
treatments are harmless to bees.

Not so fast, I said. Alberta is such a fantastic summer pasture that it 
would take a big hit to be noticeable in summer performance, especially 
since there are so many confounding factors and no controls.

I also said that a small impact would be unnoticeable, but could be an 
economic load.  I did not say there was, but just that we would not know 
if there was -- or wasn't.

The real test of bee fitness is an Alberta winter.  Alberta is not 
hospitable to bees and if not for beekeepers and constant imports, both 
legal and otherwise, beekeeping would be in rapid decline here, 
especially in the North.

Not every winter is bitterly cold.  There have been winters when I never 
plugged in a vehicle and others where we had minus forty for over a week 
at a time.  Some winters we have no snow and are barbecuing in 
shirtsleeves on New Years Day and others when we mostly stay indoors 
except to shovel snow.

Every so often we get a winter that really tests our bees' fitness. That 
is where any weakness would show up, not in summer and not in an easy 
winter.

Last winter was such a winter,  It was early and cold and it was long. 
Moreover, the spring was very slow coming and bees were under snow when 
the first counts were being made, leading to false optimism, further 
testing the hives.

Even beekeepers who had done everything "right" suffered unusual losses. 
  Of course there are always exceptions, but as the spring unfolded, the 
story got worse.

Anyhow, the point of this whole matter is simply that Alberta beekeeping 
does not prove anything in regard to neonics except that most bees do 
quite well on neonic treated canola in summer and if there is any 
effect, it is not apparent, especially as there is no way to compare and 
crops typically range widely from year to year and place to place.

That is not the same thing as saying there is no effect.  I simply do 
not know and neither can anyone else.

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