Podcasts about neonics

Season 5: Episode 210In this episode of North American Ag Spotlight, Chrissy Wozniak sits down with Jeffrey Smith of Valent U.S.A. and Dr. Frank Wong of Bayer Crop Science to discuss the essential and often misunderstood role of crop protection in modern agriculture. Representing the Growing Matters coalition, Jeff and Frank dive into the importance of science-based advocacy, the value of stewardship, and the continued fight to ensure farmers have access to the tools they need to protect their crops and yields.The conversation covers the mission of Growing Matters and the BeSure! campaign, the science behind neonicotinoid products, and the regulatory challenges posed by misinformation and shifting political winds. Jeff shares insight from his decades of work building coalitions to defend key crop protection chemistries, while Frank explains the rigorous safety and regulatory processes behind pesticide approvals and the responsibility that applicators hold.Listeners will walk away with practical reminders about treated seed, foliar applications, label compliance, and why good stewardship matters—not just for safety, but for the long-term resilience of agriculture. With a candid and even humorous look at the intersection of science, policy, and public perception, this episode offers clarity in a time when growers need it most.To learn more about Brenda and her services, visit https://growingmatters.org.#farm #smartfarming #agricultureNorth American Ag is devoted to highlighting the people & companies in agriculture who impact our industry and help feed the world. Subscribe at https://northamericanag.comWant to hear the stories of the ag brands you love and the ag brands you love to hate? Hear them at https://whatcolorisyourtractor.comDon't just thank a farmer, pray for one too!Send us a textAgritechnica in Hannover, Germany is held every other year, this year long-time tech writer & ag journalist Willie Vogt has put together for ag enthusiasts! The Agritechnica tour includes three days at the huge equipment and farm technology event. Learn more - https://agtoursusa.com/agritechnica.htmlSubscribe to North American Ag at https://northamericanag.com

One of thing neonicotinoids are good at is traveling from where they are applied, to new areas by water. This is because it is designed to dissolve in water so seeds can suck it up. The unintended consequence is that it is effectively perpetually in rivers, streams, and other water bodies. Dr. Bill Arnold from the University of Minnesota about how and why he researches neonicotinoid presence in fresh water. 

This week, the Government has refused emergency use of pesticides shown to harm pollinators for the first time.What's the future for US agriculture if farm workers with no documents are deported?And will the collective voice of the supermarkets make a difference on inheritance tax for farmers?Presented by Caz Graham and produced by Beatrice Fenton.

The dispute over the proposed inheritance tax on farms continues, with the UK's farming unions planning what they call a "Day of Unity" to demonstrate their opposition to the plans. Meanwhile, the supermarkets have added their voice to the argument, with many big players asking the Government to reconsider the tax. DEFRA Secretary, Steve Reed, argues "stable finances are the foundation of the economic growth needed" and has outlined a "new deal for farmers" that would help them become more profitable.Farmers will not be allowed to use neonicotinoid pesticides on sugar beet crops this year, after an application for emergency use was turned down by the Government for the first time. Environmental groups have welcomed the decision, but the NFU says it could leave farmers unable to protect their sugar beet crops from virus yellows - a disease spread by aphids.The UK is launching a Grain Verification Scheme to help identify grain that's been stolen from occupied areas of Ukraine. It uses chemical analysis to determine where grain was grown and a specialist database.And we go out with a second generation sheep scanner, and discover the key to successful scanning isn't just sophisticated equipment - you also need spray paint, a sturdy notepad and a lot of teamwork!Presented by Caz Graham Produce by Heather Simons

Did you know that neonicotinoids are among the most ecologically destructive pesticides we've seen since DDT? Join Food Sleuth Radio host and Registered Dietitian, Melinda Hemmelgarn for her conversation with Dan Raichel, J.D., Executive Director of the Pollinators and Pesticides Initiative at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). Raichel discusses the widespread use of, and harm from, neonicotinoid use in agriculture, lawns and gardens, and New York state's Birds and Bees Protection Act. Learn how “neonics,” the widely used neurotoxic class of pesticides, cause harm to bees, pollinators, birds, soil microbes, fish, and mammals including humans.Related Websites: https://www.nrdc.org/bio/daniel-raichel/new-york-enacts-nation-leading-law-protect-bees-birds-and-people  www.nrdc.org Saw Mill River Audubon presentation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aI9IZtMYQXw

In this episode of the North American Ag Spotlight podcast, Chrissy Wozniak welcomes back Jose Marchetti, an agronomy engineer and Business Development leader for Ecorobotix. With a rich background in agriculture across Argentina, Brazil, and the United States, Jose shares his expertise on advancing precision agriculture. The discussion centers around the ARA ultra-high-precision sprayer, a game-changing tool that reduces input costs, minimizes spray drift, and enhances crop health. Jose explains how the sprayer's advanced plant-by-plant technology distinguishes crops from weeds with remarkable accuracy, applying treatments only where needed.Listeners will learn how the ARA sprayer has helped farmers achieve up to 95% savings in crop protection products while reducing manual labor costs significantly. Jose also highlights its impact on addressing regulatory compliance, improving worker safety, and boosting productivity in windy conditions. Real-world success stories from producers using the technology underline its potential to revolutionize modern farming. Jose's deep passion for agriculture and his commitment to supporting farmers' profitability shines throughout the conversation, making this an inspiring listen for anyone interested in ag tech.Learn more about https://ecorobotix.com#agtech #precisionag #agricultureNorth American Ag is devoted to highlighting the people & companies in agriculture who impact our industry and help feed the world. Subscribe at https://northamericanag.comWant to hear the stories of the ag brands you love and the ag brands you love to hate? Hear them at https://whatcolorisyourtractor.comDon't just thank a farmer, pray for one too!Send us a textSubscribe to North American Ag at https://northamericanag.com

Following an application from farmers for the emergency use of a neonicotinoid pesticide on next year's sugar beet crop the Government has told Farming Today that it will ban neonics, but that a decision on this application will be taken 'in line with legal requirements'. We understand that that means farmers may get permission this time - but not again.We visit a Wiltshire farm, where the family who run it have spent the last 4 years changing the way they do things to reduce their carbon footprint. It's a mixed farm with dairy, beef and arable, and alongside trying to reduce the emissions from their livestock, they're also hoping to increase how much carbon they sequester by planting trees in an agroforestry project.And the Bower family farm in Staffordshire grows crops, and vegetables and has a herd of sheep and another herd of beef cattle. But locals are far more likely to know it for the pumpkin patch and the play barn - which pull in more than 100,000 visitors every year. We head to the pumpkin patch!Presented by Charlotte Smith Produced by Heather Simons

