The Silence of the Bees

Just a reminder of what's at stake.

One Third of U.S. Bird Species Endangered

Heartbreaking, awful, reprehensible.

Read the New York Times article here.

Check out the video about the report's findings and download the full report, which is the result of an extraordinary collaboration between numerous groups, including Cornell Lab of Ornithology, National Audubon Society, The Nature Conservancy, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the U.S. Geological Survey.

Also, see this resource on things you can do to do the birds a good turn.

Bee-Defenders Unite!

British bee-defender Phil Chandler has posted an excellent piece on The Barefoot Beekeeper about the bizarre situation whereby the British Bee Keepers Association (BBKA) is endorsing certain highly questionable pesticides as "bee-friendly."

BBKA's agreement to endorse pesticides of any kind is at best an acute case of strange bedfellows...at worst...it's perverse, highly suspect, bonkers, and criminal in the Karmic sense. Something's very wrong here, and I'm glad Chandler is speaking out.

Read Chandler's Ten Reasons Why the BBKA Should Not Take Bayer's Money

And see Chandler speak on the issue here:

Is the BBKA too close to Bayer? from Gord Campbell on Vimeo.

Palin's Pallin' Around

Jellyfish in a Coalmine

From this week's New York Times article, Stinging Tentacles Offer Hint of Oceans' Decline:

“These jellyfish near shore are a message the sea is sending us saying, ‘Look how badly you are treating me,’” said Dr. Josep-María Gili, a leading jellyfish expert, who has studied them at the Institute of Marine Sciences of the Spanish National Research Council in Barcelona for more than 20 years.

The explosion of jellyfish populations, scientists say, reflects a combination of severe overfishing of natural predators, like tuna, sharks and swordfish; rising sea temperatures caused in part by global warming; and pollution that has depleted oxygen levels in coastal shallows.

A Bitter Pill from Bayer

A highly worthwhile article appeared in the L.A. Times on July 30th regarding the possible link between the "disappearing honeybees" (Colony Collapse Disorder) and Bayer pesticides. Here's a taste:

"It's likely that most people have never heard of Gaucho. And no, it's not a South American cowboy. I'm talking about a pesticide.

"There is increasing reason to believe that Gaucho and other members of a family of highly toxic chemicals -- neonicotinoids -- may be responsible for the deaths of billions of honeybees worldwide. Some scientists believe that these pesticides, which are applied to seeds, travel systemically through the plant and leave residues that contaminate the pollen, resulting in bee death or paralysis. The French refer to the effect as 'mad bee disease' and in 1999 were the first to ban the use of these chemicals, which are currently only marketed by Bayer (the aspirin people) under the trade names Gaucho and Poncho. Germany followed suit this year, and its agricultural research institute said it concluded that the poisoning of the bees was because of the rub-off of the pesticide clothianidin (that's Pancho) from corn seeds.

So why did the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2002 grant an 'emergency' exemption allowing increased use of Gaucho -- typically invoked during a major infestation -- when only a few beetles were found in blueberries? Why did the agency also grant a "conditional" registration for its close relative, Pancho, allowing the chemical on the market with only partial testing? And why is the agency, hiding behind a curtain of "trade secrets," still refusing to disclose whether the additional tests required of companies in such cases were conducted and, if so, with what results?

"Therein lies a tale. Most pesticides, we're told, are safe. So we add about 5 billion pounds a year of these deadly chemicals to our world, enough to encircle the planet if it were packaged in 100-pound sacks...."

Excerpted from Buzzzzzzzz kill by Al Meyerhoff, Los Angeles Times, July 30, 2008

Read the whole important thing right here.

The Larger Sanity

An example of what Gary Snyder might call "the larger sanity":

A man with vertigo scales the 52-story New York Times building without rope, harness, or parachute to make a statement about the urgency of global warming.

Thank you, Alain, for popping over from Paris to remind us of what we already know and aren't yet doing nearly enough about.

