Bob Harrison wrote:
> Hello Bill & All,
> 
> There is not clear picture of what CCD is or caused by.

I disagree, since it seems to becoming clear that it is a pathogen of 
some sort. My problem is with those who insist, as the article whose 
headline said, that it has been solved and its name is Bayer. I have 
no issue with the fact that pesticides can cause bee and human 
problems. As noted, I practice organic farming and do not use 
pesticides for that reason. I have, however, a very big problem with 
emotional responses against chemicals where there is no science.

You asked me to prove, through studies, that minute traces of a 
pesticide do not kill or cause CCD.

All we need to do is look at organic beekeepers who suffer CCD.

But, even better, any beekeeper who has suffered pesticide kills knows 
that there are degrees to the kill. It is not black and white but you 
can have total or minor impact on a colony or apiary. In fact, often 
there are colonies that are not effected at all, since the bees did 
not go to that field while others are dieing out. Or a colony is 
partially affected since the dose was sub lethal. Lethal doses kill in 
the field, while sub lethal kill in the hive.

There is just no correlation with a pesticide kill and CCD. CCD sweeps 
through an apiary, from one group of colonies to another until the 
whole apiary is in collapse. That is a classic pathogen response. You 
do not see a "little bit of CCD" which you would see with a sub lethal 
dose of pesticide.

I was going to write a short essay on the scientific method and single 
data points, but decided that it was not worth the bother. But what we 
have here is an accusation that treated corn fields cause CCD, a 
single data point. This is not unlike the same accusations that come 
out about transmission lines and cancer, or being downwind of a 
nuclear plant and cancer. Very often you can show that there are 
increased incidences of specific cancer in some of those areas. But, 
when one looks more deeply, it turns out it is not universally true, 
but specific to one or more locations. When you look at those 
locations, often you find many relatives who live there and it is 
actually genetics that is the underlying cause of the cancer.

Could it be that large beekeeping operations in the Mid-West farmlands 
are located near corn just because there is a lot of corn in the 
Mid-West farmlands? We know that large operations are more susceptible 
to CCD, so might it be the concentration of large beekeeping 
operations in the same farmlands with attendant mixing of pathogens 
that is the real cause of CCD with those operations?

That seemed to be a characteristic of CCD with almond pollinators: all 
together to share a pathogen, get CCD, and carry it home, even those 
who never got near corn.

In essence, the data point that is being used to show that corn and 
CCD are related is not a very good one, based on all the other 
variables at work.

Truth is, if there were a pesticide smoking gun, that would have been 
obvious from the beginning. If you recall, it was hypothesized by the 
Penn State person who was working on the Hackenburg colonies, but 
dropped soon after. It would be too easy to identify any chemical 
agent as the underlying cause of CCD. A pathogen is a different story, 
especially a new one.

Bill Truesdell
Bath, Maine

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