Neonicotinoids

Stop Using Neonicotinoids

It’s really dangerous to be a bee

Let’s learn a little more about the planet’s most common offending chemicals; found in your homes, offices, and on your pets.

Have you ever talked-to or overheard anyone saying something like:

“I’ve heard that bees are dying.  Why are bees dying?  Do we know why?  I’ve heard that mites and cell phones are the cause.”

Yes.  Scientists do know.  

The biggest manmade reason that pollinators like bees are dying is a chemical class called Neonicotinoids.

For bees and other pollinators, chemical insecticide products used in homes and crops all over the globe cause a variety of neurological (brain!) conditions which result in unnecessary death.  Honey bees, specifically, are dying faster than they can repopulate.

Humanity must quickly take action in order to prevent unimaginable catastrophe.  (Can you even imagine no vegetables, spices, nuts, and fruits?)

About Neonicotinoids

Here are some facts about the chemicals, called Neonicotinoids (think Nicotine!), that are used worldwide on farms and in homes:

• Very persistent in soil and water soluble.
• Systemic pesticides applied at the root (as seed coating or drench) and then taken up through the plant’s vascular system to be expressed in pollen, nectar and guttation droplets (like dew) from which bees then forage and drink.
• Systemics on food cannot be washed off.
• Nicotine-like, neurotoxic insecticides that bind to nicotinic acetylcholine receptors in insects’ brains.
• Bees have a particular genetic vulnerability to these & other pesticides because they have more of these receptors, as well as more learning and memory genes, and fewer genes for detoxification.
• Widely used on more than 140 crop varieties, as well as on termites, flea treatments, lawns and gardens.
• Fastest-growing class of synthetic pesticides in history.
• Imidacloprid is Bayer’s top-selling Neonicotinoid chemical; used to treat fleas on pets.

Resource:  http://www.panna.org/current-campaigns/bees

* Psst!  Monsanto is involved with organic product labeling.

Click here to read more about the challenges of current commercial organic food labeling organization and policy.