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Old 24-04-2015, 10:26 PM posted to rec.gardens
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Default OT (?) Bees in trouble

It's not really OT, since the dire predicament of the pollinators that give us our "daily bread" is of concern to home gardeners as well as to consumers of commercially-produced food, organic or otherwise.


There are many sites on-line to learn about pesticides laced with Neonicotinoid,such as the powerful NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council) to other environmental groups.

A comprehensive article is at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neonicotinoid.

Science Daily has excellent article on same subject.

Are bees 'hooked' on nectar containing pesticides?
Posted: 23 Apr 2015 08:41 PM PDT
Bees are attracted to nectar containing common pesticides, scientists have discovered. This could increase their chances of exposure to high levels of pesticides.

It's "David" (us) against "Goliath", who is wired into U.S. corrupt Congress and (hah!)regulators.

What to do? Wait until magnitude of problem begins to hit the grocery shelves? Or demand action, FWIW.

HB

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Old 25-04-2015, 01:40 AM posted to rec.gardens
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Hypatia Nachshon wrote:
....
What to do? Wait until magnitude of problem begins to
hit the grocery shelves? Or demand action, FWIW.


do what you can to add bee food and habitat.

not all bees are honey bees. a lot of things
can be done to help the many different kinds of
bees...


songbird
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Old 25-04-2015, 03:25 AM posted to rec.gardens
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Hypatia Nachshon writes:

....
the dire predicament of the pollinators

....
It's "David" (us) against "Goliath", who is wired into U.S. corrupt
Congress and (hah!)regulators.


I just knew you'd foray into nutso land
rather than sticking to the important issue of the health of our bees.
That's why this whole thread is going to devolve into politics.

What to do? Wait until magnitude of problem begins to hit the grocery
shelves? Or demand action, FWIW.


Sure complain to congress.

Make sure you complain that you want the government to spend more
money to understand and fix the problem.

There are scientists studying the issue.
That's where these stories come from about the latest discovery.
If you think this problem is important, you should be willing
to pay more taxes so more work can be done. The problem may or
may not fix itself. It's too important to take that chance.

--
Dan Espen
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Old 26-04-2015, 10:46 AM posted to rec.gardens
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On 24/04/15 21:26, Hypatia Nachshon wrote:
It's not really OT, since the dire predicament of the pollinators
that give us our "daily bread" is of concern to home gardeners as
well as to consumers of commercially-produced food, organic or
otherwise.


The "pollinator" which gives us our "daily bread" is the wind. No bees
or other insects are involved. All cereal crops AFAIK are wind
pollinated, so our staple foods are not affected by the bee population.

What we would tend to lose - at least in the short term - is fruit
(including nuts), and vegetable fruits such as tomatoes, peppers,
aubergines, legumes, etc. The main problem would be the loss of soya,
not only because it is used in many forms in oriental cuisine, but
because it is a major source of animal feed. We would also need to find
substitutes for foodstuffs such as oilseed rape. As gardeners, we would
lose a lot of our home-grown crops, too.

But it would /probably/ only be a short term loss as other pollinators
such as hoverflies would move in to take the place of bees.

That all being said, I like watching bees go about their work, and would
really miss them if they disappeared.

--

Jeff
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Old 26-04-2015, 04:37 PM posted to rec.gardens
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Default OT (?) Bees in trouble

On Sun, 26 Apr 2015 09:46:12 +0100, Jeff Layman
wrote:

On 24/04/15 21:26, Hypatia Nachshon wrote:
It's not really OT, since the dire predicament of the pollinators
that give us our "daily bread" is of concern to home gardeners as
well as to consumers of commercially-produced food, organic or
otherwise.


The "pollinator" which gives us our "daily bread" is the wind. No bees
or other insects are involved. All cereal crops AFAIK are wind
pollinated, so our staple foods are not affected by the bee population.

What we would tend to lose - at least in the short term - is fruit
(including nuts), and vegetable fruits such as tomatoes, peppers,
aubergines, legumes, etc. The main problem would be the loss of soya,
not only because it is used in many forms in oriental cuisine, but
because it is a major source of animal feed. We would also need to find
substitutes for foodstuffs such as oilseed rape. As gardeners, we would
lose a lot of our home-grown crops, too.

But it would /probably/ only be a short term loss as other pollinators
such as hoverflies would move in to take the place of bees.

That all being said, I like watching bees go about their work, and would
really miss them if they disappeared.



We have been missing obvious honeybees in my area (northern NJ) for a
few years now. Other bees have taken over pollination duties. I
photograph them each season.

