[Pollinator] Is CCD really just starting in 2005/2006? Previous work on imidacloprid?

[Victoria MacPhail]

I have been following the latest theme with interest, and had been  
wondering when imidacloprid would be raised.

When I was an undergraduate student in 2002, I worked with Dr. Jim  
Kemp and Dick Rogers in Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick  
(Eastern Canada) investigating possible reasons (incl. diseases, food  
sources, pesticides, management practices, among others) behind the  
disappearance and overall decrease in honeybee populations in the  
Maritimes.  What had initated their research in the previous year  
(2001) was the concern that imidacloprid, trade name Admire, used in  
furrow in potato fields, persisted in the soil and came up in the  
clover flowers two years later, which then killed off the foraging  
bees.  I believe a similar concern with imidacloprid had been raised  
in France under the trade name Gaucho and used on sunflowers.

My understanding is that beekeepers in the Maritimes noticed in the  
late 1990s or early 2000s that bees were disappearing/dying and  
colonies crashing unexpectedly, with some beekeepers having limited  
losses and some having almost total losses.  They heard reports from  
France of the similar symptoms, said that that was their problem too,  
accused imidacloprid and the producer (Bayer), who then got Jim and  
Dick involved in the investigation.

I found an old newspaper article on-line saying essentially the same  
thing: May 25, 2002 - National Post,  
http://www.safe2use.com/ca-ipm/02-05-27.htm.  You could probably find  
other sources too.

The background information I had heard and learned about in 2002, and  
in 2003 when I was only peripherally involved in the project, sounds  
just like what is supposedly only just happening this year in the US.   
Now, I am new to the field and may be way off base, but to me this  
sounds like the same thing, so why are most of these reports saying  
this is a new phenomenon, happening either only this year or maybe  
last year too?  Are these two different problems/scenarios, or is the  
media just having a field day with it this year?

Anyway, just another thought to mull over.

Victoria MacPhail

-- 
MSc Candidate
Dept. of Environmental Biology
University of Guelph
Guelph, ON  N1G 2W1
vmacphai at uoguelph.ca
lab) 519-824-4120 ext. 56243
fax) 519-837-0442