If you are dealing with vine mealybug in your vineyard, you are not alone. Kent Daane, Cooperative Extension Specialist at the University of California Berkley studies different types of mealybug populations across the globe. Kent covers organic and conventional strategies, ways to increase the presence of generalist and specialist natural predators, and the importance of establishing refugia for beneficials. His latest work focuses on area-wide management tactics. Looking to the European Grapevine Moth eradication program as an example, Kent sees an opportunity to decrease vine mealybug populations through neighborhood driven monitoring, trapping, coordinated sprays, and mating disruption. Resources:         119: Vine Mealybug 101: Species Identification, Lifecycle, and Scouting to Create an IPM Program 130: The Biological Control of Vine Mealybug Using Mealybug Destroyers and Anagyrus Wasps Biology and management of mealybugs in vineyards Ecology and management of grapevine leafroll disease Impacts of Argentine ants on mealybugs and their natural enemies in California's coastal vineyards Insecticides for a mealybug and a carpenter moth on vine trunks, 2023 In-season drip and foliar insecticides for a mealybug in grapes, 2023 In-Season Drip and Foliar Insecticides for a Mealybug in Grapes, 2021 Kent Daane Mealybug transmission of grapevine leafroll viruses: an analysis of virus–vector specificity Sustainable Control tools for Vine Mealybug UCCE Napa Viticulture Extension Leaf Hopper site Vineyard managers and researchers seek sustainable solutions for mealybugs, a changing pest complex Vineyard Team Programs: Juan Nevarez Memorial Scholarship - Donate SIP Certified – Show your care for the people and planet   Sustainable Ag Expo – The premiere winegrowing event of the year Sustainable Winegrowing On-Demand (Western SARE) – Learn at your own pace Vineyard Team – Become a Member Get More Subscribe wherever you listen so you never miss an episode on the latest science and research with the Sustainable Winegrowing Podcast. Since 1994, Vineyard Team has been your resource for workshops and field demonstrations, research, and events dedicated to the stewardship of our natural resources. Learn more at www.vineyardteam.org.   Transcript [00:00:00] Craig Macmillan: Welcome to Sustainable Wine Growing with Vineyard Team. Our guest today is Kent Daane. He is a Cooperative Extension Specialist with the University of California, Berkeley, and he works primarily out of the Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension Center. And today we're going to talk about a number of topics. Thanks for being on the podcast, Kent. [00:00:17] Kent Daane: Craig, thanks. I'm happy to be here. [00:00:20] Craig Macmillan: Let's dive in on one pest that everybody's interested in, continuing to be interested in, and you may have some new insights or newer insights on this. Let's start with mealybug management. Kind of what's the state of the art in that topic right now? [00:00:33] Kent Daane: Yeah, that's been the number one question I've been getting for many, many years now. It is an invasive pest. We know it came in, probably being brought in by a grower down in Coachella Valley. It has since spread into the San Joaquin Valley, Central Coast area where you are, Napa Sonoma, and it's been found now in Oregon. Just like Napa, Oregon has attempted an eradication program. And probably just like Napa, most likely it's not going to work. It's a very, very difficult insect to kill 100%. I mean, I can come up with all kinds of different programs, soft programs, hard programs, expensive programs, inexpensive programs, where I can suppress that insect pest. It's very difficult to remove it from a vineyard. And that becomes important when you think about the kinds of damage we're worried about in Central Coast wine grapes. Pretty much anywhere where they're looking at grape quality. But especially in the cooler regions. So, this insect, this mealybug, is one of many mealybug species. that is a vector of grape leaf roll associated viruses. And this is the primary reason it grows to such high pest status. So for the most part, the growers can knock its levels down far enough that it's not in the grape clusters or it's rarely found in the grape clusters. That's more of an issue for table grape growers. It's a cosmetic pest. When you look at some of the Regions in the San Joaquin Valley where they're growing a lot of table grapes Kern, Tulare, Kings, Fresno, counties, there's enough heat accumulation and these grapes are harvested early enough in the season that they can still build up their Brix. They can still get a very good grape to market. Even when there's some vinely bug on the vine, they just don't tend to be as impacted by this leaf roll pathogen as our wine grapes. When you get into regions like San Luis Obispo, Napa, Monterey, Oregon, where they really are trying to hold those grapes on the vine for a longer period of time, trying to build up the bricks levels. That's where this. pathogen causes so much damage. [00:03:06] Craig Macmillan: most of our growers are already going to be familiar with this, but what kind of damage does the vine mealybug cause? It's so, so terrible. [00:03:12] Kent Daane: So the vine mealybug, besides being a vector of this pathogen, is also a direct pest of the grapevine. It can feed on the roots, on the trunk, on the leaves, and in the fruit. When this first hit California, we were working on it primarily as a San Joaquin Valley pest. growers that were putting on, you know, the products of the day dimethylate, lanate. If they were missing , the, target window where that pest was exposed, we would see thousands and thousands of mealybugs, not just per vine, but sometimes a thousand millibugs per leaf. It was causing defoliation. It was causing the berries to raisin on the vine. In South Africa, populations were getting so heavy. It was killing the vines themselves. How many people out there 20, 30 years ago were spraying so many neonics as we're saying today? We weren't doing that. now really, we were spraying for leaf hoppers as our number one pests followed by mites in case there was a flare up. It changed what we were doing in terms of pest management. In fact there's a group of us working internationally. Not just on the vine mealybug, but other mealybug species, because we've seen vine mealybug, grape mealybug, citrus mealybug, all becoming more problematic over the last decade. And we're, asking that question, why? What has gone on? And one of the thoughts we've got, not yet shown, but one idea is that we just sprayed so many of these, these newer chemicals that the mealybugs are developing resistance, The natural enemies are not, and we're seeing an escape of some of these mealybug species in now a, to them, a pesticide lessened environment. [00:05:10] Craig Macmillan: speaking of biological control, so this is an invasive pest, came from outside the U. S. That's the kinda the classical biological control problem. the pest comes, but its natural enemies don't come with it. there are some natural enemies of vine mealybug in the United States. [00:05:24] Kent Daane: Yes, they are, and I don't want to go too deep in the weeds on this, but this is new, very exciting to me. I did an importation program, that's a classic biocontrol program, where we go to the pests, origin, we look for natural enemies and we bring those back to the United States. Growers can't do that. It's got to go into quarantine. We have to study those natural enemies. Sometimes for years to make sure that they're not going to do any harm. The classic example people think about is I've got a problem with rats. And so I bring in a weasel, the weasel kills all the rats, and then starts going after my chickens. We don't do that anymore. Classic biocontrol is now much more modern. We've got all kinds of protective barriers against making a mistake. In fact, I think that we've gone a little bit too far. I think we're overly cautious. Bringing this back to the Vine melaybug, I imported material from Europe, from Israel, from Egypt, and from South Africa. We were finding mostly the same species in most of these different regions. The two most important species at that time were called Anagyrus pseudococci, which is The well known parasitoid that you can purchase from insectaries. The other one is Coxydoxinoides peregrinus, no common name on these insects. Both are established in California. When I did this work, we noticed a difference between the anagyrus near species Pseudococci that we were getting in Sicily and Spain with the material that we were getting that had already been established from Israel and what we're finding in northern Italy. Working with a taxonomist, Sergei Trapitsin he found some significant differences between these. And later on after both were imported in the United States determined that these were two species, one still Anagyrus pseudocoxi and one Anagyrus vladimiri. So sometimes you'll see insectaries selling Anagyrus vladimiri and you think, Oh, I want that. That's different. It is different, but both are established in California. We're actually going to do a followup study. now in collaboration with this international group to find out what we've got in California. I suspect we've got both. Now, why is this exciting? Because at the time we were doing this work, we felt like the parasites were different, and we felt that these different groups that we were importing, maybe one had co evolved with the citrus mealybug, And the other with the vine mealybug. And we had already done some work with the vine mealybug, molecular work, looking at its relationship to each other around the world. and their names are, scientific names would be citrus mealybug, planococcus citri. Vine mealybug, we knew as planococcus ficus, which means, Ficus tree, fig tree. And we were showing that this group was, they had an outlier and ours was the outlier. And then working with this international group, they said, look, back in the fifties, there was a planococcus vitis. And I think what you've got, what we've got on vines, is the vine mealybug. But not in Iran and Iraq at that time. And, and maybe in that Mediterranean region Israel, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Turkey the Mesopotamian region, I think is what it is. Maybe there are some parasites there that we didn't have. Certainly, my colleague in Egypt and more parasites than we were finding in Europe. We just weren't able to get them all to establish in colony in quarantine. So it opens up the window that, that maybe there's something still out there. At this point in time, I say in all the countries where vine mealybug is reported as a problem, that's most of Europe Mexico, South America South Africa. We have the best of those parasites. We just want to delve deeper into what are we seeing in Turkey? How does that match up with what we know is in Egypt? And I do have colleagues in Iran. It's just harder for me to go there. [00:10:09] Craig Macmillan: right, of course. so this makes me think, is it possible that we have mixed populations of these mealybugs in California on the same plant, so it's different areas? [00:10:17] Kent Daane: So that's the project we're working on with this international group. What we decided to do in a three part approach is to first find out what everyone's got. The assumption is that in South America, In the United States, North America, we have got single invasion events. Our guess is that it arrived in the U S in Coachella and Mexico at the same time. We're pretty sure that the population they have in Peru is from California Yeah, they were bringing nursery wood in and lo and behold, they found vine mealybug. We went down to look at a nomatode problem to be honest with some UC California researchers. And we found that they had some mite problems at the same mites that we've got in North American California. So they were probably not being very cautious in what they were importing. So we're assuming that South America's got this California group which came from Israel. We know Israel and Egypt have something very similar, but it's different than most of Europe. South Africa is similar to Portugal and Spain, which makes sense with the trade routes that were going on in the 1960s. What we're guessing is that The European groups, there probably are, there's reported failures of vine mealybug mating disruption in some European areas. And we think that probably is this other mealybug that is probably in Turkey. So it's all very exciting to me, kind of delving deeper into the weeds on this. But the first part of this international group, again, a great group of people, Europe, South America our first part is what do we all have? Our second part is what we're doing a grower survey that we actually sent to the vineyard team and they spread out to some growers as well. What are, what are growers using to control the mealybug? Because maybe with some of the, we find out what it is and maybe growers are working harder to control our vine mealybug than say that the fig millebug which appears to be what they've got in most of Europe. Remember when I started the foreign exploration when I was in Spain growers would tell me yeah we've got the vine millebug but it really is not much of a pest. Citrus millebug on vines is more of a pest. Well they probably have that fig mealybug but [00:13:01] Craig Macmillan: Ah, [00:13:01] Kent Daane: You know, taxonomically, it looked to us like the vine mealybug.And I hope I'm not throwing all these things out and it's confusing. So, second part, that is, the survey. What do you have and what are you using to control it? And if it matches up that, yeah, what we've got is the one that's more difficult, that fills in a lot of boxes. Third and fourth part are now looking at the natural controls. What parasites are you getting coming off of this? What parasites are in your region? And how do they respond to the pheromones that we know are out there? So if they're not, if they're responding to both citrus and vine, maybe that's an indication that it's this other group. If they're not responding at all, or weakly, yeah, we've, we've got three or more distinct species. And we can't tell them apart, but maybe the parasites can. [00:13:56] Craig Macmillan: this is kind of a practical question. hoW do you monitor parasitic wasps? They're tiny. They live in refugia. They then come out and plant their eggs in their host. that seems like a really hard thing to do. [00:14:10] Kent Daane: That's an absolute fantastic question. So let's look at that most common parasite, Antigyrus Pseudococci slash Vladimiri. So what we found over the years is that it does a great job on mealybugs that are exposed in the fruit, on the leaves, on the cane. By the end of the season, if you're not putting on a lot of contact chemicals, you're getting greater than 40 percent parasitism. Very easy to see, [00:14:43] Craig Macmillan: Right. [00:14:43] Kent Daane: doesn't do very well against the mealybugs under the bark, because it's got this searching behavior where it's got to get on top of the mealybug, determine how big it is, do I want to put a an egg that's not fertilized in that, which would be a male, and they need smaller mealybugs for that. Do I want to put an egg which is fertilized? In that, that will become a female parasite that needs larger host. [00:15:09] Craig Macmillan: the same insect, the same parasite has the ability to do either. [00:15:13] Kent Daane: Yes. [00:15:15] Craig Macmillan: Wow. [00:15:15] Kent Daane: again, this is really a neat subject and I hope I don't bore the audience too much. But, a lot of these parasites that become important for mealybugs they have this little sac, so you've got your oviduct going to your ovarioles, in the female. And right around the oviduct area, before it splits into the two ovarioles, you've got this little sac called the spermatheca. unlike humans, where the sperm goes in and Seeks out the eggs and fertilizes it. The sperm go in and the female parasite stores them in the spermatheca. And then as the eggs are mature and ready to go down, oviduct and get ready to be oviposited into the mealybug, the female decides to fertilize the egg or not fertilize it. And if it's fertilized, it becomes a female. If it's not fertilized, it becomes a male. And that allows her to determine what the host size is, because the females are bigger than the males. And so she will walk up and down. and size that mealybug and say that this, this mealybug is a good enough size that this is worthy for me to put a fertilized egg in and that will become a female. Or a second in store mealybug, she'll say, this really isn't that good of a mealybug host. So I'm going to put An unfertilized egg, and that will become a male. And that was, going back to this Anagyrus Vladimiri versus Pseudococci, that was the most important difference that we found in this Sicilian and Spanish group of Anagyrus, was that they would oviposit and put females in smaller hosts than the male. earlier parasite which probably evolved on the citrus mealybug. So going back to this question because I do go off on different tangents. How do you sample for these things? So it's really easy to find a mummified mealybug on a leaf. But remember what we're doing. We're spraying now a lot of Movento and we're spraying a lot of the Neonics regardless of its Admire, Platinum, or generic derivative. They're all good materials. and maybe you're putting on an IGR like a plot, again, all good materials, Assail, all good materials. What they tend to do is work really good against the mealy bug, which is exposed on the leaves. Our systemic materials are really good at going out to the leaves. Our contact materials, our IGRs, the neonics, that are contacts kill the mealybug that's exposed. All of these materials do less of a good job with the mealybug underneath the bark. we're not getting a true indication of what these parasites can do because we're killing the host that's the best location for them to attack. So that means to really find out what's going on, you got to strip bark oftentimes. So now you're looking at parasitism in that region of the vine that the parasite doesn't like to be. Now, if we add to this, this other good parasite, which is the coccidoxoenoides peregrinus, we really liked to bring this in because it attacks the very, very small stages of the mealybug, the first and the second instar. It's sometimes a small third, but really it's focused on the second instar. [00:19:05] Craig Macmillan: Got it. [00:19:06] Kent Daane: It's in California. You can find it, but it's really hard to find out what impact it's got because it will parasitize the mealybug and will cause the parasitized mealybug to die. to feel sick and to seek out some area for protection because the anagyrus if you see that mealybug parasitized on the leaf causes that mealybug to kind of glue itself down to the leaf You have to flip that thing to get it off the leaf. A mummy is a dead mealybug which sticks to the leaf. The coccydox anoides causes the mealybug to find a place of protection because it doesn't stick it to the leaf. So it often times goes to the trunk, or goes to the stem, and eventually falls off the vine, and will pupate down into the ground. And so to sample for that one, you have to collect them as first or second instars live, bring them back to the insectary, and rear them out to the parasite, which is just really a lot of work hard to do. so these things are far more difficult to do. Sample four, then going out and counting, you know, aphid parasites, which are just out there as little brown mummified aphids. [00:20:29] Craig Macmillan: it sounds like this would play a role in my timing of my insecticide applications, whether it's Spirotetramat or Neonic or One of the programs that I think is common is to have spirotetramat on top and have a myothiamethoxam soil applied. Does that sound right? [00:20:47] Kent Daane: Yeah, that sounds right. I mean, they're both good products and they're doing what they're supposed to do. they're killing the mealybug. And when the timing is right, they're getting out there before the mealybug. So as the mealybug is going out towards the leaves. You know, they're probably doing a better job than the parasite will do on its own. Now, if you are an organic grower and you can't use those materials, then timing does become a little bit more critical because you're putting on, oftentimes, organic materials every 10 to 14 days because they've got a shorter residual. So on those you may want to, you know, work your timing around to avoid to give it a window of opportunity some of these natural enemies. There you're looking on the leaf, you're looking for mummified mealybugs. You know, are, do I have some of these good natural enemies in the field? You're looking for the mealybug destroyer, or one of the other beetles. Green lancelings are also doing a pretty good job. So you're monitoring those. And maybe you're deciding, I've got a lot of good activity maybe I should wait to put on pyganic or one of the other