In fact, we just came back from a trip to SoCal and I was intrigued by
seeing all the honeybees again. We had not seen them in ages and ages
in our neck of the woods.

Boron




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Old 26-04-2015, 05:31 PM posted to rec.gardens
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Default OT (?) Bees in trouble

Jeff Layman wrote:
Hypatia Nachshon wrote:
It's not really OT, since the dire predicament of the pollinators
that give us our "daily bread" is of concern to home gardeners as
well as to consumers of commercially-produced food, organic or
otherwise.


The "pollinator" which gives us our "daily bread" is the wind. No bees
or other insects are involved. All cereal crops AFAIK are wind
pollinated, so our staple foods are not affected by the bee population.


What you know is incorrect. All plants are pollenated by wind to some
extent but wind alone doesn't do a very good job. Grain/forage crops
still rely *primarilly* on insect pollenation... you obviously don't
live in farming country for if you ever walked about wheat/corn/hay
fields you'd see more insect polinators at work than you can count,
and their noise is deafening. Relying on wind alone most of the
pollen would be blown away, that's why I installed central air, the
interior of my house was coated yellow everywhere, and I got rid of
the window screens, couldn't see out through all the pollen anyway.
Now I never open windows. My property is surrounded by thousands of
acres of grain and hay fields, my property was in grain and hay too
when I bought it, but was too dirty, noisy, and ugly; with the insects
all day and the frogs all night couldn't sleep or talk in normal
tones, and after the crops were harvested when there was no snow all
I'd see outside was stubble... now I mow those fields so they are
lawn, much nicer. But there's still lots of pollen, trees and wild
flowers produce more pollen than crops. I still can't understand how
the people here live with no AC and open windows, they can't keep up
with dusting/vacuuming, and they insist on hanging their wash
outdoors, they wear yellow clothes, I mean as much as possible they
buy yellow clothing so folks don't notice the pollen. Just beginning
to green up here... much nicer in every way than hay fields, at dusk
my fertilizing tenants appear:
http://i57.tinypic.com/28iyg6b.jpg
http://i59.tinypic.com/spufwh.jpg

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Old 26-04-2015, 08:36 PM posted to rec.gardens
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Default OT (?) Bees in trouble

On 26/04/15 16:31, Brooklyn1 wrote:
Jeff Layman wrote:
Hypatia Nachshon wrote:
It's not really OT, since the dire predicament of the pollinators
that give us our "daily bread" is of concern to home gardeners as
well as to consumers of commercially-produced food, organic or
otherwise.


The "pollinator" which gives us our "daily bread" is the wind. No bees
or other insects are involved. All cereal crops AFAIK are wind
pollinated, so our staple foods are not affected by the bee population.


What you know is incorrect.


I am afraid you have it wrong.
http://www.fao.org/ag/magazine/0512sp1.htm
"While not all flowering plants depend on animals for pollination -
cereals, for example, are wind-pollinated - most of the world's orchard,
horticultural and forage crops can only produce seeds and fruit if
animals move pollen from the flower's male anthers to the female stigma
of the same or another flower. "

http://www.plantbiotechnology.org.in/issue4.html
"The pollination behavior of the cereal and millet crop plants shows
that most of them are highly self-pollinated or wind pollinated. Biotic
vectors do not visit these species. In some other crop species biotic
vectors that visit the flowers only take what they want such as nectar
and/or pollen, and not necessarily pollinate. However, biotic vectors
are important pollinators of a considerable number of species of fruit
and vegetable crops and several wild species."

http://pollinators.biodiversityirela...f-pollinators/
"In terms of weight, 35% of the world food production come from crops
which depend on insect pollination, 60% come from crops which do not
(such as cereals) and 5% come from crops on which the impact of insect
pollination is still unknown."

Many other similar hits if you Google "pollination" and "cereals".

All plants are pollenated by wind to some
extent but wind alone doesn't do a very good job. Grain/forage crops
still rely *primarilly* on insect pollenation... you obviously don't
live in farming country for if you ever walked about wheat/corn/hay
fields you'd see more insect polinators at work than you can count,
and their noise is deafening.


I live less than 5 minutes from "farming country" (a lot less than that
if you consider the smells which are pretty common this time of
year...). I often walk through fields of wheat and barley and almost
never see bees in them. If there are any pollinators they will be found
on or around flowering weeds in a sea of cereals. They never visit the
cereal flowers as they get nothing from them.

