Honeybees

A decline in wildlife is threatening core functions of the ecosystem that are vital for human wellbeing, researchers behind an unprecedented study of biodiversity in the UK have warned. Hedgehogs, hoverflies, moths and birds are among the groups in most serious decline, with individual species under particular threat including the common red ant, red shanked carder bee and the common banded hoverfly. The findings are based on what is believed to be the biggest analysis of British wildlife ever conducted, with researchers from the University of Reading and the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology looking at records covering 4,424 species, collected between 1970 and 2009. Among species considered pollinators – such as bees, moths and hoverflies – 28% are in decline, while 16% of those that act as natural pest controllers, such as ants and ground beetles, have witnessed significant losses. Dr Tom Oliver, an ecologist at the University of Reading who led the study, told the Guardian that continued losses among wildlife performing those functions would lead to significant rises in the price of food, with some food groups likely to become unavailable. “Under current trends we are moving towards the loss of species and the ecosystem functions that are vital for human wellbeing, especially pollination and pest control,” he said. “We need insects to pollinate our crops – we can’t do it by hand – and if we lose natural pest controls, less food will be available. If we lose those functions, the crops we eat won’t be able to be pollinated so the price of food would go hugely up and certain foods we wouldn’t be able to eat such as fruits including strawberries, raspberries and apples.”

The first-ever study of pesticide residues on field-caught bees in the USA, finds native wild bees are being exposed to neonicotinoid insecticides and other pesticides. The research, conducted by the U.S. Geological Survey and published in the journal Science of the Total Environment, focused on native bees, because there is limited information on their exposure to pesticides. It did not look at pesticide exposure to honey bees. The researchers say little is known about how toxic these pesticides are to native bee species at the levels detected in the environment. “We found that the presence and proximity of nearby agricultural fields was an important factor resulting in the exposure of native bees to pesticides,” said USGS scientist Michelle Hladik, the report’s lead author. “Pesticides were detected in the bees caught in grasslands with no known direct pesticide applications.”

Grosse Konzerne wie BASF, Bayer, Monsanto oder die Basler Syngenta mischen schon heute mit im Geschäft mit dem biologischen Pflanzenschutz. Der Markt ist momentan zwar noch klein. Er wächst aber rasant. Viren, Bakterien, Pilze oder Pheromone – sie sind die modernen Krieger im Kampf gegen Schädlinge. Die biologischen Pflanzenschützer sollen künftig deutlich öfter zum Einsatz kommen, denn auch die grossen Agrarunternehmen haben entdeckt, dass sich mit ihnen Geld verdienen lässt. Syngenta zum Beispiel ist vor drei Jahren in den Bereich «Biologicals» eingestiegen. Mehrere Produkte werden bereits verkauft, darunter Bodenbakterien, die Fadenwürmern in Sojabohnen zu Leibe rücken. Diese Schädlinge verursachen allein in den USA Ernteausfälle in Milliardenhöhe. Die wachsende Leidenschaft der Chemiekonzerne für die Biologie ist auch aus der Not geboren, denn der Markt für chemische Pflanzenschutzmittel ist stark unter Druck: Bei vielen Unkräutern, die jahrelang mit dem immer gleichen Gift traktiert wurde, zeigen sich Resistenzen, die Mittel wirken also nicht mehr. Prominentestes Beispiel ist das Unkrautvernichtungsmittel Glyphosat, besser bekannt unter dem Monsanto-Markennamen Roundup oder dem Syngenta-Pendant Touchdown. Das beliebteste Spritzmittel weltweit hat noch andere Probleme: Schon vor Jahren ist der Patentschutz abgelaufen. Seitdem wird das Mittel immer öfter von der asiatischen Billigkonkurrenz produziert. Zudem steht das Mittel bei der WHO im Verdacht, Krebs zu erzeugen. Kräftige Umsatzeinbussen gibt es bereits bei Neonicotinoiden. Diese Gruppe hochwirksamer Insektengifte gilt als mitverantwortlich für das Bienensterben der vergangenen Jahre. Deshalb dürfen Neonicotinoide auch in der Schweiz derzeit nur stark eingeschränkt verkauft werden.

L’organisation non-gouvernementale Greenpeace a publié un rapport sur l'impact environnemental des pesticides utilisés par l'agriculture industrielle dans l'Union européenne. Ce rapport compile les données d'environ 250 publications scientifiques. Afin de décrire « l'ampleur de la contamination de notre environnement par les pesticides et ses conséquences dramatiques pour certaines espèces vivantes », l’ING Greenpeace a publié un rapport sur l’impact environnemental des pesticides.