materials, which is broad spectrum give the other parasites a chance, a cycle, to see what their impact's going to be on that millibug population. Or maybe you're going to leave every fifth row unsprayed to let the parasites come back in and then hit that row later. So you've got a chance for those natural enemies to move the just sprayed vines. [00:22:22] Craig Macmillan: That was going to be my next question is what is the refugee situation for these parasites? Do they come into the vineyard, do their thing and then leave? Do they come in when there is host and then they hang out in the vineyard for the rest of the season? Do we know? I'm just thinking about ways that I can preserve, conserve those parasites as much as possible so that they're there when I need them. [00:22:45] Kent Daane: That's a great question, Craig. And let's break this apart into two different areas. Let's talk about First, the generalist predators that I just mentioned, the green lacewings, a good mealybug predator against the smaller mealybug stages. A lot of the things we do to enhance natural enemies will enhance generalist predators. So that's where your cover crops come in. That's where your pollen and nectar come in. You'll increase generalist predators. Ladybird beetles, green lacewings, minute pyre bugs, those can all attack and kill. That same group of cover cropping that brings in the gentleness predator may have little impact on the specialized parasitoids. Things like the anagyrus and the coccidocsinoides, what they want is the mealybugs. And not all mealybugs will do. They really want the mealybugs that are better hosts for them. So, they tend to get everything they need out of that pest population. They can host feed. They can stick their ovipositor into a mealybug, turn around and feed on some of that exudate, some of what's being bled. The mealybug creates honeydew. That honeydew, instead of trying to plant a cover crop for honeydew, that honeydew serves as a food to increase the longevity of those parasitoids. And as the mealybug density goes down, the parasite numbers should go down as well. Now there are different kinds of food sprays that we hope to look at that oftentimes do help increase both generalists and perhaps specialist natural enemies. [00:24:46] Craig Macmillan: Hm. [00:24:46] Kent Daane: The number one thing you do to to enhance beneficial insect numbers is to watch the broad spectrum insecticide sprays or to time them where you're not spraying, you know, all 100 acres at the same time, but you're leaving a refugia so they can move back in. [00:25:08] Craig Macmillan: Interesting. So, I might be looking at something and saying, okay, I am going to have to take some action here. I'm hitting an action threshold but not pull the trigger on the whole thing. leave one area for a little bit, and then can you come back and treat that later, so that you're preserving some of these folks, and then they can come back on the other side, and find a balance between the chemical and the biological. Mm [00:25:31] Kent Daane: Right. A balance, a delay might just be 10 days, might be 20 days. We don't want to miss our spray window, but remember, Most of the natural enemies are winged as adults, whereas the female mealybug is never winged. Fairly slow, fairly thestle. So that allows for those beneficials to come back in. And if you're a large grower this just happens over over the course because you can't spray 100 acres in a day. [00:26:07] Craig Macmillan: Right. Right. Fascinating. Are growers starting to adopt, in your experience with the folks that you work with, are growers starting to adopt these kinds of timings and techniques and methods? [00:26:19] Kent Daane: I think growers are constantly adopting, improving, changing one of the common misconceptions when I talk to students or people who just don't don't know how to farm or farmers is that farmers really don't want to spray. Spraying costs money. it is an added expenditure, added time, added worry. So they'd much rather, you know, go back 50 years when we didn't have all these invasive insects from Vine mealybug to Virginia Creeper growers are always seeking out how to improve the insecticide materials they've got, how to reduce the insecticide applications they have to make. And that does include natural enemies, mating disruption. What it comes down to is just costs. So oftentimes there's a trade off. If you're going to use mating disruption, you may not be doing three applications of an insecticide for vine mealybug. Maybe it's one insecticide plus vine mealybug mating disruption. If you're organic and you're releasing beneficial insects and spraying every other week. Maybe you don't have the cost for mating disruption. So these are all decisions that individual growers have to make. Obviously we've got some growers in some regions can spend 300 per acre for mealybug control. Other growers simply cannot do that because of the value of, their product at the very end. [00:28:03] Craig Macmillan: Right. This is kind of a natural lead in to something I wanted to touch on, and that is the Virginia Creeper leafhopper that's found on the North Coast. That also an invasive, correct? Came in from outside. [00:28:15] Kent Daane: It is invasive to some extent. It is not invasive like the vine mealybug is from. The Mediterranean region Virginia creeper most likely is, is North American. But yes, it was never really a California leafhopper pest. It was, no England, Canada. Pest that then went into Washington, then went into Oregon, that then came into California. interestingly, the, leafhopper that I worked on for so many years the variegated grape leafhopper probably North American, probably had a different avenue, probably came up from the south, from Mexico, Texas, to Arizona, to California. So Some of our invasives are close relatives. [00:29:07] Craig Macmillan: Interesting. what's the difference in damage that's caused by the Virginia creep leaf hopper and the the variegated leaf hopper. [00:29:17] Kent Daane: So they're, they're very similar. I think that the grape leafhopper is the one we've been dealing with for the longest time and has been relatively mild compared to the other two. The variegated grape leafhopper When it first came into the San Joaquin Valley, it could defoliate vines. It had three to four generations per year. [00:29:42] Craig Macmillan: Oh, wow. [00:29:43] Kent Daane: It seemed to be much more damaging than the grape leafhopper. Virginia creeper leafhopper, now in northern California, making its way south. So it's gotten to the middle of the state. It's in Napa, Sonoma, Sacramento. I have not seen it. Heard it reported in the Fresno area. Oh, it has been reported in Fresno. But I'm not saying it causes much damage here. We really don't get many leaf hopper reports for damage here, except for organic growers. And that's because all the sprays for vine mealybug. Most of those vine mealybug sprays are very good against the leaf hoppers. Where I have seen it as a pest. It's been mostly in wine grapes. Mostly in the cooler regions of the state. Mostly controlled by conventional insecticides. There are programs organic materials registered for Virginia creeper that I think have done a fairly good job. But it, it does get out of hand. And I think for all these leaf hoppers with organic materials, what happens is that The organic products tend to not work well , against the leaf operant in the egg stage or the leaf operant in the adult stage. So timing is very important. You want to get those materials on. when egg hatch is nearly complete and when you've got mostly first and second instars out there. That's because most of our organic products tend to impact these pests by either being a desiccant like the soaps that dry it out or a suffocant like the oils that clog the spiracles. And so the the, adults just fly away from that tractor rig as it's coming down. The eggs are protected inside the leaf itself, in their little clusters for the Virginia Creeper. And the larger insects can, they're just more mobile. So it's hard to kill them. So timing becomes relatively critical with these insects. I've not worked directly with Virginia creeper other than hosting Houston Wilson did his graduate work in my lab and really focused on, on the parasites of this insect. Lucia Varela, now retired, did focus on looking at the different insecticides and she's got a nice summary article which is on Monica Cooper's website. It talks about the different insecticides, U C cooperative extension Napa County. And she's got a website that goes into materials for organic growers for Virginia creeper leaf hopper. I think that's where I saw. that information posted. And what Houston did was he just looked at and tried to improve the Enneagrus. So we get those two confused. The Lilybug parasite is Anagyrus. The Leafhopper parasite is Enneagrus. The two names sound pretty similar, but one is an inserted family and one is a Mimerit. Or a fairy fly, fairy winged fly. They're some of the smallest insects known. So, [00:33:03] Craig Macmillan: Wow. So, we are continuing to look at these new parasites, how they're performing, we're learning a lot more about them, and we're learning a lot more about timing of different kinds of sprays around their life cycle. [00:33:17] Kent Daane: Yeah, what Houston was trying to do was to understand why parasitism against the Virginia creeper leafhopper was against all the leafhoppers. Why parasitism was relatively low. So I was working with Danny Gonzales and Sergei Tripitsin, And just mentioning to the taxonomist, Sergei, that it seemed like there were differences amongst these Enneagris samples that we were releasing. And I had happened to save all of the material that had died. So I sent that to Sergei, and Sergei looked at these things closely and then said, look, we've got a complex of parasites. And he named Enneagris erythronureae. After the species that was most commonly attacking variegated grape leafhopper, which is Erythronere variabilis. There was another one, and he called a Negris tryptocova, which was named after his wife's father's family and he said that was the better looking one of the group. And there was one that just didn't do that much. And he named that after me, a Negris Dana. And so that one we thought was the one attacking the western grape leaf hopper most commonly. And it was being found more commonly in the riparian zone. So that's 20 years ago, fast forward to our new invasive leaf hopper, the Virginia creeper leaf hopper, which is again coming down from Canada to Washington to Oregon to California. Well, it ends up that the Enneagris deni is very important attacking that leaf hopper. So Houston was working out the relationship of these three parasites against these three leaf hoppers and trying to understand if he could manipulate their numbers to improve biocontrol. He looked at hedgerows, he looked at augmentative releases or inoculative releases, and we're still curious to see if that can't be improved even. [00:35:30] Craig Macmillan: That's fantastic. Another topic that I wanted to touch on, because it's a really cool idea, and I think we'll have applications across a lot of things eventually, and that is area wide pest management strategies. And I know that you've done a lot of work in this area from the beginning, really, of kind of the concept. What is an area wide pest management strategy? Management program. What does it look like? What can it what is its goal? How does it operate? What kind of success we've seen so far? [00:35:59] Kent Daane: Yeah, that's a fantastic question. It's a topic I'm really excited about and let's think about it when we think about the European grapevine model. that was another invasive insect, It was found in California, it was found in Chile around the same time. So you've got this invasive insect, and the state of California deemed this important enough to have an eradication program. [00:36:22] Craig Macmillan: Oh and just real quick. What kind of damage does grapevine moth do? [00:36:26] Kent Daane: So the European Greenvine Moth it'll feed on the vine, but it gets in the fruit clusters. think of the omnivorous leaf roller One of those, one of our tortricid pests that can really cause damage to the grape a number of generations per year, a lot of different possibilities where it might come from in terms of a host plant material. So it can be very problematic. It would require a spray every single year, an additional spray for a tortricid pest, if it were to establish. [00:37:00] Craig Macmillan: one the big issue here is that it attacks the berries directly [00:37:03] Kent Daane: absolutely. [00:37:04] Craig Macmillan: Okay. So that's a, that's a serious problem. [00:37:07] Kent Daane: No, no, the, it, it causes mold and rot and everything else once it gets in there. So, you know, two or three doesn't seem like a lot. You just think, well, berry can go to crush, but that berry will get all kinds of bunch rot. not a good fruit. So when you think about the eradication program, where there was monitoring everywhere in the state. When you think about the eradication program, where when they found this pest through pheromone traps, and then they did a ground search to find out where it was. And then there was a coordinated investigation. Effort to spray the right materials, to use mating disruption, to go after it in all of the adjoining areas. those eradication programs are very intense. Area wide control programs. So, let's think about Vine mealybug, which is now in most vineyards. We're still approaching this on an individual grower basis. We might have one grower using mating disruption, because they're going to go organic, and a next door neighbor doing nothing. There's going to be constant movement of that pest into that grower's. field We might have two growers, one using Movento every other year, and another using Platinum every other year. Those males are going back and forth between those vineyards, sharing whatever genetic resistance that they're developing. And so really, if those growers are switching, one's using Movento, one's using Platinum that insect is moving between those vineyards all the time. And it's not a resistance management program, or you might have a small five acre grower deciding to put out mating disruption. Mating disruption works better blanketing the whole area. So an area wide program, and then you bring into it the idea of roguing leaf roll diseased vines. there are two things I just mentioned in this last 30 seconds that are so important for area wide management of mealybug and leaf roll that are the killers to those programs. The first is mating disruption still costs more money than a pesticide application. It's a fantastic tool. It is a tool that works better the lower and lower the mealybug density gets. So you use insecticides to really drop the mealybug population down, but there gets to be a point where the mealybugs are now on the bark. There are little populations here and there, and we know the insecticides are never 100 percent. Mating disruption works better. The lower the milli buck density is. [00:40:05] Craig Macmillan: Got it. [00:40:06] Kent Daane: But there's a cost to it. So we start with insecticides. The next part is the rowing of the infected vines. That's very important on an area wide basis because if you're planting, you've had, vineyard is old, it's not productive, it's had leaf roll. You pull it out, but it's right next to a block that's got 80 percent infected vines. You're always going to have new infections showing up over and over and over again. Unless that grower next to you is just doing this bang up job of applying insecticides all the time to keep mealybugs from going into your vineyard. you can make area wide control work for the pathogen. and the pest. But in the best world, let's say you're in control of a thousand acres, pull out every vineyard that's infected and replant and then pull out every new infection in it. And people just can't afford this. [00:41:06] Craig Macmillan: Right. [00:41:07] Kent Daane: if you're managing 200, 300 acres and Your vineyard with leaf roll that's at 30 percent is still profitable. it's hard to pull out those 30%. It's just hard to do. I get it. But something that I wish we could get, you know, government subsidy for to, to have them help us come in, pull out the infected vines, start clean again. But it does work. It's worked in South Africa. It's worked in New Zealand. It's worked in Napa. It just comes at a cost that may be prohibitive in some regions, in some areas. So the best we can do is to manage mealybug and the disease incidence in an area wide manner. [00:41:52] Craig Macmillan: if I remember correctly, I mean, the work has been done now that, demonstrates roguing is your best strategy overall long term, but it's expensive short term. and that is the issue. That's the tricky bit. [00:42:06] Kent Daane: There are two tricky bits to it. The first tricky bit is the expense you just talked about. The second tricky bit is that in most of the regions where we know it's worked They have not been dealing, perhaps, with our vine mealybug. They've been dealing with the grape mealybug, long tail mealybug, obscure mealybug. we've got I think the worst mealybug. And maybe that mealybug is just better at surviving on root remnants. You know, you hear all the time from growers, I r I've been removing 10 percent of my vineyard every single year for five years. And when I looked at The south African data, they removed 20%. Second year, 5%. Third year, 3%. Fourth year, 1%. And after that, it was always 1%. [00:42:54] Craig Macmillan: last piece of this puzzle in my mind is you have to get your neighbors to cooperate. That's the area wide bit. You have to get people to get on the same page in terms of what they're doing. And it sounds to me like they don't necessarily have to be doing exactly the same thing. They just have to be sensitive to what somebody else wants to do. Does that sound right? [00:43:15] Kent Daane: There are areas where it has worked well. It can work in the Central Coast. It can work in Lodi. We may not see, you know, eradication of diseased vines. We may not see a reduction of vine mealybug to a point where we can treat every other year. We might be treating every single year. for this, but we can improve what we're doing through communication right now. In the central Valley, we're working with a great group of growers where we're just mapping out the vine mealybug and we're sharing with the growers where the melaybug populations are. It's their decision. What? What to use, what to do for control. It's their decision. Can they rogue or not rogue? But what we're trying to do is to help foster communication amongst the different growers that are neighbors, because we're a third party, which I think helps a little bit. it would be fantastic if we could have someone hired as a scout or PCA, where we work with. PCAs in the region and everyone shares data. We're trying a new computer program this year, which we at the end of the season, we'll launch with our collaborating growers where they can log on in real time. and see what the trap counts are as we count those trap counts. And that will help them make a decision, we hope, on what to do in terms of control measures. But again, the best thing might be that we're opening up communication, just as the Vineyard team is doing through podcasts, through field days, through the website. [00:44:55] Craig Macmillan: Well, let's hope. And I, and there's a number of other organizations too. the, the group in Lodi has done a fantastic job from what I understand. Fostering communication and sharing information. like you said, I think that's probably one of our, our, our best hopes. Is working collaboratively as an industry and getting communication between the experts like PCAs and the extension community. . [00:45:15] Kent Daane: And of course, anyone can always reach out to me with questions as well. [00:45:18] Craig Macmillan: Fantastic. And we'll put your information in the show notes. I want to thank you for being on the podcast. fantastic. Very helpful and very, very exciting. I think I was feeling a little more dismal about this whole topic coming into this interview than I am now. I think there's maybe more potential than I was kind of giving credit. I, you know, I come from a time back in the 90s when Vine Mealybugs showed up in the Central Coast. And it was a lot of gnashing of teeth and pulling of hair, and we did not know what to do, and the damage was insane. I mean, I saw stuff that was just blood curdling, and I think we've come a long way. We've come a long way, and that's from the efforts of folks like you, so I really appreciate it. I want to thank our guest, Kent Daane. He is a Cooperative Extension Specialist with the University of California, Berkeley. he works primarily out of the Kearney Ag Research Extension Center. And, thanks so much for being on the podcast. This is great. [00:46:10] Kent Daane: Thank you very much. Enjoy the harvest time coming up.   Nearly perfect transcription by Descript