Relying on wind alone most of the pollen would be blown away


Nonsense. It does get everywhere - particularly up the noses of hayfever
sufferers, but there is more than enough to go round to pollinate cereal
crops.

--

Jeff
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Old 26-04-2015, 09:21 PM posted to rec.gardens
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Default OT (?) Bees in trouble

On 4/26/2015 2:36 PM, Jeff Layman wrote:
On 26/04/15 16:31, Brooklyn1 wrote:
Jeff Layman wrote:
Hypatia Nachshon wrote:
It's not really OT, since the dire predicament of the pollinators
that give us our "daily bread" is of concern to home gardeners as
well as to consumers of commercially-produced food, organic or
otherwise.

The "pollinator" which gives us our "daily bread" is the wind. No bees
or other insects are involved. All cereal crops AFAIK are wind
pollinated, so our staple foods are not affected by the bee population.


What you know is incorrect.


I am afraid you have it wrong.
http://www.fao.org/ag/magazine/0512sp1.htm
"While not all flowering plants depend on animals for pollination -
cereals, for example, are wind-pollinated - most of the world's orchard,
horticultural and forage crops can only produce seeds and fruit if
animals move pollen from the flower's male anthers to the female stigma
of the same or another flower. "

http://www.plantbiotechnology.org.in/issue4.html
"The pollination behavior of the cereal and millet crop plants shows
that most of them are highly self-pollinated or wind pollinated. Biotic
vectors do not visit these species. In some other crop species biotic
vectors that visit the flowers only take what they want such as nectar
and/or pollen, and not necessarily pollinate. However, biotic vectors
are important pollinators of a considerable number of species of fruit
and vegetable crops and several wild species."

http://pollinators.biodiversityirela...f-pollinators/
"In terms of weight, 35% of the world food production come from crops
which depend on insect pollination, 60% come from crops which do not
(such as cereals) and 5% come from crops on which the impact of insect
pollination is still unknown."

Many other similar hits if you Google "pollination" and "cereals".

All plants are pollenated by wind to some
extent but wind alone doesn't do a very good job. Grain/forage crops
still rely *primarilly* on insect pollenation... you obviously don't
live in farming country for if you ever walked about wheat/corn/hay
fields you'd see more insect polinators at work than you can count,
and their noise is deafening.


I live less than 5 minutes from "farming country" (a lot less than that
if you consider the smells which are pretty common this time of
year...). I often walk through fields of wheat and barley and almost
never see bees in them. If there are any pollinators they will be found
on or around flowering weeds in a sea of cereals. They never visit the
cereal flowers as they get nothing from them.

Relying on wind alone most of the pollen would be blown away


Nonsense. It does get everywhere - particularly up the noses of hayfever
sufferers, but there is more than enough to go round to pollinate cereal
crops.


Nice references.
Appears the higher value crops of fruit and nuts need bees.
Would be interesting to see that ratio.
Around here, we are approaching the season where my cars turn yellow but
that is only a month or two. Then I wash them
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Old 27-04-2015, 12:37 AM posted to rec.gardens
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Default OT (?) Bees in trouble

Jeff Layman wrote:
On 26/04/15 16:31, Brooklyn1 wrote:
Jeff Layman wrote:
Hypatia Nachshon wrote:
It's not really OT, since the dire predicament of the pollinators
that give us our "daily bread" is of concern to home gardeners as
well as to consumers of commercially-produced food, organic or
otherwise.

The "pollinator" which gives us our "daily bread" is the wind. No
bees or other insects are involved. All cereal crops AFAIK are wind
pollinated, so our staple foods are not affected by the bee
population.


What you know is incorrect.


I am afraid you have it wrong.
http://www.fao.org/ag/magazine/0512sp1.htm
"While not all flowering plants depend on animals for pollination -
cereals, for example, are wind-pollinated - most of the world's
orchard, horticultural and forage crops can only produce seeds and
fruit if animals move pollen from the flower's male anthers to the
female stigma of the same or another flower. "

http://www.plantbiotechnology.org.in/issue4.html
"The pollination behavior of the cereal and millet crop plants shows
that most of them are highly self-pollinated or wind pollinated. Biotic
vectors do not visit these species. In some other crop
species biotic vectors that visit the flowers only take what they
want such as nectar and/or pollen, and not necessarily pollinate.
However, biotic vectors are important pollinators of a considerable
number of species of fruit and vegetable crops and several wild
species."
http://pollinators.biodiversityirela...f-pollinators/
"In terms of weight, 35% of the world food production come from crops
which depend on insect pollination, 60% come from crops which do not
(such as cereals) and 5% come from crops on which the impact of insect
pollination is still unknown."

