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Traces of pesticides in drinking water were found in eleven rural elementary schools in Oregon, according to a U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) study released on August 30. The study found traces of several different types of pesticides in the drinking water of Dixie and Fairplay, the elementary schools that service Corvallis, Oregon. Some of the pesticides that were found in the Dixie school water include atrazine, bromacil, diuron, imidacloprid, metolachlor, norflurazon, and simazine.

Rachel Carson would be horrified – our bees and insect-eating birds become scarcer year by year and there is overwhelming evidence pointing to neonicotinoid pesticides as a major cause, but the UK government's “Advisory Committee on Pesticides” has decided not to ban them, unlike some other countries (Michael McCarthy, 7 September). Only the agrochemical industry will rejoice. For the rest of us, food will become more costly as we lose crop pollinators and the sound and soul of our summer countryside withers and is silenced. Government should be ashamed, and there is no point paying farmers to plant “bee banks” and “nectar borders” if you then spray the bees to death.

This month is the 50th anniversary of the publication of "Silent Spring," Rachel Carson's landmark book calling attention to the harmful effects of chemical pesticides, specifically DDT. She charged that pesticides caused food contamination, cancer, genetic defects and the elimination of entire species. In a CBS documentary, Carson said, "Man's attitude toward nature is today critically important simply because we have now acquired a fateful power to alter and destroy nature. But man is a part of nature, and his war against nature is inevitably a war against himself."

The Bicknell's thrush (Catharus bicknelli), a rare songbird that breeds atop mountains in the Adirondacks and northern New England and winters in the Caribbean, is being considered for endangered species status, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said. The sparrow-sized brown bird, which nests at elevations over 3,000 feet in New York, Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont, has one of the most limited breeding and wintering ranges of any bird in North America. Scientists consider the decline of a plant or animal species to be an indication of the overall health of the natural environment. Measures to protect the Bicknell's thrush would also benefit other species that depend on the boreal forests they inhabit. The bird was first discovered by amateur ornithologist Eugene Bicknell on Slide Mountain in the Catskills in 1881, according to the state Department of Environmental Conservation. With a total population believed to be less than 50,000 birds, it's one of the rarest American songbirds. The thrush's diet consist mainly of insects, but wild fruits are added in late summer, during migration, and on the wintering grounds. They usually forage on the forest floor, but also catch flies, and glean insects from the foliage of trees.

The issue of house sparrows (Passer domesticus) disappearing from big cities, including Delhi, has been a cause of concern for environmentalist and wildlife lovers for quite a while now.Though there is no official data on the number of sparrows left in India, the population of the small birds has declined the world over. As part of a campaign to save the common house sparrow, Delhi government recently declared it the State Bird. Recognising the decline in the number of sparrows in the City, the Delhi Government accorded this status to common bird along with launching a campaign ‘Rise for the Sparrows’ to connect people from all walks of life to save this humble, unassuming species. The founder of Nature Forever Society, Mohammed Dilawar, who has been working specifically on this campaign for over a year and around seven years for increasing their numbers in general, says declaring house sparrow as the state bird will send out a significant message among both - the special and the common man. It was high time we did it. Generally, some rare bird is given this status but by declaring a common bird a State Bird will attract everybody’s attention towards the issue,” he says.

There is no sign of the rusty-patched bumble bee which used to be one of the most common bees in southern Ontario and Quebec but is now one of the rarest. In fact, the rusty-patched bumble bee, known to scientists as Bombus affinis, is the first bee in North America to be officially declared an endangered species. Federal Environment Minister Peter Kent added the bee to Canada's list this summer and federal wildlife advisers warn the bee appears to be on the brink of extinction. Few people even realized the bee was in trouble until Sheila Colla, a PhD student at York University, documented the drastic decline. "It shows we are really not paying attention, which is kind of scary," she says. Bees may not be everyone's favourite bugs - onlookers tend to take a few steps back when they realize Colla is using her net to catch bees, not butterflies - but they are key eco-logical players. They're essential for production of fruit and seeds that feed everything from bears to birds. They also pollinate crops that produce one-third of the human food supply. "Yet most people consider them to be an irritant," says York biologist Laurence Packer, keeper of Canada's biggest bee collection.

Nerve-agent pesticides should not be banned in Britain despite four separate scientific studies strongly linking them to sharp declines in bees around the world, Government scientists have advised. An internal review of recent research on neonicotinoids – pesticides that act on insects' central nervous systems and are increasingly blamed for problems with bee colonies – has concluded that no change is needed in British regulation. The British position contrasts sharply with that of France, which in June banned one of the pesticides, thiamethoxam, made by the Swiss chemicals giant Syngenta. French scientists said it was impairing the abilities of honey-bees to find their way back to their nests. The Green MP Caroline Lucas described the British attitude as one of "astonishing complacency".

Today, a number of groups including: the Center for Food Safety, Beyond Pesticides and the Sierra Club, (along with affected citizens from around the country), filed a Sixty-Day Notice with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of their intention to jointly sue the Agency for its violation of the Endangered Species Act (ESA). The intended lawsuit centres on the EPA's failure to ensure, (through consultation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service), that the EPA's approval of numerous pesticides containing the neonicotinoid insecticides: clothianidin and thiamethoxam, are not likely to jeopardize any Federally-listed threatened or endangered species. "The EPA has failed to uphold the clear standards of the Endangered Species Act," said Peter Jenkins, attorney at the Center for Food Safety. "By continuing to ignore the growing number of reports and studies which demonstrate the risks of neonicotinoids to honey bees, and a large number of threatened and endangered species, the EPA is exposing these already compromised populations to potentially irreversible harm."

In Europe and the USA there have been concerns for some time about the potential for insecticides to impact on the health of honey bees and other insect pollinators. Of particular interest is whether a particular class of insecticides, the neonicotinoids, might have sub-lethal effects on bees, which may reduce their ability to pollinate plants and produce honey. These concerns have created some anxiety among Australian beekeepers who have noted that many of the neonicotinoids used overseas are also used here. Accordingly, the APVMA has commenced an investigation of the scientific literature to determine whether:
•use of neonicotinoids in Australia presents any more of a risk to honey bee health than other pesticides that have been in use for many years
•current APVMA data requirements for testing of insecticides are adequate to address any potential effects of neonicotinoids on bees.
The outcomes of our investigation will be published by early 2013.

The purpose of the attached reports by Rosemary Mason and Palle Uhd Jepsen is to highlight the problems of the current and future use of agrochemical products, using a series of case studies. Have we forgotten Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring from 1962? Many of these chemicals are far more toxic (and persistent) than DDT. They are the silent destroyers of human health and the environment.