Did you know that imidacloprid systemic granules are neonicotonoids and totally bad for bees? Let's talk about using them thoughtfully, plus letting go of our houseplant-parent egos and giving ourselves EASE instead ❤️

There have been ominous declines in many insect populations.  Chief among them have been declines in pollinators, which have severe consequences for our food supply.  There are multiple possible causes of these declines and undoubtedly several have been involved simultaneously. A new study on butterfly populations in the Midwest indicates that agricultural insecticides exerted the […]

In the latest episode of North American Ag Spotlight, host Chrissy Wozniak sits down with Tyler Williams, a sustainable systems agronomist, to delve into Bayer's innovative digital platform, ForGround by Bayer. With a rich background in meteorology, climatology, and agronomy, Tyler has dedicated his career to enhancing farm productivity and sustainability, making him an ideal advocate for Bayer's latest venture.Tyler Williams grew up on a ranch in south central Nebraska, fostering an early connection to the land. He pursued his education at the University of Nebraska Lincoln, focusing on meteorology, climatology, and agronomy. After spending a decade with the University of Nebraska Extension, where he developed programs to bolster farm productivity and resilience, Tyler joined Bayer. He initially worked as a field scientist with the Bayer Crop Science Seed Production Innovation organization before transitioning to his current role in the Bayer Carbon Initiative. As a Sustainable Systems Agronomist, he now helps farmers adopt sustainable practices that enhance their operations' long-term viability.ForGround by Bayer is a cutting-edge digital platform designed to support farmers in transitioning to sustainable agricultural practices. Tyler explains that ForGround provides comprehensive agronomic support, valuable tools, and resources, alongside opportunities for revenue generation through the adoption of regenerative practices. This platform aims to connect growers with businesses seeking to meet their sustainability and carbon objectives, offering a win-win scenario for both parties.One of the standout features of ForGround is its potential to help farmers earn revenue. Tyler elaborates that producers can benefit financially by adopting practices that sequester carbon and improve soil health. By doing so, they can sell carbon credits or receive incentives from companies. With numerous options available for regenerative agriculture, Tyler highlights what sets ForGround apart. The platform's farmer-first approach ensures that growers receive tailored support and practical solutions. ForGround also emphasizes measurable outcomes, allowing farmers to track their progress and demonstrate tangible results, which is crucial in an industry often plagued by greenwashing.Looking ahead, Tyler sees numerous opportunities for growers in 2024 and beyond. Innovations in technology and agronomy will continue to open new avenues for sustainable practices. He encourages farmers to stay informed and engaged with platforms like ForGround to capitalize on these opportunities.For farmers interested in joining ForGround, Tyler assures that the process is straightforward. The platform is designed to be user-friendly, with ample support available to guide farmers through each step. More information can be found on Bayer's website or by contacting their local agronomic advisor.For more information on ForGround by Bayer and to hear the full interview with Tyler Williams, tune in to North American Ag Spotlight on your favorite podcast platform.Send us a Text Message. We facilitate the investment process between businesses and investors. Our platform completes the exchange of investment agreements and funds. You may think of us as a digital investment platform for private company investments, rather than publicly traded stocks. We ultimately provide farms and businesses with access to funding directly from the communities they serve.Learn more at https://www.netgreen.com/ The ultimate destination for online farm equipment auctions!Visit https://agr.fyi/fastline-auctionsRegister for the July 13, 2023 webinar at https://NorthAmericanAg.com/fastline-webinarSubscribe to North American Ag at https://northamericanag.com

Today, we are joined by Amanda Freund, a third-generation farmer from East Canaan, Connecticut. Together with her father, Matt, Amanda manages their company called CowPots, where the family manufactures biodegradable containers using the dairy farm's digested and composted manure.Amanda's connection to compost goes back to her 8th-grade science fair project, where she compared different carbon sources in compost piles. She also served as an agriculture volunteer with the Peace Corps in Zambia from 2010-2012, where she trained farmers on building and maintaining compost piles. Today, she oversees production schedules, marketing, and distribution of their value-added compost products nationwide.CowPots uses pulp molding equipment to manufacture biodegradable, plantable containers from digested and composted cow manure. Currently offering 15 styles ranging in size from 3" to 17", CowPots began as a way for the family to manage their nutrients better and has grown into a profitable business that provides growers and gardeners with an American-made, renewable, and recycled alternative to plastic and peat pots.Apart from CowPots, Amanda maintains the website and social media for another farm business, Freund's Farm Market and Bakery. In her free time, she enjoys dabbling in beekeeping and walking the crop fields with her dog, Brie.Join us as we dive into Amanda's journey and how CowPots is revolutionizing the industry!Learn more about #cowpots #farming #agricultureNorth American Ag is devoted to highlighting the people & companies in agriculture who impact our industry and help feed the world. Subscribe at https://northamericanag.comThis episode is sponsored by INTENT - Collect and interpret geospatial agronomic data with speed, precision, and scale. Learn more at https://intent.agWant to hear the stories of the ag brands you love and the ag brands you love to hate? Hear them at https://whatcolorisyourtractor.comDon't just thank a farmer, pray for one too!The ultimate destination for online farm equipment auctions!Visit https://agr.fyi/fastline-auctionsRegister for the July 13, 2023 webinar at https://NorthAmericanAg.com/fastline-webinarSubscribe to North American Ag at https://northamericanag.com

In this week's North American Ag Spotlight Chrissy Wozniak  delves into the vital role of crop protection products in agriculture and horticulture. Our guests, Dr. Frank Wong, Ph.D., and Nick Tinsley, discuss the importance of responsible and effective crop protection practices.We explore how products like neonicotinoid insecticides are essential for protecting crops from pests while ensuring safety for people and the environment when used responsibly. Discover practical stewardship practices and learn how the BeSure! campaign promotes the safe and responsible use of crop protection products.Tune in to learn more about the collaborative efforts of Growing Matters, Bayer Crop Science, BASF, and others to support growers and applicators in protecting pollinators and wildlife while maintaining agricultural productivity.Learn more about the BeSure! campaign and Growing Matters at https://growingmatters.org#farm #farming #agricultureNorth American Ag is devoted to highlighting the people & companies in agriculture who impact our industry and help feed the world. Subscribe at https://northamericanag.comThis episode is sponsored by INTENT - Collect and interpret geospatial agronomic data with speed, precision, and scale. Learn more at https://intent.agWant to hear the stories of the ag brands you love and the ag brands you love to hate? Hear them at https://whatcolorisyourtractor.comDon't just thank a farmer, pray for one too!FASTLINE AUCTIONSAuctions is the only auction platform with over 40 years of data to target more farmers than any other. We also make it super simple for our customers – our auctions are embedded directly into Fastline.com's current website listings, so there's no need for buyers to visit a separate website. Learn more at Fastline.com!Subscribe to North American Ag at https://northamericanag.com

In this week's North American Ag Spotlight Chrissy Wozniak speaks with James Harper, Chief Executive Officer at Quatronics, about cybersecurity threats faced by the agricultural industry.James Harper is an information security expert with over 25 years of experience in the defense industry and entrepreneurship. He currently serves as the CEO of Quatronics, a company specializing in cybersecurity compliance and governance, helping organizations achieve and maintain compliance with frameworks like ISO 27001, NIST, and HIPAA.James' passion lies in demystifying complex cybersecurity concepts and empowering individuals to protect themselves and their organizations. He is a captivating speaker, drawing upon his extensive experience to deliver insightful presentations on various cybersecurity topics.  He has a particular interest in the agriculture, coming from multiple generations of family farm owners.At Quatronics, they are more than just a cybersecurity consulting firm; they are a dedicated ally in safeguarding digital assets and ensuring a resilient and secure business environment. Based in Dallas and founded in 2020, they offer a wide range of services tailored to meet the diverse needs of businesses across the United States. Their focus spans across industries including agriculture, the financial sector, government contractors, and small to medium-sized businesses.Their services include Cybersecurity Vulnerability and Risk Assessments, taking a proactive approach to identify potential risks and vulnerabilities that pose a threat to businesses. They also provide Compliance Services, assisting companies in achieving government and industry compliance certification to ensure operations align with required standards.In addition, Quatronics specializes in Disaster Recovery, ensuring business continuity in challenging times and helping businesses return to normal operations as quickly as possible. They offer innovative solutions like Cue Farm Software for Agriculture, tailored to the unique needs of the agriculture industry.Their expertise extends to Custom Software Development and Integration, crafting secure and user-friendly software solutions. They excel in Advanced Data Analytics, helping businesses harness the power of data for informed decision-making.Furthermore, Quatronics offers Voice over IP (VoIP) Phone Systems, facilitating seamless communication integrated into CRM and other business management tools. With experience in developing IoT devices, wireless communication systems, and other custom electronic devices, they provide end-to-end solutions from concept through certification to UL standards and manufacturing.Learn more about Quatronics at https://www.quatronics.com or https://cue.farm#farm #farming #cybersecurityNorth American Ag is devoted to highlighting the people & companies in agriculture who impact our industry and help feed the world. Subscribe at https://northamericanag.comWant to hear the stories of the ag brands you love and the ag brands you love to hate? Hear them at https://whatcolorisyourtractor.comDon't just thank a farmer, pray for one too!FASTLINE AUCTIONSAuctions is the only auction platform with over 40 years of data to target more farmers than any other. We also make it super simple for our customers – our auctions are embedded directly into Fastline.com's current website listings, so there's no need for buyers to visit a separate website. Learn more at Fastline.com!Subscribe to North American Ag at https://northamericanag.com

The Government has promised that hedgerows will continue to be protected, even though there's been a gap in regulations after EU rules lapsed at the end of last year. DEFRA has confirmed that legislation will include plans to maintain cutting bans on hedges and 2 metre protective buffer strips. But farmers will also be allowed to apply for an exemption to cut or trim hedges in August, if they are sowing oilseed rape or temporary grass. Conservation groups have welcomed the protections but some, including the Wildlife Trusts say the government could have gone further.The Labour Party is considering stopping the emergency use of harmful neonicotinoid chemicals, if it wins the next election. The chemicals protect crops from pests which spread disease, but are dangerous for pollinators. Their use is generally banned but the Government granted emergency authorisation for farmers to use them on sugar beet this year, for the fourth time in a row.And we visit Wood Farm, near Carlisle, in Cumbria, for lambing! Tom Wilson has 1250 Suffolk Cross Texels to look after, but his family also runs a 200 strong dairy herd so the family employ a live-in lambing assistant.Presented by Anna Hill Produced for BBC Audio in Bristol by Heather Simons

First, the tadpoles and frogs disappeared; then the bats and the songbirds left. Dr. Elizabeth Hilborn, a honey bee veterinarian and environmental health scientist, soon realized the bees—the vital pollinators of fruits, plants, and vegetables—were dying. Everything went still and silent. In 2017, after a large flood, most of the teeming life on her beloved family farm in North Carolina had vanished in a matter of weeks. As a scientist and a naturalist, Hilborn set about to get answers and shares her story in her riveting book, Restoring Eden, and in this episode.No matter where you live- even if it's a city far from farmland- if you drink water and eat food, you are going to want to listen to this episode.HighlightsThe alarming findings about pesticides, particularly Roundup and neonicotinoids, on the environment, wildlife, and human health.Why some pesticides cannot be washed off.Strategies for individuals to minimize exposure to harmful pesticides and support a healthier ecosystem.What YOU Can DoGet in the know by buying her book, Restoring EdenSupport local agriculture, agroecology,  regenerative agriculture, and organic agricultural practices in the food you buy, when possible.Mow less and plant native flowers (grown from uncoated seed) to support wild pollinators.Leaving soil undisturbed and leaving leaves when they fall are ways to support our beneficial insects.The Environmental Protection Agency is soliciting comments about treated seed. Leave a comment in support of regulations. (find other petitions to sign once this comment period is over or create your own)ResourcesVisit Elizabeth's websiteEnvironmental Working Group's Dirty Dozen List Want a free guide to help you become a force for nature? Get it HERE!If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe, rate, and review it! This helps to boost its visibility. Hit me up on Instagram and Facebook and let me know what actions you have been taking. Adopting just one habit can be a game-changer because imagine if a billion people also adopted that! What difference for the world are you going to make today?

2023 was expected to be a big year for Europe in reducing harm from agrochemicals. But in a surprise move in November, European Parliament rejected a law to halve pesticide use. That same month, The European Commission stated it would renew the controversial approval of glyphosate for another 10 years. What happened? Alasdair talks to Dr Martin Dermine, Executive Director of Pesticide Action Network Europe, about why EU regulation of agrochemicals is moving so slowly.Further reading: 'Glyphosate, the active ingredient in the weedkiller Roundup, is showing up in pregnant women', The Conversation, December 2023'EU Commission hosts a secret 3-day meeting with the pesticide industry as their exclusive guest', Pesticide Action Network, December 2023'Green Deal is dead', Pesticide Action Network, November 2023'Beneath the orange fields: Impact of Glyphosate on soil organisms', Pesticide Action Network, November 2023'Conservative backlash kills off EU's Green Deal push to slash pesticide use', Politico, November 2023'EU to renew herbicide glyphosate approval for 10 years', Reuters, November 2023'Long-term evidence for ecological intensification as a pathway to sustainable agriculture', Nature Sustainability, 2022Listen to our previous episodes on Monsanto, EU lobbying, and Neonics.Click here to visit The Future Unrefined, our curated collection of articles and podcasts on raw materials and extraction. Find more podcasts and articles at www.landclimate.org