Industrial agriculture, with its heavy use of chemical pesticides, pollutes our water and soil and leads to loss of habitats and biodiversity, according to a Greenpeace report. With almost one in four (24.5%) vulnerable or endangered species in the EU being threatened by agricultural effluents, including the use of pesticides and fertilizers, species survival and crucial ecosystem services, like pollination, are at risk. Political and financial support is urgently needed to shift from chemical-intensive, damaging agricultural methods, to sustainable ecological farming practices. In Europe, a catastrophic decline of insects was signaled by the "IUCN Task Force on Systemic Pesticides" in 2015, after analyzing over 800 scientific reports. The impacts can be devastating, as 70 per cent of the 124 major commodity crops directly used for human consumption like apples and rapeseed are dependent on pollination for enhanced seed, fruit, or vegetable production. Dirk Zimmermann, Ecological Farming Campaigner at Greenpeace Germany said: "Europe's dependency on chemical pesticides is nothing short of an addiction. Crops are routinely doused with a variety of chemicals, usually applied multiple times to single crops throughout the whole growing season. Non-chemical alternatives to pest management are already available to farmers but need the necessary political and financial support to go mainstream."

In ihrer Studie untersuchten die Wissenschafter die Wirkung von zwei verbreiteten Neonikotinoiden (Thiamethoxam und Clothianidin) auf Bienenköniginnen. In der EU und der Schweiz ist die Anwendung dieser und weiterer Substanzen seit Ende 2013 für zwei Jahre stark eingeschränkt. Die Idee hinter diesem Moratorium: Die Zeit sollte genutzt werden, um den Einfluss der umstrittenen Gifte auf das Bienensterben zu untersuchen. Genau das hat die schweizerisch-kanadische Arbeitsgruppe getan. Sie konzentrierte sich auf die Königinnen, weil Umfragen bei Imkern den Verdacht aufkommen liessen, dass diese Tiere beim Bienensterben eine Schlüsselrolle spielen könnten. In der Studie seien die Bienenköniginnen dem Thiamethoxam und dem Clothianidin in einer realistischen Umgebungskonzentration ausgesetzt worden, schreiben die Forscher. Dies hatte gravierende Auswirkungen auf die Fruchtbarkeit der Königinnen, wie die Wissenschafter in der Fachzeitschrift «Scientific Reports» schreiben. Bei den Tieren stellten sich sowohl anatomische wie auch physiologische Veränderungen ein. So wiesen sie vergrösserte Eierstöcke auf und konnten weniger Spermien von männlichen Bienen (Drohnen) speichern. Insgesamt waren die Bienenköniginnen dadurch weniger erfolgreich beim Eierlegen.

Queen health is crucial to colony survival of social bees. Recently, queen failure has been proposed to be a major driver of managed honey bee colony losses, yet few data exist concerning effects of environmental stressors on queens. Here we demonstrate for the first time that exposure to field-realistic concentrations of neonicotinoid pesticides during development can severely affect queens of western honey bees (Apis mellifera). In pesticide-exposed queens, reproductive anatomy (ovaries) and physiology (spermathecal-stored sperm quality and quantity), rather than flight behaviour, were compromised and likely corresponded to reduced queen success (alive and producing worker offspring). This study highlights the detriments of neonicotinoids to queens of environmentally and economically important social bees, and further strengthens the need for stringent risk assessments to safeguard biodiversity and ecosystem services that are vulnerable to these substances.

In recent years, an intense debate has been generated about the environmental risks posed by neonicotinoids, a group of widely-used, neurotoxic insecticides. When these systemic compounds are applied to seeds, low concentrations are subsequently found in the nectar and pollen of the crop, which are then collected and consumed by bees. Here we demonstrate that current focus on exposure to pesticides via the crop overlooks an important factor – throughout spring and summer, mixtures of neonicotinoids are also found in the pollen and nectar of wildflowers growing in arable field margins, at concentrations that are sometimes even higher than those found in the crop. Indeed the large majority (97%) of neonicotinoids brought back in pollen to honey bee hives in arable landscapes was from wildflowers, not crops. Both previous and ongoing field studies have been based on the premise that exposure to neonicotinoids would only occur during the blooming period of flowering crops and that it may be diluted by bees also foraging on untreated wildflowers. Here, we show that exposure is likely to be higher and more prolonged than currently recognized due to widespread contamination of wild plants growing near treated crops.