Alain Robert: The Solution is Simple

Bees and Air Pollution—Again

Last week I wrote about an important report from University of Virginia linking air pollution with difficulties among pollinators—including honeybees—in locating the fragrances and chemical signals flowers use to attract pollinators. This is important news, and we're not hearing nearly enough about it in the mainstream media.

Thank goodness for WNYC and other un-bought media outlets with brains in tact. Leonard Lopate interviews the researcher, Professor Jose D. Fuentes, who provides in-depth information on his research and its quite major implications (including its possible correlation with the dreaded CCD). The conversation is fascinating and well worth a listen.

Bees Vs. Police

I get it that "Africanized" honeybees don't mess around when it comes to defending themselves (why should they?) and I have genuine empathy for the police officers in Tapachula, Chiapas who suffered what can only have been a terrifying and excruciating experience, but the lack of balance in the headline Bees Attack Police rankles me: Police Shoot Hive Minding Its Own Business; Bees Retaliate might be a bit more "fair and accurate," no?

Our Smog Thwarts Bees

An important and not-at-all surprising new study by Jose D. Fuentes of the University of Virginia shows that air pollution hampers bees' ability to follow the scent of flowers to their source—a clear impediment to the delicate and essential process of pollination upon which our lives (or at least life as we know it) depend.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that the "mystery" of CCD may well be connected to this and the many other environmental insults the honeybees and other pollinators are enduring at our hand. Yes, folks, everything going wrong with the honeybees IS our fault! Canary-in-the-Coalmine Alert, Code Red.

The Washington Post article titled Air Pollution Impedes Bees' Ability to Find Flowers includes the following:

"In the prevailing conditions before the 1800s, the researchers calculated that a flower's scent could travel between 3,280 feet and 4,000 feet, Fuentes said in an interview, but today, that scent might travel 650 feet to 1,000 feet in highly polluted areas such as the District of Columbia, Los Angeles or Houston.

"'That's where we basically have all the problems,' Fuentes said, adding that ozone levels are particularly high during summer. 'The impacts of pollution on pollinator activity are pronounced during the summer months.'

"This phenomenon triggers a cycle, the authors noted, in which the pollinators have trouble finding sufficient food, and as a result their populations decline. That, in turn, translates into decreased pollination and keeps flowering plants, including many fruits and vegetables, from proliferating."

Enough said. (And thanks, S.J., for the tip.)

Update on Bat Die-Off and White-Nose Syndrome

Hundreds of thousands of dead bats throughout the Northeast—a (sad, depressing, fascinating) update from NPR.

Bat Conservation International—an excellent organization that's been in the vanguard of protecting bat habitat and educating the public about the ecological importance of bats, has this article on the bat die-off and is helping to coordinate the efforts to obtain funding to try to identify the cause(s) of white-nose syndrome. (Sure to be an uphill battle in the current economy.)

If you're looking for a place to donate to this important cause, BCI is a fine place to start. By the time the federal government gets around to funding research on white-nose syndrome, there'll be nary a bat left to study.

Bee Warned!

Human Footprint

Bat Crash: The Die-off Continues

More on the frightening threat to that wonderful creature, the bat.

Chinook Colony Collapse Disorder

In other bad environmental news, there's a disturbing article in today's New York Times about the total disappearance of the Chinook Salmon in the Sacramento River. The article describes the situation as "the almost complete collapse of the richest and most dependable source of Chinook salmon south of Alaska."

Got Pharma-gunk?

Next time you enjoy a nice glass of drinking water, please be aware that you're likely to be ingesting some of the following "extras" with every sip:

• estrogen and other sex hormones
• sedatives
• pain medications
• psychiatric meds
• anti-convulsants
• antibiotics
• mood stabilizers

A new Associated Press study on pharmaceuticals in America's drinking water supply cites the following "fun facts" from around the US of A.