Summary: Birds and pesticides do not mix! Join Kiersten and Cheryl as they talk about the history of birds and pesticides, the current status of birds and pesticides, and discuss what we can do in our own backyards.   For our hearing-impaired listeners, a transcript of this podcast follows the show notes on Podbean.   Show Notes: “Huge decline in songbirds linked to common insecticide.” National Geographic, https://www.nationalgeographic.com “A neonicotinoid insecticide reduces fueling and delays migration in songbirds,” by Margaret L. Eng, Bridget J. M. Stutchbury, and Christy A. Morrissey. Science, Vol 365, Issue 6458, pp. 1177-1180. “Take Flight From Lawn Pesticides: Tips for Organic, Bird-Friendly Gardening,” by Hardy Kern, April 12, 2022. https://abcbirds.org   DIY Pesticides: Lawn Love, https://lawnlove.com Natural Lawn Care Products: Jonathan Green, https://www.jonathangreen.com For more information on rodenticides and birds please listen to our episode titled: Rodenticides: A Deadly Decision   Transcript: Kiersten: Intro – Pesticides and birds do not mix. They have a long and devastating history ever since humans have begun using synthetic chemicals. In this episode we're going to look at some of that history, current issues, and what we can do to help in our own backyard.   Cheryl: As Kiersten likes to do, we're starting off with the definition of a pesticide.  A pesticide is anything that kills off something that humans have decided is a pest. They can be classified into insecticides that kill insects, rodenticides that kill rodents, herbicides that kill unwanted weeds, and fungicides that kill fungus. Every kind of pesticide affects birds. Usually in a detrimental way.  Since the 1940s, since the use of synthetic pesticides became more widely used, bird populations have continuously declined. Today around 1 billion pounds of pesticides are sprayed into the environment just in the United States.   Kiersten: Let's take a look at what brought our attention to the fact that pesticides that we were using in the environment were killing off birds. Some of you may have heard of or read the book Silent Spring. Written by Rachel Carson this book brought attention to what pesticides such as organochlorines were doing to our environment. It focused on a specific pesticide known as DDT. It was used to kill off insects on crops and it was very effective. What we didn't initially know was the long-lasting devastation that these chemicals could cause in the environment.             All chemicals break down and when DDT breaks down it leaves behind DDE. DDE wreaked havoc on the lives of birds. Organochlorides are extremely persistent. They remain active for a long time and they are fat soluble which means they can accumulate in the fatty cells of organisms that are exposed to them and accumulate over time. I'm sure you see where I'm going with this. Birds that ingested insects sprayed with DDT didn't just poop out the chemicals, they absorbed them into their system. Then when those birds were eaten by predators, the chemical was passed on to them. This is a process called biomagnification and with each step the contaminants become more concentrated.             All birds were greatly impacted, but raptors were affected most of all because they were consistently eating contaminated food. DDT impacted their entire lifecycle. They died from ingesting the chemical, it was also passed onto the embryos in eggs causing them to never develop, but the most heart-wrenching side effect was the leaching of calcium from eggs shells. Birds were laying eggs with shells so thin that when females sat on the eggs to incubated them, they were crushing their own young.             Because of DDT many species of birds were pushed to the brink of extinction, and we did learn our lesson. Organochlorides have been banned from use in the United States, but other pesticides have taken their place.   Cheryl: The effects of DDT were recognized almost sixty years ago, but today birds are facing threats from another pesticide. Chemicals known as “neonics” are now causing just as many problems as DDT. Neonics are a pesticide used mainly in the farming industry. It is sprayed extensively on crops. It is also used as a coating on seeds so that when the plant grows it will incorporate the neonic throughout the entire plant. It's great for the plant but it has presented more hurdles for our birds.             The neonics are especially devastating to our migrating songbirds. A research paper published in 2019 has shown that migrating birds that eat seeds covered in neonics lose wait drastically and delay their migration travels. In the study, white-crowned sparrows were monitored with radio telemetry. Researchers found that birds that ate seeds covered in neonics lost 6% of their body weight in six hours and delayed their migration by 3 and ½ days. This is a significant amount of time to delay causing them to miss out on finding mates and territories which can mean they do not breed for the year.             Neonics affect the nervous system of animals that ingest the chemicals. These chemicals are also contributing to the decline of honey bees. The bees lose their ability to navigate back to their hives and eventually starve to death. Neonics may also be harming us. These pesticides are designed to remain in the plant for the entirety of their lives which means the produce from those plants also have neonics in them. Studies are currently on going about how these pesticides affect humans.   Kiersten: Okay! What can we do to help? We can start by looking in our own backyards. If you are a gardener or you have friends or family that garden, you typically take pride in how lovely it looks. As you should! But there are a few small things we can do to help curb the reach of these chemicals. Here are some tips from the American Bird Conservancy on how to garden responsibly: Avoid using neonicotinoids, glyphosate, and carbaryl pesticides. Avoid anything that says it is a systemic pesticide. Weed by hand Use DIY pesticides. A mixture of diluted white vinegar, salt, and dish soap is a great way to rid your yard of weeds without using synthetic chemicals. According to Lawn Love, you can make a large supply for continued use by combining a gallon of vinegar with a cup of salt and one tablespoon of dish soap. Put this in a spray bottle fro easy use and store in your garage. You can prevent weeds by sprinkling corn gluten around established plants. You can get rid of weeds near the pavement by pouring boiling water on them. Do be careful of splash back. Use organic insecticides that use essential oils to combat insects. Check out a company called Jonathan Green for some great options. And our absolute favorite method. Plant native plants. These plants already know how to combat insects and are best suited for the area in which you live, and attract native birds by offering them what they need to survive.   Cheryl: Another way to help is let local, state, and federal agencies know that you are not okay with these chemicals being sprayed on our farmlands. The EPA and FDA have the power to ban the use of these neonics. Other countries have done so, and so can the United States. With all the political craziness going on around us, we often forget that we have a voice. But don't forget we do have a voice and we can make a difference with votes and petitions.   Kiersten: Thanks everyone for listening and helping our backyard songbirds. Cheryl and I do have an announcement. This is the first episode of our last ten episodes. We will be ending The Feathered Desert. I think I can speak for both of us by saying we've have a wonderful time writing and producing this podcast. We've learned a lot and we hope you've learned a lot, as well.  Stick with us for our final episodes though!   

This week on North American Ag Spotlight Chrissy Wozniak learns about RNAi technology in agriculture from Todd Hauser, the Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Trillium Ag.  With more than 20 years of experience in biotechnology and gene silencing, Todd is a leader in the movement to modernize crop protection.  With an expert understanding of crop science and a passion to protect the long-term global food supply and the environment, Todd brings a unique combination of scientific experience and technological knowledge to Trillium Ag.Trillium Ag (www.trillium.ag) was founded in 2016 by Todd Hauser and Paul Olivier, two Seattle-area scientists and entrepreneurs with a more then 50 years of combined experience in bio-technology and RNA Interference (RNAi).  Their goal was to unlock the potential for a safer and more sustainable approach to farming by creating a revolutionary new class of biologicals that target pests and provide superior crop protection.  Leveraging their scientific expertise and new developments in RNAi technology, Trillium's co-founders recognized an opportunity to develop a crop protection platform that is greener, more effective and provides the answer to agriculture's escalating pest problem.      Traditional approaches to crop protection, such as synthetic chemicals and bacterial toxins, are in rapid decline. Due to increasing pest resistance, as well as regulatory and consumer pressures, there is an urgent need for new crop protection strategies in order to avoid continued worldwide crop losses of $220 billion annually.  The Trillium Ag team understood that the agricultural industry was facing a growing problem and it was critical to uncover a solution in order to secure the world's long-term food supply.  Tapping cutting-edge science and modern technology, Trillium Ag has developed Agrisome, the future of crop protection.Trillum Ag's patented Agrisome technology is a revolutionary crop protection platform that employs first-of-its-kind biologicals to target agriculture's most problematic pests, including, but not limited to, the lepidoptera and hemiptera insect classes.  Alone, these two orders of insects are responsible for $50 billion in crop losses across the globe annually.  Leveraging innovative RNAi science, Trillium Ag's breakthrough platform delivers a scalable, adaptable and stacked line of crop defense, providing a sustainable and biodegradable solution in the fight against crop-targeting pests. Agrisome utilizes naturally-derived protein coated RNA molecules creating a new class of biologicals that address and solve challenges that have hindered prior RNAi-derived crop protection attempts.  Agrisome targets and activates a pests own naturally occurring processes through gene silencing, unlocking a safer and more sustainable approach to farming.  Offering a topical and seed trait based product platform, Agrisome serves as a replacement for synthetic chemical pesticides and is poised to transform the agricultural industry. Agrisome has proven efficacy in both in vitro and in vivo models and Trillium Ag is currently collaborating with the industry's top commercial and academic leaders to further confirm commercial feasibility and broad scale agricultural application.  In addition, Trillium Ag's pipeline, which is based on naturally-derived protein coated RNA molecules, includes added sustainable bio-agriculture products currently in the research and development stage.Learn more about Trillium Ag at https://trillium.ag#rnai #modernfarming #agricultureNeed help with your agriculture based company's marketing plan? https://www.northamericanag.com/full-service-agri-marketingDon't just thank a farmer, pray for one too!Subscribe today at NorthAmericanAg.com!Subscribe to North American Ag at https://northamericanag.com

Neonics devastate the bees, birds, and other pollinators critical to New York's food security, economy, and environment. Neonics also threaten New Yorkers' health, especially that of children. The Birds and Bees Protection Act would address worsening neonic contamination by banning the harmful and unnecessary uses accounting for 80-90% of the neonics entering the states' environment every year. Daniel Raichel of NRDC talks to Mark Dunlea of Hudson Mohawk Magazine as to whether Governor Hochul will sign the bill into law.

BREAKING NEWS! Neonicotinoids banned in New York State The New York State Legislature has passed the Birds and Bees Protection Act, which limits the use of neonicotinoid pesticides, commonly referred to as neonics. This bill is the first of its kind in the United States and aims to reduce the use of neonic coatings on corn, soybean, and wheat seeds, as well as lawn and garden uses. Neonics are known to have a devastating impact on pollinators such as bees and birds, and have been linked to negative impacts on human health and the environment. The pesticides are believed to have caused massive bee and bird losses, contaminated water and soil, and created human health concerns. The new bill eliminates 80-90% of neonics entering New York's environment on a yearly basis and has gained support from a wide range of environmental, health, garden, social justice, and farm groups. The bill still permits the use of neonics for invasive species treatments, but this is expected to eliminate 80-90% of neonics entering New York's environment each year. While the Birds & Bees Protection Act does not go as far as Europe's total outdoor neonic ban, and Canada has largely phased out neonic-coated corn and soybean seeds, it is the first law to address neonic seed coatings in the U.S. New York farmers will still be able to grow their staple crops while limiting the damage done to the environment, water quality, and pollinators by neonic pesticides. Supporters of the bill hope it will help protect New York's environment, food security, and agricultural economy. The New York State Legislature's decision to regulate neonic pesticides is a significant move forward in promoting sustainable agriculture and protecting the environment. If you have any questions about this issue, tune in to my podcast where I will interview a lawyer. For more information, please check the press release: https://www.nrdc.org/press-releases/new-york-protects-birds-and-bees-nation-leading-legislation Or Listen to our Podcast Episode where I interview Dan Raichel one of the lawyers behind this important bill. or Watch the interview on YouTube.

We're not done with turkeys yet! This week, Matt, Tim, and Mark Drury host Deputy Director of Resource Management Jason Sumners and wild turkey biologist Nick Oakley, both from the Missouri Department on Conservation. The guys go through all the challenging factors our beloved bird is up against (spoiler alert, it's not just one). Neonicotinoids, season dates, nest raiders, poult production, and more, it's a comprehensive conversation and a crash course on likely culprits.  Want your turn in the spotlight? Submit your audition video, here!  Leave us a Question of the Day by clicking here and you could win a DeerCast hat! Watch every episode of the podcast on DeerCast and subscribe to the audio version of the show on the platform of your choice: Apple  Spotify 

Listen to the podcast here - https://www.northamericanag.com/north-american-ag-spotlight - The BeSure! Mission with Growing MattersIn this week's North American Ag Spotlight Chrissy Wozniak talks to Jeffrey Smith & Caydee Savinelli of Growing Matters. Growing Matters is a coalition of organizations and individuals committed to scientific discourse on the stewardship, benefits and alternatives of neonicotinoid insecticides in North America. Today we talk about the importance of neonics, what the industry could look like without them, and farming best practices when it comes to crop protection.Jeffrey Smith currently serves as Manager of Industry and Government Relations for Valent U.S.A. LLC where his primary responsibility is to develop partnerships with allied commodity and trade associations to advance policies supporting grower access to new crop and yield enhancement tools. Jeff also works with Federal and state regulatory agencies and legislatures on industry wide pesticide issues. Prior to his current role, he was a Field Market Development Specialist responsible for developing crop protection products row crop and specialty markets throughout the Midwestern, Southwestern and Southeastern United States.  Jeff also has experience in the retail sector of the industry, starting his career with Gold Kist, Inc.  Combined, Jeff has over 30 years of experience within the crop protection industry. Caydee Savinelli is the Syngenta U.S. Stewardship Team and Pollinator Lead.  In this role, she leads a team with goals of advocating, educating, and collaborating for stewardship of Syngenta products to provide farmers and golf and landscape professionals a variety of tools to control important pests.  The team provides a catalyst for change through Sustainable and Responsible Business and Good Growth Plan initiatives.  Some of the main areas of the stewardship team's focus are environmental issues, endangered species, pesticide safety education and pollinator and biodiversity conservation initiatives. Caydee has focused on pest management, product development and crop protection throughout her 38-year career and has worked in the U.S., Europe, and Latin America. Agriculture and horticulture are key to nourishing families and communities. Feeding a growing population, enhancing the beauty of our surroundings and a sustained commitment to environmental protection are fundamental needs that matter. Crop protection products, both natural and synthetic, are important tools that protect plants from tough and invasive pests that can devastate crops and urban landscapes. Growing Matters is funded by a consortium of companies committed to open and healthy scientific discourse on stewardship, benefits and alternatives to neonicotinoid insecticides in North America. Consortium members include Bayer, Syngenta, Valent U.S.A., BASF, and Mitsui Chemicals Agro, Inc. The BeSure! campaign is also supported by Gowan Company and PBI Gordon Corporation. Go to www.GrowingMatters.org for information, reports, videos and infographics on the benefits of neonicotinoid insecticides.Learn more aEnergrow's oilseed pressing system helps farmers CRUSH their feed costs.The easy way to make fresh, home-grown, high-quality meal + expeller-pressed oil, right on the farm. The fully automated, turnkey CRUSH-Pro is easy to set up and run 24/7.Learn more at - https://agr.fyi/energrow Sponsored by Tractors and Troubadours:Your weekly connection to agriculture industry newsmakers, hot-button industry issues, educational topics, rural lifestyle features and the best in true country music. Brought to you by Rural Strong Media.Listen now at https://ruralstrongmedia.com/tractors-and-troubadours/Subscribe to North American Ag at https://northamericanag.com

