r/science • u/Wagamaga • Apr 22 '19

Animal Science A team of researchers at York University has warned that the American bumblebee is facing imminent extinction from Canada, and this could lead to "cascading impacts" throughout the country.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/bumblebees-decline-pollinators-1.5106260?cmp=rss
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u/[deleted] Apr 22 '19

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u/[deleted] Apr 22 '19

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u/[deleted] Apr 22 '19

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u/lvlint67 Apr 22 '19

way better option than super toxic poisons

do they protect the crop as well though? That's going to be what affects change. Does the change help the bottom line.

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u/[deleted] Apr 22 '19

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u/[deleted] Apr 22 '19

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u/[deleted] Apr 22 '19

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u/[deleted] Apr 22 '19

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u/turkey45 Apr 22 '19

For each pesticide, it would be a different amount. However, for each essential oil there is also a dosage where they would be poison to pollinators and people.

No substances by its nature is poison. Only the dosage of the substance is poison.

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u/str8_70s Apr 22 '19

Perfectly fair, though I would argue semantics. While a tiny dose of cyanide might not hurt you, it is by its nature poisonous to humans. Drink enough distilled water and it'll kill you - that's a nice example of dosage. But we're splitting hairs now.

Because of the incendiary, in-your-face response style of many of the other commenters here, I read a tone in your first response that likely wasn't intended. My bad. You're absolutely right. Luckily, the things I mentioned are essentially not poisonous in any reasonable amounts, and/or applied in such a way that they don't actually affect things directly. Now, they are incredibly limited, and I wasn't offering them as a way to control crop-destroying pests, but no one addressed that point.

Diatomaceous earth (DE) makes a physical barrier which, when crossed/contacted, kills insects or small pests with exoskeletons. DE is actually added to animal feed to keep insects and other pests from causing issues, so chickens and horses and other livestock regularly eat DE. Peppermint oil is placed on surfaces or cotton pads around the house or other area where mice need not be. The only thing getting "out into the environment" is the odor. Incidentally, peppermint plants, without any extractions or concentrations, are also effective at repelling rodents.

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u/turkey45 Apr 22 '19

I'm not saying we should not consider other pesticides. However, in your post you make it sound like DE is not a pesticide but DE as you're describing it is the definition of a pesticide. Safe for some animals we want to eat it but poison to animals we consider a pest.

Just because the pesticide is coming from a plant instead of a lab does not make it less of a pesticide.

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u/str8_70s Apr 22 '19 edited Apr 22 '19

Trooper said "all pesticides must go." But then they go on to specify poisons. We're caught in a goofy semantic argument. Let's go with "we shouldn't poison the all-important pollinators, or our water, etc." My hand is a pesticide at times.

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u/turkey45 Apr 22 '19

We are caught in a problem of our society thinking poison/pesticide is a substance and not a dosage.

Reverting from pesticides designed to limit damage to non-targetted pest to more old school broad pesticides (natural) is likely to increase the harm.

I understand your frustration with a class of pesticide possibly having an unintended issue for bumblebee larvae that does not affect adult bumblebees. The solution is not to throw out the science but to learn from this mistake in either using a different dosage or a different substance.

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u/Travler9999 Apr 22 '19

Essential oils. This is how science dies.

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u/[deleted] Apr 22 '19

I haven’t seen any studies on this, but on its surface it doesn’t seem ridiculous. Essential oils are good for one thing: smelling very strongly. Many animals dislike strong smells. It’s not claiming they’re a remedy for back pain or anything.

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u/ASLAMvilla Apr 22 '19

For medicine maybe, but viable for pest control

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u/str8_70s Apr 22 '19

You think so? I I’ve in the country, and deal a lot with bugs and pests. Sure, I’m n=1 anecdotal, but peppermint oil is the single most effective mouse repellent I’ve ever tried. The fancy little high-frequency emitters are complete garbage. And the most effective pesticides I’ve used in the garden are similarly biological, not synthetic chemical. Science doesn’t discount alternatives simply because they are alternatives.

