Insecticides

Bayer attempts to discredit peer-reviewed study showing its products caused a Japan fishery to collapse

The May 2019 newsletter of the Saitama Ecosystem Conservation Society describes how, before the introduction of neonicotinoids in the 1990s, numberless brilliant red akiakane or autumn darter dragonflies could be seen around rice fields in the fall. Experiments by Japanese dragonfly expert Tetsuyuki Ueda of Ishikawa Prefectural University showed how the pesticides reduced the number of surviving dragonfly nymphs to a small fraction, and that the chemicals persist for years in the soil of rice paddy fields.

Rosemary A. Mason: The sixth mass extinction and chemicals in the environment: our environmental deficit is now beyond nature’s ability to regenerate

Two papers about the future of the planet appeared within a month of each other (June/July 2015): "Accelerated modern human-induced species losses: Entering the sixth mass extinction" was the first. The 6 authors calculated the average rate of vertebrate losses over the last century and compared it with the background rate of losses. They estimated it to be up to 114 times the background rate and asserted that this rate of losses of biodiversity indicated that a sixth mass extinction is already under way.

Loss of arthropod species diversity across German forests and grasslands

Recent studies have shown that arthropods—insects, arachnids and other small, hard-bodied animals—are in trouble, from massive declines in the biomass (total weight) of flying insects to regional extinctions in a number of insect groups, such as butterflies. A new large-scale study across a number of habitats in Germany has found that the problem may be more extensive than previous research suggests.

Systemic pesticide concerns extend beyond the bees

In the summer of 2010, Henk Tennekes from Experimental Toxicology Services Nederland at Zutphen warned that the accumulation of neonicotinoids in the environment would not only decimate useful insects but also have a knock-on effect on other species, including birds (Curr. Biol. (2011) 21, R137–R139). At the time, Tennekes did not find much support for his views and went on to publish his warnings as a book — The Systemic Insecticides: A Disaster in the Making.

Not all smiles on annual bird count in Starved Rock State Park

Steve Gillam, Starved Rock volunteer Tom Williams and Starved Rock State Park natural resource coordinator Lisa Sons exchanged jokes and friendly chitchat as they trudged over a muddy path along a field edge, wetland and woods at Matthiessen State Park. They were not seeing many birds, despite sunny, breezy conditions and diverse habitat, during their after-lunch hike over their territory in the Starved Rock Audubon Society Christmas bird count. And they said they had not seen many birds in the morning among the oak trees and canyons in the Matthiessen Dells area.

EU doet landbouwgif thiacloprid in de ban

Het in de landbouw gebruikte bestrijdingsmiddel thiacloprid wordt verboden in de EU omdat het risico’s voor de gezondheid en het milieu met zich meebrengt. De Europese Commissie maakte maandag officieel bekend de vergunning niet te verlengen, op basis van een wetenschappelijk advies van de Europese Autoriteit voor Voedselveiligheid (EFSA).

Lees verder in Trouw van 20 januari 2020:
https://www.trouw.nl/duurzaamheid-natuur/eu-doet-landbouwgif-thiaclopri…

Mayfly numbers drop by half since 2012

Mayflies, which form swarms in the billions that are visible on weather radar, are in steep decline, mirroring the plight of insects worldwide. Every summer, mayflies burst forth from lakes and rivers, taking to the skies of North America. These insects, which are particularly abundant in the northern Mississippi River Basin and Great Lakes, live in the water as nymphs before transforming into flying adults. They synchronize their emergence to form huge swarms of up to 80 billion individuals—so massive that, in waterside towns, they are sometimes scooped up with snowplows.

Oligotrophic bacterium Hymenobacter latericoloratus CGMCC 16346 degrades the neonicotinoid imidacloprid in surface water

The intensive and extensive application of imidacloprid in agriculture has resulted in water pollution and risks to aquatic invertebrates. However, pure bacteria remediation of imidacloprid in surface water environments has not been studied. Here, we isolated an imidacloprid-degrading bacterium from a water environment, examined its imidacloprid degradation in pure culture and surface water, sequenced its genome, and compared its Clusters of Orthologous Groups (COG) protein categorization with that for another imidacloprid-degrading bacterium.

In 2018 was imidacloprid in de glastuinbouw nog steeds een probleemstof

Het Hoogheemraadschap (HH) Delfland heeft een meetnet om de waterkwaliteit van het glastuinbouwgebied te monitoren: er zijn 23 meetlocaties in het meetnet voor de glastuinbouw, namelijk op 3 referentielocaties buiten het glastuin-bouwgebied, 5 boezemlocaties en 15 locaties in glastuinbouwgebied. Op deze locaties zijn elke maand bestrijdingsmiddelen gemeten.

Das Insektensterben ist global

Das Verhältnis von Insekten und Landwirtschaft ist ein durchaus ambivalentes. Auf der einen Seite sind sie als Schädlinge für Ernteausfälle verantwortlich. Vor allem in den tropischen Ländern können sie bis zu 40 Prozent der Ernten vernichten. Sie werden deswegen von der Agrarwirtschaft intensiv bekämpft: Weltweit hat sich der Verbrauch von Pestiziden seit 1950 um das 50fache erhöht. Auf der anderen Seite ist Landwirtschaft ohne Insekten kaum denkbar. Sie sind unerlässlich für die Bodenqualität, indem sie Dung und abgestorbenes Material zersetzen.