Alasdair speaks to Professor Mike Norton, Environment Programme Director at the European Academies Science Advisory Council, about newly published research on neonicotinoid pesticides. In 2013, the European Commission severely restricted the use of several 'neonics' due to emerging research showing they had wide ranging harfmul environmental impacts on insect populations and ecosystems. But last month, the European Court of Justice ruled that Belgium had abused emergency authorisations to continue using them. Many Member States have similiarly authorised their continued usage since 2013, and the EU is now considering stricter legislation to prohibit the substances. Further reading: - Read the full EASAC report here, or the press release here. - 'EU Court puts end to emergency use of bee-toxic pesticides', EURACTIV, Jan '23- 'Commission's verdict still out on EU court ruling on bee-toxic pesticides', EURACTIV, Feb '23- 'Neonicotinoids in Africa' - a 2020 article by Mike for Chemistry WorldClick here to visit The Future Unrefined, our curated collection of articles and podcasts on raw materials and extraction. Find more podcasts and articles at www.landclimate.org

Trimming corners, Hive Registration,Smoker Fuel, Neonics banned in NJ, Dysentery, Cottage Law, LLC, Mead, Local Hive Report

I saw a recent article wherein the Dept. of Natural Resources has been testing the spleens of road kill deer and deer spleens from hunters who sent them in wherein there were noenicitinoids found in all of them. This insecticide was found in deer that were in corn fields and deer in northern Minnesota away from any treated fields. Learn more and understand there is a lot more research to do. Check out today's Garden Bite.

Sorry to say, you need to worry about more than just the neonics being used in horticulture/agriculture and silvicuture/arboriculture.  As fast, actually way faster, as one pesticide's use is restricted slightly several more "novel" ones are licensed for use.   Add to that the horrifying number of pesticides used on plants/soils in our industry, and those related to ours, you get a  fatal stew of synergistic fatal effects for our beloved insects.    This week we chat with the truly brilliant, Dr. Harry Siviter, who has published an astonishing number of powerful research papers so early in his career.  His rigorous and extensive analyses and research has allowed him to make strong statements in top-tier scientific journals.   One of his key messages: "Therefore, while our results confirm that bans on neonicotinoid use will likely benefit wild bee populations, they will only be successful if paired with (1) changes to the agrochemical regulatory process, that ensures novel insecticides do not have a similar sub-lethal effects on non-Apis bees and (2) a reduction in intensive agriculture, and a move towards an integrated pest management approach that promotes biological control, and reduced insecticide use (Colin et al., 2020; Siviter & Muth, 2020). A failure to radically change food production, and agrochemical regulation, will result in a continued decline in bee populations that we rely on for functioning eco-systems." Listen in to hear why. And if you want to read more, here are the references to just a few of his impressive papers: Siviter H, Richman SK & Muth F (2021) Field‐realistic neonicotinoid exposure has sub‐lethal effects on non‐Apis bees: A meta‐analysis. Ecology Letters, 24, 2586–2597. Siviter H, Bailes EJ, Martin CD, Oliver TR, Koricheva J, Leadbeater E & Brown MJF (2021) Agrochemicals interact synergistically to increase bee mortality. Nature, 596, 389–392. Harry Siviter, Anthony K Johnson, Felicity Muth, Bumblebees Exposed to a Neonicotinoid Pesticide Make Suboptimal Foraging Decisions, Environmental Entomology, Volume 50, Issue 6, December 2021, Pages 1299–1303. Siviter H, Muth F. (2020) Do novel insecticides pose a threat to beneficial insects? Proc. R. Soc. B 287: 20201265. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2020.1265 Siviter, H., Brown, M.J.F. & Leadbeater, E. Sulfoxaflor exposure reduces bumblebee reproductive success. Nature 561, 109–112 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-018-0430-6   Our theme music was composed and performed by Heather's son Callum, and the challenging job of audio editing done by the uber-talented Laura Eccleston.  

We address the feedback we received on our episode with Sharon at Xerces in this episode.   Once again please please download Xerces Buying Bee Safe Plants document and keep asking the questions of everyone you buy plants from and be sure to ask about their use through the ENTIRE supply chain.   Our theme music was composed and performed by Heather's son Callum, and the challenging job of audio editing done by the uber-talented Laura Eccleston.

This was a bombshell of an interview for us.  We were horrified and brought to tears by what we learned from Sharon in this conversation.  Please please please download the two excellent guidelines for consumers and retailers about what to ask suppliers about the persistent systemic insecticides that may be present in your nursery bought plants-  ESPECIALLY if you buy from big box stores.  Buying Bee Safe Plants Offering Bee Safe Plants: Guide for Nurseries You can also learn so much from Xerces webinars on these topics: Buying Bee Safe Plants Webinar Sharon's top notch webinar about pesticides, which will teach you so much can be found here: Pesticides and Pollinators - Sharon's excellent webinar You think you are buying plants to help the pollinators- when in fact you are luring them to a potentially toxic plant that will kill them or prevent them from multiplying.  Yes, it is horrific... we all have to put pressure on the nursery industry- retail and wholesale to come clean about what they are doing. The essential references mentioned in the conversation: Understanding Neonicotinoids All the other systemic insecticides the nursery and ag industries are using And lastly, but by no means least- a timeline of the regulation (lack thereof) in Canada by the good folks at Edmonton Chapter of the Council of Canadians and Mark Stumpf-Allen of Alberta Organic Master Gardeners Neonicotenoid Timeline Canada   Our theme music was composed and performed by Heather's son Callum, and the challenging job of audio editing done by the uber-talented Laura Eccleston.

Neonicotinoid seed treatments can set back progress on regenerative properties with negative, cascading effects on beneficial insects.  Equally alarming, Neonics are proving detrimental to the health of our game species. This episode provides some background information for the episode to follow.

Trimming corners, Hive Registration,Smoker Fuel, Neonics banned in NJ, Dysentery, Cottage Law, LLC, Mead, Local Hive Report

Frame Manufacturing, Thermosolar Hive, Neonics and Deer, Varroa Mite impact workers, Ancient UK Bees, Fondant Recipe, Local Hive Report

Frame Manufacturing, Thermosolar Hive, Neonics and Deer, Varroa Mite impact workers, Ancient UK Bees, Fondant Recipe, Local Hive Report

Developed in the 1990s - Neonicotinoids or “Neonics” are the most widely used pesticides used in agriculture around the world today. Thought to be a safer pesticide, we now know they contribute to bee colony collapse, have decimated fish farms, contaminated water and are a known neurotoxin to humans. One seed treated with this pesticide will kill a small bird. If you have eaten anything non organic - you have ingested this pesticide. Today I am speaking with the Acting Director of NRDC's Pollinator Initiative, Dan Raichel and Dr. Kathleen Nolan, pediatrician and Co Founder and Director of Concerned Health Professionals of New York. We will discuss why it is crucial to our health and future generations that we ban neonics once and for all and how you can be a part of it by getting The Birds and Bees Protection Act passed in NY State.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/bethechange-with-christine-dimmick. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Developed in the 1990s - Neonicotinoids or “Neonics” are the most widely used pesticides used in agriculture around the world today. Thought to be a safer pesticide, we now know they contribute to bee colony collapse, have decimated fish farms, contaminated water and are a known neurotoxin to humans. One seed treated with this pesticide will kill a small bird. If you have eaten anything non organic - you have ingested this pesticide. Today I am speaking with the Acting Director of NRDC's Pollinator Initiative, Dan Raichel and Dr. Kathleen Nolan, pediatrician and Co Founder and Director of Concerned Health Professionals of New York. We will discuss why it is crucial to our health and future generations that we ban neonics once and for all and how you can be a part of it by getting The Birds and Bees Protection Act passed in NY State.Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/bethechange-with-christine-dimmick. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

­Everyone's concerned about dropping turkey numbers, but what if hunters are part of the problem? What if the food plots we're planting are hurting our cherished birds and other wildlife? Dr. Grant Woods of Growing Deer and Mark Drury join the show this week to discuss the potential threat of neonic seed coatings and what you can do about it. Want to be on the show? Leave us a Question of the Day by clicking here and you could win a DeerCast hat! Join the 100% Wild Crew! It's a Facebook group just for you and other 100% Wild podcasters! Watch every episode of the podcast on DeerCast or right here in your podcast player!

On this week's episode, Canadian Cattlemen field editor Piper Whelan looks at the implications for ranchers to a proposed open-pit coal mine in the Rocky Mountains of Alberta; reporter Robert Arnason of The Western Producer discusses the implications for farmers on the recent Health Canada ruling on neonicotinoid insecticides; and […]

On this week’s episode, Canadian Cattlemen field editor Piper Whelan looks at the implications for ranchers to a proposed open-pit coal mine in the Rocky Mountains of Alberta; reporter Robert Arnason of The Western Producer discusses the implications for farmers on the recent Health Canada ruling on neonicotinoid insecticides; and […]

Health Canada just published final decisions for its special reviews of clothianidin and thiamethoxam last Wednesday. The organization has also opened up a 60-day consultation period on how plant breeding is done in Canada. Today’s guest has a lot on their plate to discuss regarding these recent events, and how agricultural science is viewed by... Read More

On today’s  edition of RealAg Radio, you’ll hear a Beef Market Update with Anne Wasko of Gateway Livestock Exchange. You’ll also hear an issues panel featuring Lyndsey Smith, Kelvin Heppner, and Andrew Campbell. They’ll be talking about: Health Canada’s decision on two neonicotinoid active ingredients; Some comments on immigration and population growth; Farm show returns;... Read More

On today’s  edition of RealAg Radio, you’ll hear a Beef Market Update with Anne Wasko of Gateway Livestock Exchange. You’ll also hear an issues panel featuring Lyndsey Smith, Kelvin Heppner, and Andrew Campbell. They’ll be talking about: Health Canada’s decision on two neonicotinoid active ingredients; Some comments on immigration and population growth; Farm show returns;... Read More

Imker-Beschwerde wegen Neonics in RP

Quality not quantity, Unicorn Listeners, melt honey in oven, Melle water, Meditation, Propolis Tinctures, Neonics impact bee sleep, Pollen Tincture, Local Hive Report

Quality not quantity, Unicorn Listeners, melt honey in oven, Melle water, Meditation, Propolis Tinctures, Neonics impact bee sleep, Pollen Tincture, Local Hive Report

A new process to remove sea-lice from farmed salmon using Neonicotinoids has been trialled in Norway and could come to Scottish fish farms in the future. Neonics have been banned for use in arable farming because they are damaging to bees. Anna Hill asks Gareth Moore, Editor of fishfarmingexpert.com to explain the details. It's flower week on Farming Today, and for many growers this time of year would see them supplying weddings with blooms and bouquets. With coronavirus putting those on-hold, Rebecca Rooney has spoken to one grower in South Gloucestershire who has switched to selling online. Travel restrictions mean farmers are worried of a shortage of sheep shearers. But it’s not just sheep that need shearing, there are now more than 40 thousand Alpacas in the UK and Kim McAllister has been to a farm in Edinburgh to hear how one shearer made it over from New Zealand after had to self-isolate in his camper van. Producer: Toby Field

In this episode, we have the great pleasure of speaking with award-winning journalist, Stephen Leahy about the use of neonics, extremely harmful pesticides used in industrialized agriculture. We discuss how the most widely used pesticides pervasively contaminate our environment, threaten wildlife and put our global food supply at risk. All of life hangs in the balance upon a greater web. Evidence to our broken web of life hides in plain sight (and sound).LINKS:Stephen Leahy WILD ROOTS Patreon

Jerry Hayes is an internationally recognized honey bee expert and columnist for the American Bee Journal.  In this interview, Hayes discusses the causes of Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), the first time he saw Africanized Honey Bees during the autopsy of a 900 lbs. horse, and the fascinating behavior of honey bees.Hayes has been featured on the cover of Wired Magazine, featured in books about bees and at one point worked for Monsanto to try to stop the deadly bee parasite: the Varroa Mite.

