John Upton
grist
June 21, 2013
National Pollinator Week began grimly Sunday when tens of thousands of dead
bumblebees, honeybees, ladybugs, and other insects were discovered blanketing a shopping plaza’s parking lot
just off Interstate 5 in Wilsonville, Ore.
Bumblebees were the species hardest hit, with an estimated 25,000 dead and 150 colonies
lost outside a Target store. “They were literally falling out of the trees,”
said Rich Hatfield, a conservation biologist with the nonprofit Xerces Society
for Invertebrate Conservation. “To our knowledge this is one of the largest
documented bumblebee deaths in the Western U.S. It was heartbreaking to
watch.”
It turns out that landscapers had sprayed the lot’s 65 European linden trees
on Saturday with the insecticide Safari. The insecticide is marketed by manufacturer Valent as “a
super-systemic insecticide with quick uptake and knockdown.”
Read More
Friday, June 21, 2013
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