Many other similar hits if you Google "pollination" and "cereals".

All plants are pollenated by wind to some
extent but wind alone doesn't do a very good job. Grain/forage crops
still rely *primarilly* on insect pollenation... you obviously don't
live in farming country for if you ever walked about wheat/corn/hay
fields you'd see more insect polinators at work than you can count,
and their noise is deafening.


I live less than 5 minutes from "farming country" (a lot less than
that if you consider the smells which are pretty common this time of
year...). I often walk through fields of wheat and barley and almost
never see bees in them. If there are any pollinators they will be
found on or around flowering weeds in a sea of cereals. They never
visit the cereal flowers as they get nothing from them.

Relying on wind alone most of the pollen would be blown away


Nonsense. It does get everywhere - particularly up the noses of
hayfever sufferers, but there is more than enough to go round to
pollinate cereal crops.


Once again Sheldon hasn't done his homework but relies instead on his
observation skills which are poor and his bluster which is huge. Naughty
boy Shelly, sit in the corner.

For those who want to know what plants require insect pollination this will
tell you much, with cites to research if you want to follow up details of
particular plants.

http://www.ars.usda.gov/SP2UserFiles...onHandbook.pdf

A relevant quote:

"Worldwide, more than 3,000 plant species have been used as food, only 300
of which are now widely
grown, and only 12 of which furnish nearly 90 percent of the world's food.
These 12 include the grains:
rice, wheat, maize (corn), sorghums, millets, rye, and barley, and potatoes,
sweet potatoes, cassavas or
maniocs, bananas, and coconuts (Thurston 1969).1 The grains are
wind-pollinated or self-pollinated,
coconuts are partially wind-pollinated and partially insect pollinated, and
the others are propagated
asexually or develop parthenocarpically. However, more than two-thirds of
the world's population is in
Southeast Asia where the staple diet is rice. Superficially, it appears that
insect-pollination has little effect
on the world's food supply - possibly no more than 1 percent."

The last sentence sums it up.

--
David

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Corporate propaganda is their
protection against democracy

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Old 28-04-2015, 06:36 AM posted to rec.gardens
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Once upon a time on usenet Jeff Layman wrote:
On 24/04/15 21:26, Hypatia Nachshon wrote:
It's not really OT, since the dire predicament of the pollinators
that give us our "daily bread" is of concern to home gardeners as
well as to consumers of commercially-produced food, organic or
otherwise.


The "pollinator" which gives us our "daily bread" is the wind. No bees
or other insects are involved. All cereal crops AFAIK are wind
pollinated, so our staple foods are not affected by the bee
population.
What we would tend to lose - at least in the short term - is fruit
(including nuts), and vegetable fruits such as tomatoes, peppers,
aubergines, legumes, etc. The main problem would be the loss of soya,
not only because it is used in many forms in oriental cuisine, but
because it is a major source of animal feed. We would also need to
find substitutes for foodstuffs such as oilseed rape. As gardeners,
we would lose a lot of our home-grown crops, too.

But it would /probably/ only be a short term loss as other pollinators
such as hoverflies would move in to take the place of bees.


"Short term" evolutionarily speaking but in fact it would take many hundreds
of years for other insects to fill the niche vacated by bees to any
significant degree. (And then whatever is killing bees would likely kill
them as well, assuming it's man-made and we're still here then.) Where would
these many thousands of hoverflies per square mile find fetid swamps for
their larvae to live in (within flying distance)? We're removing wetlands as
fast as we can without a care for the animals that live in them for some or
all of their lives.

That all being said, I like watching bees go about their work, and
would really miss them if they disappeared.


More than you think. World-wide famine would be a major distraction.
--
Shaun.

"Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a
cozy little classification in the DSM."
David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)




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Old 28-04-2015, 06:44 AM posted to rec.gardens
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Default OT (?) Bees in trouble

Once upon a time on usenet Jeff Layman wrote:
On 26/04/15 16:31, Brooklyn1 wrote:
Jeff Layman wrote:
Hypatia Nachshon wrote:
It's not really OT, since the dire predicament of the pollinators
that give us our "daily bread" is of concern to home gardeners as
well as to consumers of commercially-produced food, organic or
otherwise.

The "pollinator" which gives us our "daily bread" is the wind. No
bees or other insects are involved. All cereal crops AFAIK are wind
pollinated, so our staple foods are not affected by the bee
population.