Host Shaun Haney is back from Las Vegas and ready to cover the top ag issues impacting your farm! In today’s RealAg Radio: You’ll  hear the top ag news stories of the day with Jessika Guse We dip into the RealAg mail bag to hear your feedback and thoughts from email and the RealAg listener... Read More

Neonicotinoids are the most popular – and the most poisonous – insecticides in the world. The large-scale collateral damage caused by neonicotinoids, or ‘neonics’ in short, on our ecosystem has been suppressed for years by industry spin doctors and intensive lobbying by producers of this agricultural poison. Jeroen van der Sluijs argues that, although the recent EU ban on neonics is an important step it is not yet enough to turn the tide. Written by Jeroen van der Sluijs and read by Julia Lagoutte. Text version: www.greeneuropeanjournal.eu/the-ipcc-report-and-its-political-implications/ Twitter: twitter.com/GreenEUJournal Facebook: facebook.com/greeneuropeanjournal

On episode 36 we welcome Shauna Sadowski - Head of Sustainability, Natural & Organic Operating Unit at General Mills. "The way we manage agricultural lands is driving many environmental and social challenges and I seek to create solutions that account for a more balanced, triple-bottom line (people, planet and profits) outcome. I care deeply about the food that ends up on your plate and work to create a healthy and balanced system for people and the planet" explains Sadowski about our role in properly managing natural resources to feed ourselves moving forward. Throughout the 45 minute conversation Shauna shares some interesting anecdotes of situations that have arisen in her time at as VP at Annie's, and most recently while managing the organic allotment of General Mills' vast arsenal of products.  "I believe that food companies have an opportunity and a responsibility to play a significant and positive role in creating a more sustainable food system. I work cross-functionally and throughout the industry to create programs that enable transparency to the farm and a deeper understanding of how our agricultural and farming systems connect to the foods we eat."   Earlier this year Annie's and General Mills launched a wireframe for their regenerative scorecard.  The objective of the scorecard tool is to encourage producer commitment and consumer awareness to soil health.  It seems a shared language would be a big win for food values.  Now, heading up Sustainability and Organic brands for a fortune 500 company with 38,000 employees - Shauna continues to demonstrate her commitment to moving the industry more regenerative through creatives approaches that bridge a production divide.    It's interesting stuff - have a listen:

Local Hive Report, Tomentum, Neonics, African Bee Protection, Hive Size for Overwintering, Broodminder T2, Listener Mail, Closing Comments

On episode 35 we welcome Dr. Jonathan Lundgren.  After 11 years at the USDA, responsible for his own lab and a good sized staff, the career of this well-regarded scientist and author began to fall apart as he published research that cautioned against the use of specific pesticides approved by the federal agency. Continuously penalized for his actions, Dr. Lundgren was soon forced out of the USDA as retaliation against his scientific findings and for not backing down.  A whistle blower case was filled against the USDA stating the actions of leadership in the agency was to suppress his voice, to suppress his science. Dr. Lundgren had done extensive research into the pesticide Neonicotinoid (neonics), and their impact on bees. Lundgren discovered that one kernel of GMO corn has enough neonics to kill 360,000 bees. These potent neurotoxin synthetics are now the most used pesticides in the world. Used on mass and vast scale stateside – his research showed that we were wiping out 150% (after re-queening) of our hives annually. Lundgren stood tall and let the piece fall as they may. "The planet is facing some pretty serious issues right now, and we need people to stand-up and do the right thing for the right reasons." Lundgren states in explaining his actions.  So, if not Jonathan, than who was going to step forward and risk their career for something they’d believed in; for something that is true and just?  As it turned out, Lundgren proved to be a pioneer in his efforts.  The USDA was laster hit with 200 additional cases by whistle blowing scientist who corroborated Lundgren’s claims that the agency tampering or muzzling their findings. The ripple effect of Lundgren’s actions are being witnessed in realtime throughout broader federal agencies where scientists, public servants and concerned systems thinkers are standing tall for what’s right. Today, Dr. Jonathan Lundgren is the founder and director of the Ecdysis foundation.  He’s set on changing the minds of farmers around the world backed on the research he does at the Blue Dasher Farm Lab. Through the support of his community and supporters Lundgren crowd-funded his research lab focused on the future of regenerative agriculture.  In our 35 minute conversation we cover subjects including planetary stability, professional science, future food & farming, and much more.  Have a listen you what this truthteller has to say. www.SourcingMatters.show

Did the herd grow or shrink? Barb Duckworth of The Western Producer looks at Canadian cattle numbers, Alexis Stockford with the Manitoba Co-operator and Lee Hart of Grainews report on the worrying lack of feed and water for prairie livestock, Ed White of The Western Producer provides an update on […]

In this second episode of Season 9, Matt and Erin bounce around a variety of topics. First, Matt provides an update on the neonicotinoid ban in Europe. Neonics have been temporarily banned in Europe for a few years because of risk to honey bees, bumble bees and wild bees. In February, more news came out that supports these risks to pollinators. A vote will happen soon that could possibly permanently restrict or ban neonic use in Europe. Then, Erin reminds us ticks are active in Iowa right now, so beware of these disease vectors if you are in areas with tall vegetation. Over 250 cases of Lyme disease and 17 cases of Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever were confirmed in Iowa in 2017. Send your ticks in for ID at the ISU Plant and Insect Diagnostic Clinic.  Thanks, Andy, for the honey drop off! Learn more about Meadow Blazingstar honey and candles here.  Ever wondered what your state insect? Look at the Wikipedia list. Why doesn't Iowa have a state insect?  

LINKS CONTACT:  podcast@worldorganicnews.com   Podcast Like a Pro: mrjonmoore.com   FREE .PDF One Square Metre Garden: square@worldorganicnews.com   Blog: www.worldorganicnews.com   Facebook Page:  World Organic News Facebook page.   WORLD ORGANIC NEWS No Dig Gardening Book: Click here EU votes to ban bee-harming pesticides – INKLINE https://wp.me/p5Cqpo-mjw DDT https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDT Silent Spring https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Spring  

In Today's Episode This week Vidal decided to bring Martha Rosenberg back into her show. Along with her investigations about food, Martha also has much research into the medical industry. This time the audience will be enlightened about hormone imbalances and the truth about the drugs doctors are using to treat women and men.   Martha Rosenberg is a nationally-recognized investigative health reporter, whose food and drug exposé, Born with a Junk Food Deficiency, won an American Society of Journalists and Authors honorable mention. Rosenberg has appeared on CSPAN, National Public Radio, and lectured at the medical school and university levels.   Martha is also an editorial cartoonist, whose articles have been published in the San Francisco Chronicle, The Providence Journal, The Chicago Tribune, as well as in many more publications.   Most disease, including cancer, come from toxins; you need to be informed about what is threatening your health and start your way to detox as soon as possible. Take a big breath and open your eyes to the reality behind pharma and food industries. Enjoy the show! Knowledge is power and health is freedom!   Outline of This Great Episode [11:12] The marketing of the hormone replacement for women and testosterone for men. [13:18] Main disruptors of our hormone system. [15:02] BPA free is not enough. Get rid of plastic. [16:05] Why do you want fragrance free products. [16:32] How the Environmental Working Group works. [18:04] Flame retardant is hidden everywhere. [19:09] There are plastic and mercury in the fish we eat. [21:55] Avoid antibacterial in detergent and soap. [28:40] Neonics are killing the bees. [32:09] Which are the foods that are filled with hormones? [33:40] Reasons why you should not drink milk. [43:22] Prostate cancer, PSA screening test. [48:04] Overtreatment and its consequences. [49:11] Why young men are having problems getting erections? [52:06] The lies about cancer treatment. [1:00:40] Hypocrisy in the Breast Cancer Month movement. [1:01:14] Menopausal symptoms. [1:05:20] Consequences of hormone replacement treatment. [1:11:38] Osteoporosis. [1:16:19] There are alternatives for keeping hormone system balance. [1:20:22] Consume flaxseed and grind them yourself. [1:24:33] Foods to balance your hormones: chase Berries, fennel, raspberry leaf tea, maca powder, cacao. [1:30:24] Yaca is a natural painkiller.   Mentioned In This Episode Visit Deborah Vidal and subscribe to this podcast! Vidal thanks you for using her banner for your shopping. Environmental Working Group Maca Powder Thrive market   Connect with Today's Guest Read more about Martha Rosenberg Buy Martha Rosenberg's book. Twitter @MarthRosenberg Facebook Martha Rosenberg

Local Hive Report, Neonics in Honey, RNAi Primer, Dicamba Troubles, Selling Honey, RIRDC YouTube, Cut Out Video, Bees and Beer Event, Bee Free Honee Pt. 2, Closing Comments

LINKS CONTACT:  podcast@worldorganicnews.com   FREE .PDF One Square Metre Garden: square@worldorganicnews.com   Blog: www.worldorganicnews.com   Scientists found bee-killing neonicotinoids in 75% of honey sampled from around the world — Quartz http://www.worldorganicnews.com/61084/scientists-found…the-world-quartz/ journal Science Why Bees Matter so Much to Humans http://www.onegreenplanet.org/environment/why-bees-matter-so-much-to-humans/ Converting Golf Courses in: In Defense of a Modern Yeomanry http://www.worldorganicnews.com/published-books/long-pieces-and-ideas/ **** This is the World Organic News for the week ending 16th of October 2017. Jon Moore reporting! We begin this week with a worrying development in honey. From the Blog Quartz comes the post: Scientists found bee-killing neonicotinoids in 75% of honey sampled from around the world. Quote: A study published Oct. 6 in the journal Science found that a significant amount of the world’s honey contains traces of neonicotinoids, a class of commonly used pesticides, at levels strong enough to cause brain damage in bees. The chemicals are meant to attack the nervous systems of pests and keep them from eating crops, but it appears they may also hurt bees, which have been dying off in huge numbers in recent years, much to the befuddlement of researchers around the globe. End Quote This is a deeply concerning piece of research. There is some argument for the fact that neonics may not be killing bees outright, that is, there’s a full colony on day one and no colony on day three but that they are more insidious. By weakening the adult females collecting the honey they don’t tend to live as long as they would have. This means the next wave of workers have to step up before they are fully mature and the cycle continues until there aren’t any workers to feed the hive. So a slow collapse of the colony structure by the gradual effect of increased wakening. Add to this the neonics in the honey and the problem is magnified. This may or may not be the cause of colony collapse disorder but it seems a fair working hypothesis. Because neonics are systemic, that is they reside in every cell of the treated plant, there is no mechanism for avoiding them. They are effective at killing pests which, bite, burrow into and suck sap but there are other insects which are of benefit to the producer. Apart from honeybees and all the other species of bees which assist with pollination, there are the predator species which attack the plant destroying insects. Now a monoculture of a crop will attract the unwanted insects as quickly as free beer attracts alcoholics. And monocultures are the prefered cultures for industrial farming methods. Economies of scale, cost savings on fencing, remotely operated or even “smart” in air quotes self driving tractors. These economic considerations make perfect sense if the full costs are not paid for by the producer. So things like health costs to the general population from long exposure to carcinogenic pesticides like the now banned DDT are covered by the healthcare industry not the producers of the pesticides. They can keep their costs relatively low and change a very healthy margin to farmers who have been convinced to plant monocultures, invest in expensive machinery and now need a return on investment to keep the banks happy. The monocultures and their economies of scale create feeding grounds for pest insects. The farmers need to return a profit or go bankrupt, the insecticide companies don’t pay the full costs imposed by their products and therefore we have DDT and neonics to name but a few. The difference between DDT and neonics is that DDT had to be resprayed every time there was an outbreak of pests. Neonics sit there, in the plant, ready to attack the nervous system of any insect that consumes a plant part. Hooray for science! Less spraying equals good for the environment, no? Well, yes and no. Yes, if less spraying means less pesticide actually in the environment but in the case of systemic pesticides, the answer is a very definite NO! Neonics sit there, just waiting, in every cell of the plant. Not surprisingly this also includes pollen and nectar cells. Pollinators smack bang up against these cells and their neonic compounds. But i hear you ask: Such tiny amounts can have much of an effect, can they? I’m so glad you asked. From the post: Quote: For the study, researchers analyzed 198 honey samples from around the world, testing them for five common neonicotinoids: acetamiprid, clothianidin, imidacloprid, thiacloprid, and thiamethoxam. They discovered that at least one of those was present in 75% of the samples. And 34% of the samples contained a concentration of the compounds known to be lethal to bees. End quote. It would appear some form of regulation or ban on these chemicals should have happened yesterday but has only been partially implemented in the EU. Why are bees so important? After all, not everyone gets their sugar from honey. Honey is almost a pleasant side effect of bees and their behaviours. A post from One Green Planet dot org from back March 26 this year gives a few clues. Quote: A new study published in Nature Communications found that just two percent of wild bee species contributes 80 percent of the crop pollination visits observed globally. This means that if this small percentage of bees disappears … then 80 percent of our agricultural system will collapse. Seventy of the top 100 food crops grown worldwide rely on pollinators, this is equivalent to 90 percent of the world’s nutrition. It might sound unbelievable, but without bees we can say goodbye to food such as apples, almonds, oranges and avocados. End Quote. Indeed we would be left with plants which are either wind pollinated or which reproduce asexually. So basically things like cereals, wheat, rye, maize, sorghum and so on, potatoes and pineapples! I love pineapples but really I would prefer other fruits too. Some herbs could continue through propagation by cuttings, so rosemary, sage and the like. It does seem we would be left with a very dull diet with very poor nutritional outcomes. Bees matter! Bees matter a lot. As do those birds which assist in the pollination process and the other insects, butterflies, some wasps and the like. We have a choice. Fill every cell of every food plant with a poison to kill insects, including bees and move to a diet of spuds, bread and pineapples or end the use of systemic and other, I would argue, all other pesticides. This will mean a necessary change in the means of production. Monocultures will have to go. Alley cropping is one solution which still maintains some economies of scale while adding the benefits of habitat for beneficial insects and birds, reducing soil erosion, protecting crops and livestock and increasing tree numbers. There are solutions. I have argued elsewhere in this podcast and on the blog http://www.worldorganicnews.com/published-books/long-pieces-and-ideas/ that supporting a large number of smaller farmers would bring even more benefits to both the farmers and society as a whole. We could start by converting and rehabilitating every or maybe nearly every golf course and earth and turning them into local organic food producing hubs. There are ways, we must seize them before it is too late. Live in hope and grow at least a little of your own food. To that end, the one square metre garden handout is still available. email me at square@worldorganicnews.com and it’ll be in your inbox pronto! There’s a link at the top of the show notes. And with that I’ll finish up for this week. Thank you for listening and I'll be back at the same time. **** LINKS CONTACT:  podcast@worldorganicnews.com   FREE .PDF One Square Metre Garden: square@worldorganicnews.com   Blog: www.worldorganicnews.com   Scientists found bee-killing neonicotinoids in 75% of honey sampled from around the world — Quartz http://www.worldorganicnews.com/61084/scientists-found…the-world-quartz/ journal Science Why Bees Matter so Much to Humans http://www.onegreenplanet.org/environment/why-bees-matter-so-much-to-humans/ Converting Golf Courses in: In Defense of a Modern Yeomanry http://www.worldorganicnews.com/published-books/long-pieces-and-ideas/

