More Research Links Pesticides to Honeybee Die-Off

It's more bad news for beleaguered bees. According to The Independent, new research shows that neonicotinoids, a widely used class of pesticide, could make honeybees more susceptible to disease. The U.S. Department of Agriculture research — which was actually concluded two years ago, but is just coming out now — has some experts pointing to these pesticides as the leading culprit causing colony collapse disorder, a massive honeybee die-off affecting insects at home and abroad.

The research, led by Jeffrey Pettis of the USDA's Bee Research Laboratory, exposed two groups of honeybees to nosema, a bee disease. However, one group of honeybees was also exposed to small amounts of imidacloprid, a neonicotinoid pesticide produced by Bayer. Scientists found that the group of bees exposed to imidacloprid were much more vulnerable to the nosema infection than bees that weren't exposed to the pesticide.

"This new research from America confirms that at very, very low concentrations neonicotinoid chemicals can make a honeybee vulnerable to a fatal disease," Matt Shardlow, director of the insect conservation non-profit, Buglife, told The Independent. "If these pesticides are causing large numbers of honeybees, bumblebees, solitary bees, hoverflies and moths to get sick and die from diseases they would otherwise have survived, then neonicotinoid chemicals could be the main cause of both colony collapse disorder and the loss of wild pollinator populations."

While Pettis' study hasn't been published in a scientific journal yet — which means it hasn't undergone a peer review and the usual scientific checks and balances — this is just the latest piece of research indicating that neonicotinoids could be causing honeybees' demise. Pettis' study was replicated by French researchers from the National Institute for Agricultural Research, and they came up with the same conclusion as Pettis. (And their study was published in the journal Environmental Microbiology). Then last month, a leaked internal document from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) revealed that clothianidin, a commonly used neonicotinoid pesticide also produced by Bayer, could be contributing to colony collapse disorder. The agency's own scientists said that the pesticide hadn't undergone the proper research to prove its safety to honeybees.

Some scientists suspect that neonicotinoids — which are neurotoxins, by the way — are systemic, which means they're taken up into every part of the plant. Bees and other pollinators might be absorbing this poison through the pollen or nectar and taking it back to their nests and hives, resulting in honeybees' death even though they're not the insecticide's intended target.

That would be a big problem for honeybees, obviously, but also for us: Through pollination, honeybees are responsible for producing about one-third of the food we eat. Killing them off could mean massive food shortages in America as well as other countries.

The real issue here is that studies proving pesticides' safety (or lack thereof) should be conducted before these substances are approved for use. Neonicotinoids have been in use since the 1990s, and the research highlighting their potential dangers is just starting to really roll in. The situation makes wildlife and people guinea pigs in a very dangerous science experiment — one where we may be just beginning to see the horrifying effects.

Let's stop using pesticides that could very likely be killing off honeybees and threatening our food supply. Sign Pesticide Action Network's petition asking the EPA to ban clothianidin, one kind of neonicotinoid that's been linked to honeybees' die-off.

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Photo credit: photogirl7.1 via Flickr