What you know is incorrect.


I am afraid you have it wrong.
http://www.fao.org/ag/magazine/0512sp1.htm
"While not all flowering plants depend on animals for pollination -
cereals, for example, are wind-pollinated - most of the world's
orchard, horticultural and forage crops can only produce seeds and
fruit if animals move pollen from the flower's male anthers to the
female stigma of the same or another flower. "

http://www.plantbiotechnology.org.in/issue4.html
"The pollination behavior of the cereal and millet crop plants shows
that most of them are highly self-pollinated or wind pollinated. Biotic
vectors do not visit these species. In some other crop
species biotic vectors that visit the flowers only take what they
want such as nectar and/or pollen, and not necessarily pollinate.
However, biotic vectors are important pollinators of a considerable
number of species of fruit and vegetable crops and several wild
species."
http://pollinators.biodiversityirela...f-pollinators/
"In terms of weight, 35% of the world food production come from crops
which depend on insect pollination, 60% come from crops which do not
(such as cereals) and 5% come from crops on which the impact of insect
pollination is still unknown."

Many other similar hits if you Google "pollination" and "cereals".


Two things;

1) 'Man cannot live on bread alone'.

2) Google is no longer the non-partisan benign corporation that they painted
themselves to be for over a decade. Relying on their search results for
anything other than casual curiousity is foolhardy at best.

All plants are pollenated by wind to some
extent but wind alone doesn't do a very good job. Grain/forage crops
still rely *primarilly* on insect pollenation... you obviously don't
live in farming country for if you ever walked about wheat/corn/hay
fields you'd see more insect polinators at work than you can count,
and their noise is deafening.


I live less than 5 minutes from "farming country" (a lot less than
that if you consider the smells which are pretty common this time of
year...). I often walk through fields of wheat and barley and almost
never see bees in them. If there are any pollinators they will be
found on or around flowering weeds in a sea of cereals. They never
visit the cereal flowers as they get nothing from them.

Relying on wind alone most of the pollen would be blown away


Nonsense. It does get everywhere - particularly up the noses of
hayfever sufferers, but there is more than enough to go round to
pollinate cereal crops.


LOL. That explains the short-sightedness - cereal pollen in your eyes.
--
Shaun.

"Humans will have advanced a long, long, way when religious belief has a
cozy little classification in the DSM."
David Melville (in r.a.s.f1)


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Old 15-05-2015, 09:29 PM posted to rec.gardens
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On Friday, April 24, 2015 at 1:26:06 PM UTC-7, Hypatia Nachshon wrote:
It's not really OT, since the dire predicament of the pollinators that give us our "daily bread" is of concern to home gardeners as well as to consumers of commercially-produced food, organic or otherwise.


There are many sites on-line to learn about pesticides laced with Neonicotinoid,such as the powerful NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council) to other environmental groups.

A comprehensive article is at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neonicotinoid.

Science Daily has excellent article on same subject.

Are bees 'hooked' on nectar containing pesticides?
Posted: 23 Apr 2015 08:41 PM PDT
Bees are attracted to nectar containing common pesticides, scientists have discovered. This could increase their chances of exposure to high levels of pesticides.

It's "David" (us) against "Goliath", who is wired into U.S. corrupt Congress and (hah!)regulators.

What to do? Wait until magnitude of problem begins to hit the grocery shelves? Or demand action, FWIW.

HB


Excellent article in the Spring 2015 magazine of "Defenders of Wildlife" (one of the most honest groups in its field) titled "The Pollinator Predicament" about the problems of Bee, Bat and Butterfly pollinators.

http://www.defenders.org/magazine/spring-2015/pollinator-predicament

In same issue of DW magazine, an article entitled

http://www.defenders.org/magazine/sp...living-lightly

discusses the neonicotinoid group of pesticides,naming names of products.

Probably members know about these, but here's quote from article:

"Don't forget to check the ingredients of products used in the yard and garden. Avoid any that incorporate ***imidacloprid, clothianidin, thiamethoxam, acetamiprid or dinotefuran,**** all of which belong to the group of pesticides called neonicotinoids (see The Pollinator Predicament, page 10). To take it a step further, tell big box home improvement stores not to sell plants and seeds that are pretreated with neonics.

You can also become proactive with legislators and ask them to support banning certain pesticides, to follow ecologically friendly land use practices and to protect sensitive areas from development. Improved pesticide labeling is also key to better understand how our food is grown. By buying organic food, you can help encourage pesticide-free farming."

HB
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