From doggone insect issues to dream farm shops, we have some exciting things to cover on this week’s episode of Wheat Pete’s Word. RealAg agronomist Peter Johnson tackles some cereal questions regarding harvest timing, winter cereal planting, nitrogen losses in manure, and more. Listen here, and read some of the highlights below: Your questions/feedback/yield results are... Read More

The results of the first large-scale field study looking at neonicotinoid pesticides and their impact on bees has caused controversy. It was carried out by the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (CEH) and commissioned and funded by the agricultural chemical companies Syngenta and Bayer. However, both companies have expressed dissatisfaction with the paper. Adam Rutherford talks to Dr Peter Campbell from Syngenta and Dr Ben Woodcock from CEH about the results. In a separate project, beekeepers have been trying to improve hive health by breeding 'hygienic bees'. These nifty insects love to keep their homes clean and free from disease, improving colony numbers and reducing the need to use antibiotics. Reporter Rory Galloway embarks on some fieldwork at the University of Sussex, with Luciano Scandin, Honeybee Research Facility Manager and Francis Ratnieks, Professor of Apiculture. What happens when you rap inside an MRI scanner? Neuroscientist Sophie Scott wanted to find out. She's been making movies of the internal workings of some extraordinary voice boxes, owned by beatboxers, opera singers and rappers, like biochemist Alex Lathbridge aka Thermoflynamics. Presenter: Adam Rutherford Researcher: Caroline Steel Producer: Michelle Martin.

Dave Goulson is Professor of Biology at Sussex University, founder of the Bumblebee Conservation Trust and has published over 200 scientific articles on the ecology of bees and other insects. His published books include Bumblebees; their behaviour, ecology and conservation (2010, Oxford University Press) and A Sting in the Tale (2013, Jonathan Cape), and A Buzz in the Meadow (2017, Vintage Books. Brigit Strawbridge is a campaigner on behalf of bumblebees and other wild bees and is currently working on her first book.  Our conversation includes ways in which beekeepers can help support other pollinators; the impact of pesticides, habitat loss and diseases on wild bees; the dangers of neonicotinoids, and the current state of bee research. Recorded at Brimpts Farm on Dartmoor during the Moor Meadows conference on July 1st 2017.  

We sit down with lawyer Charles Hatt and scientist Elaine McDonald about how neonics are threatening pollinators and our case to protect them. Next, we chat with longtime Ecojustice staff member Carol McDonald and reflect back many years at Ecojustice. Look how far we've come!

In this week's segment of The Neonicotinoid View, host June Stoyer and Colorado beekeeper, Tom Theobald talk to Walter Haefeker who will be talking to us from Luxembourg, at the European Court of Justice helping to defend the ban on neonicotinoids. Walter is the president of the European Professional Beekeepers Association, Board of Directors of the German Professional Beekeepers Association coordinator of the International Federation of Beekeepers' Associations (Apimondia) Working Group 10 on GMOs “The Neonicotinoid View”, which is produced by The Organic View Radio Show is unique, weekly program that explores the impact of neonicotinoids on the environment. Tune in each week as host, June Stoyer and Colorado beekeeper, Tom Theobald, explore the latest research and news from the beekeeping community. Today's show is sponsored by Austria's Finest Naturally Authentic Pumpkin Seeds and Pumpkin Seed Oil from the Steiermark available at OrganicUniverse.com. Listeners of TheOrganicView can receive $1 off their purchase by using the coupon code "orgview".  For more offers, please visit our website at www.theorganicview.com

In this week's segment of The Neonicotinoid View, host June Stoyer and Tom Theobald talk about efforts in the city of Chicago to ban neonicotinoids as well as an EPA hosted conference call to discuss the effects of glyphosate. Stay tuned!  “The Neonicotinoid View”, which is produced by The Organic View Radio Show is unique, weekly program that explores the impact of neonicotinoids on the environment. Tune in each week as host, June Stoyer and Colorado Beekeeper, Tom Theobald explore the latest research and news from the beekeeping community. Tune in to The Organic View Radio Show, Monday through Friday at 6pm Eastern and visit our contest section at www.theorganicview.com/contests to win one of our monthly prizes! Today's show is sponsored by Eden Foods the most trusted name in certified organic clean food! When you shop online at EdenFoods.com enter the coupon code “ORGVIEW” to receive 20% OFF any regularly priced items (excluding cases). For other promotional offers, please visit TheOrganicView.com's website.  

In this week's segment of The Neonicotinoid View, host June Stoyer and Tom Theobald talk about why efforts are being made to continue planting wildflowers without testing for neonicotinoids and the new federal lawsuit against EPA regarding labeling of seed treatments. Stay tuned!   “The Neonicotinoid View”, which is produced by The Organic View Radio Show is unique, weekly program that explores the impact of neonicotinoids on the environment. Tune in each week as host June Stoyer and Colorado beekeeper, Tom Theobald explore the latest research and news from the beekeeping community. Today's show is sponsored by Eden Foods the most trusted name in certified organic clean food! When you shop online at EdenFoods.com enter the coupon code “ORGVIEW” to receive 20% OFF any regularly priced items (excluding cases). For other promotional offers, please visit TheOrganicView.com's website.  Tune in to The Organic View Radio Show, Monday through Friday @6pm Eastern and visit our contest section at www.theorganicview.com/contests to win one of our monthly prizes!

In this week's segment of The Neonicotinoid View, host June Stoyer and Tom Theobald discuss new research on the impact of pesticides on bee sperm. Stay tuned!  “The Neonicotinoid View”, which is produced by The Organic View Radio Show is unique, weekly program that explores the impact of neonicotinoids on the environment. Tune in each week as June and Tom explore the latest research and news from the beekeeping community. Tune in to The Organic View Radio Show, Monday through Friday @6pm Eastern and visit our contest section at www.theorganicview.com/contests to win one of our monthly prizes! Today's show is sponsored by Eden Foods the most trusted name in certified organic clean food! When you shop online at EdenFoods.com enter the coupon code “ORGVIEW” to receive 20% OFF any regularly priced items (excluding cases). For other promotional offers, please visit TheOrganicView.com's website.

Dr. Cynthia Scott-Dupree and Dr. Brady Deaton discuss the science that informs understanding of the relationship between bees and neonics - a pesticide that has recently been made subject to new restrictive regulations in Ontario, Canada and elsewhere.

Discussion about new ban on neonicotinoids in Europe and how Brexit will impact the environment. “The Neonicotinoid View”, which is produced by The Organic View Radio Show is unique, weekly program that explores the impact of neonicotinoids on the environment. Tune in each week as June and Tom explore the latest research and news from the beekeeping community. Today's show is sponsored by Eden Foods the most trusted name in certified organic clean food! When you shop online at EdenFoods.com enter the coupon code “ORGVIEW” to receive 20% OFF any regularly priced items (excluding cases). For other promotional offers, please visit TheOrganicView.com's website. Tune in to The Organic View Radio Show, Monday through Friday @6pm Eastern and visit our contest section at www.theorganicview.com/contests to win one of our monthly prizes!

Everyone loves to point the finger at the cause of Colony Collapse Disorder; here's what we actually know.

No one likes getting stung by a bee, but with bee populations plummeting, it's time to understand why. Jen Sass joins us to explain the issues with neonicotinoids, an insecticide that's showing unintended consequences around the globe.   ----------------------------- SustainabilityDefined is the podcast that seeks to define sustainability, one concept (and bad joke) at a time. Hosted by Jay Siegel and Scott Breen. Each episode focuses on a single topic that helps push sustainability forward. We explain each topic with the help of an experienced pro, place it within our organizational tree, and help our listeners define what exactly sustainability is, episode by episode. We have divided our organizational tree into the following seven sectors: Energy Cities Natural Environment Transportation Business Policy Social Each episode is categorized under one of our sectors and visually depicted within our organizational tree. The more episodes we complete, the more the tree will visually define what exactly sustainability means. www.sustainabilitydefined.com

In this week's segment of The Neonicotinoid View, host June Stoyer and Colorado beekeeper, Tom Theobald, discuss a ban on glyphosate in Spain due to health concerns, neonicotinoids wiping out dragonflies on rice paddies in Japan, and more news from Boulder Colorado on the use of gmo's on public land. Stay tuned!  “The Neonicotinoid View”, which is produced by The Organic View Radio Show is unique, weekly program that explores the impact of neonicotinoids on the environment. Tune in each week as June and Tom explore the latest research and news from the beekeeping community.

In this week's segment of The Neonicotinoid View, host June Stoyer and Tom Theobald continue the discussion about the New Zealand Study on Chlorpyrifos, unsettling news about the German population contamination due to glyphosate, scientific integrity policy reform, neonics in building materials and Illinois ban on neonics! Stay tuned!  “The Neonicotinoid View”, which is produced by The Organic View Radio Show is unique, weekly program that explores the impact of neonicotinoids on the environment. Tune in each week as June and Tom explore the latest research and news from the beekeeping community. Today's show is sponsored by Eden Foods the most trusted name in certified organic clean food! When you shop online at EdenFoods.com enter the coupon code “ORGVIEW” to receive 20% OFF any regularly priced items (excluding cases). For other promotional offers, please visit TheOrganicView.com's website. Do you like FREE stuff? Tune in to The Organic View Radio Show, Monday through Friday @6pm Eastern and visit our contest section at www.theorganicview.com/contests to win one of our monthly prizes!

Pesticides and habit changes are killing honeybees.  What can we do to rescue these vital pollinators?  We talk honey, hives, gardening, and "the birds and the bees" in this month's episode.  Interviews with Jessica Lamden and Kirk Anderson.   Helpful bee information What does a honey bee eat and how do they collect it?  -Catskill Provisions  Why do honey bees need pollen? -Bee Pollen Products HoneyLove, urban bee keepers (website of the McFarlands, authors of Save the Bees with Natural Backyard Hives) The Orchard Mason Bee: The Life History, Biology, Propagation, and Use of a North American Native Bee  by Brian L. Griffin (Author), Sharon Smith (Illustrator) Bee friendly plants  Suggestions for planting a bee garden from Honey Bee Conservancy Natural Resources Defense Council information on saving the bees Nature Conservancy’s page on bees  Suggestions for planting a bee garden from Honey Bee Conservancy Kirk Anderson’s Apiary Apricot Lane Farms Call to Action Contact the biggest manufacturer of Neonics, Bayer I could not, of course, locate an actual address for the CEO of Bayer but here is his snail mail address.  I’d just write a note addressed to the CEO of Bayer MY research indicates that this is: Dr. Marijn Dekkers, 51368 Leverkusen, Germany, Phone: +49 214 30-1 Monsanto, thee US’s the biggest ahem, home grown, polluter.  Their website claims they are a “sustainable corporation.”  Contact them and tell them what you think Two websites to find your congressperson and/or your senator and/or your state senator so you can email all of them about banning Neonics and saving the bees: OpenCongress.org House.gov

In this week's segment of The Neonicotinoid View, special guest, Dr Jonathan Lundgren talks to host June Stoyer and Colorado beekeeper, Tom Theobald about his research on neonicotinoids, the role of biodiversity in food production and pest management, the risk assessment of neonicotinoids and GM crops and his new endeavor with Blue Dasher Farm. Stay tuned! “The Neonicotinoid View”, which is produced by The Organic View Radio Show is unique, weekly program that explores the impact of neonicotinoids on the environment. Tune in each week as June and Tom explore the latest research and news from the beekeeping community.

Local Hive Report, European study on Neonics, Bee Activities, EPA Imidicloprid, Oxalic and Nosema, Thriving or Dying, Following a Swarm, One Gallon Mead, Winter Feeding, New BKCorner Website

Episode Topics: Local Hive Report, Neonics not helpful for Soybeans, Queen Replacement Guidance, Using Honey to lure bees to water, 8 Frames vs. 10 Frames, Bear Platform, Golden Mean-Top Bar Hives-Foundationless Strategy, Scale Data, Propolis Etc. Catalog – Alcohol Wash Containers, Most popular BKCorner episodes, Collapse and Recovery

In this second episode of Season 9, Matt and Erin bounce around a variety of topics. First, Matt provides an update on the neonicotinoid ban in Europe. Neonics have been temporarily banned in Europe for a few years because of risk to honey bees, bumble bees and wild bees. In February, more news came out that supports these risks to pollinators. A vote will happen soon that could possibly permanently restrict or ban neonic use in Europe. Then, Erin reminds us ticks are active in Iowa right now, so beware of these disease vectors if you are in areas with tall vegetation. Over 250 cases of Lyme disease and 17 cases of Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever were confirmed in Iowa in 2017. Send your ticks in for ID at the ISU Plant and Insect Diagnostic Clinic.  Thanks, Andy, for the honey drop off! Learn more about Meadow Blazingstar honey and candles here.  Ever wondered what your state insect? Look at the Wikipedia list. Why doesn't Iowa have a state insect?