--Officials in Philadelphia said testing there discovered 56 pharmaceuticals or byproducts in treated drinking water, including medicines for pain, infection, high cholesterol, asthma, epilepsy, mental illness and heart problems. Sixty-three pharmaceuticals or byproducts were found in the city's watersheds.

--Anti-epileptic and anti-anxiety medications were detected in a portion of the treated drinking water for 18.5 million people in Southern California.

--Researchers at the U.S. Geological Survey analyzed a Passaic Valley Water Commission drinking water treatment plant, which serves 850,000 people in Northern New Jersey, and found a metabolized angina medicine and the mood-stabilizing carbamazepine in drinking water.

--A sex hormone was detected in San Francisco's drinking water.

--The drinking water for Washington, D.C., and surrounding areas tested positive for six pharmaceuticals.

--Three medications, including an antibiotic, were found in drinking water supplied to Tucson, Ariz.

How could this be happening? Here's the polite way of putting it, from the AP article:

"People take pills. Their bodies absorb some of the medication, but the rest of it passes through and is flushed down the toilet. The wastewater is treated before it is discharged into reservoirs, rivers or lakes. Then, some of the water is cleansed again at drinking water treatment plants and piped to consumers. But most treatments do not remove all drug residue."

Given that, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, the average American received more than 11 prescriptions in 2006 (that's more than 3 billion prescriptions, total, for one year alone), we're talking massive influx of pharma-gunk into our water supply. Yum!

We've been reading for years about the effects of infusing our water supply with pharmaceuticals, pesticides, and personal care products, but the focus has mostly been on three-headed frogs, intersex frogs, intersex fish, and other harm to wildlife. But who cares about wildlife?Now it seems, the intersex chickens are coming home to roost—in our gastrointestinal tracts. Let's call this a case of getting our "just desserts" until we clean up our act.

Read the whole sordid, filthy, horrifying and yet unsurprising story here and (for the New York angle, here.)

If you're a bit blue after doing so, calm yourself down with a nice, cool, sedative-laced, mood-stabilizing glass of water.Watch this while you're at it, for some fun at the expense of big pharma, bringer of such wonders as Seasonale, which the SNL clip below lampoons.

Northeast Bat Die-Off Mirrors Honeybee Collapse

I was horrified and heartbroken to pick up a local paper in upstate New York this weekend reporting of a massive bat die-off suspiciously similar to the honeybee die-off we've been hearing so much of.

As always, "nobody knows why this is happening," and—as usual—we'll merrily continue ravaging, degrading, abusing, exploiting and dissing our ecosystem in a thousand different ways, inexorably transforming this beautiful earth into a lifeless biohazard without ever making the all-too-obvious connection between our actions and the disaster we're bringing down on bats, bees, and yep, ourselves. Learn more. And weep.

What do you think of cloning?

The brilliant and wonderful Verlyn Klinkenborg weighs in in today's New York Times. A taste:

"I think the clearest way to understand the problem with cloning is to consider a broader question: Who benefits from it? Proponents will say that the consumer does, because we will get higher quality, more consistent foods from cloned animals. But the real beneficiaries are the nation’s large meatpacking companies — the kind that would like it best if chickens grew in the shape of nuggets. Anyone who really cares about food — its different tastes, textures and delights — is more interested in diversity than uniformity.

"As it happens, the same is true for anyone who cares about farmers and their animals. An agricultural system that favors cloned animals has no room for farmers who farm in different ways. Cloning, you will hear advocates say, is just another way of making cows. But every other way — even using embryo transplants and artificial insemination — allows nature to shuffle the genetic deck. A clone does not."

How Is Global Warming Affecting Your State?

How is global warming affecting your state?

The National Wildlife Federation has created some useful fact sheets describing the effects on a state-by-state basis.

As for me, seeing bees fly in January (when of course there is no food source for them) and watching people riding around in open convertibles (while wearing T-shirts) is not my idea of an all-is-well Winter in the Northeast!

Global Warming Ignored By Media in 08 Presidential Campaign

Sign the petition.

Learn more about the League of Conservation Voters.