[Pollinator] Portland Business Journal -- D's support bees

[Scott Black]

<http://www.bizjournals.com/portland/>
Portland News, Portland Business Journal, Portland Newspaper


D's support bees

Portland Business Journal - 10:25 AM PDT Friday, June 29, 2007

Rep. Earl Blumenauer, D-Oregon, and Rep. Alcee Hastings, D-Florida 
have introduced a bill to make pollinator conservation an overarching 
priority in conservation programs administered through the U.S. 
Department of Agriculture.

The Pollinator Habitat Protection Act of 2007 comes in the wake of a 
spate of mysterious European honeybee colony collapses occurring 
around the country. In Oregon, honeybees are key for pollinating the 
state's plentiful tree fruit crops, including pears, apples and 
cherries. Beyond recent collapses of European honeybee populations, 
the National Academies of Science in October 2006 released a report 
that warned of declining populations of multiple varieties of 
pollinators, including birds, bats, bees and other insects.

The Pollinator Protection Act of 2007 aims to improve habitat and 
food sources for pollinators. The bill utilizes existing conservation 
programs to strengthen both native and managed pollinator habitat. It 
also requires existing conservation programs to acknowledge 
pollinator habitat as a conservation target and rewards producers 
whose conservation practices are beneficial for pollinators.

"By increasing pollinator habitat on the land, this bill supports a 
diversity of native and managed pollinators," said Scott Hoffman 
Black, executive director of the Portland-based Xerces Society for 
Invertebrate Conservation. "It will improve crop security and the 
sustainability of agriculture, by helping farmers in the United 
States diversify their pollinator portfolio."

The bill also makes it a priority for Plant Material Centers managed 
by the Natural Resource Conservation Service to emphasize native 
plantings that benefit pollinators, and for the USDA to make 
nurseries and land managers more aware of these same plants.

The House Pollinator Protection Act of 2007 is a companion bill to 
several others introduced in recent weeks that make native and 
managed pollinators a target for research and habitat conservation.

An official explanation for recent colony collapses has not been 
released but experts say they look different from the disastrous 2005 
season in which many bees were killed by mites. Some scientists have 
pointed the finger at cell phone towers and certain pesticides. Many 
beekeepers have found their hives deserted, without telltale signs of 
a mite infestation.




*************************
Scott Hoffman Black
Ecologist/Entomologist
Executive Director
The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation
4828 SE Hawthorne
Portland, OR 97215
Direct line (503) 449-3792
sblack at xerces.org

The Xerces Society is an international nonprofit organization that
protects the diversity of life through invertebrate conservation.

To join the Society, make a contribution, or read about our work,
please visit <http://www.xerces.org/>www.xerces.org.


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