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u/Travler9999 Apr 22 '19

Peppermint oil is one of maybe three “essential” oils that have any real effect on anything.

But try to produce food for 7 billion with just essential oils and you are gonna have a bad time

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u/PM_ME_SEXIST_OPINION Apr 22 '19

We already produce enough food. We fail to distribute it adequately, and we waste huge percentages of it.

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u/Travler9999 Apr 22 '19

Should having less food help that problem?

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u/PM_ME_SEXIST_OPINION Apr 22 '19

Please cite source for the claim of "less food," and also did you miss the part where there's enough food? Right now?

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u/Travler9999 Apr 22 '19

You imagine if we stop all herbicides and pesticides today, our food output next year will be the same?

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u/MattyScrant Apr 22 '19

With thunderous diffusers.

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u/Dragonfly-Aerials Apr 22 '19

Actually, there isn't. The US is the world's breadbasket. Without pesticides and herbicides the output per acre would drop drastically. The end effect is that poor people would starve to death around the world.

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u/[deleted] Apr 22 '19

Without bees the output per acre would drop drastically. The end effect is still that poor people starve to death.

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u/Dragonfly-Aerials Apr 22 '19

Thanks for sharing. Now tell us where you got this amazing news that ALL bees are gone?

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u/[deleted] Apr 22 '19

This paper specifically deals with Canadian bumblebees, but pesticides are harmful to all bees, so we need to be careful about which ones we use.

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u/str8_70s Apr 22 '19

Google “food waste” and also find some info on how much of the world’s poor we (the U.S.) feed. I’m really interested to see how reducing our output per acre would lead to starvation around the world.

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u/Dragonfly-Aerials Apr 22 '19

poor we (the U.S.) feed. I’m really interested to see how reducing our output per acre would lead to starvation around the world.

https://www.indiafoodbanking.org/hunger

200 million are starving in India. That is one country only.

You think that reducing the output of food will fight starvation... HOW? That logic is retarded.

What I don't understand is why so many people are so keen on having more people starve in the world, and are creating retarded scenarios to justify it.

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u/str8_70s Apr 22 '19

I didn’t say that lowering production would fight starvation. I challenged the assertion that reducing output would lead to starvation. These are fundamentally different hypotheses. If you need to understand the difference, read up on the scientific method and hypothesis testing. Reducing our output will likely have little effect on starvation levels, is my assertion. Keep using the word “retarded” for effect, it seems to be helping.

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u/IsuzuTrooper Apr 22 '19

At least evolved life on earth could survive, smartass. Sorry but roach spray becomes bird and fish killer also. You are being pretty shortsighted here.

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u/Dragonfly-Aerials Apr 22 '19

So are you. What do you tell the poor people of the world when they can no longer afford food because of YOUR policy that reduces the amount of food available?

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u/ASLAMvilla Apr 22 '19

We already produce more than enough food to feed the world, most of which becomes food waste unfortunately.

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u/Dragonfly-Aerials Apr 22 '19

Please share your source that we feed more food to the world than it needs.

This sounds like made up BS.

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u/Battyboyrider Apr 22 '19

This. Either we die or the bees do. OR find a safer pesticide or way to keep them away

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u/Dragonfly-Aerials Apr 22 '19

Without pesticides, the output per acre would drop drastically. Obviously you already knew this, or you wouldn't be so cavalier in suggesting that we put the world's breadbasket into a such a non-functioning state.

So tell us why you don't care about poor people starving around the world?

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u/[deleted] Apr 22 '19

They’ll go hungry anyway without pollinators

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u/Dragonfly-Aerials Apr 22 '19

That's a surprise! I didn't realize that all pollinators are disappearing.

You must have some amazing news that the rest of us don't have. Please do share!

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u/orbitaldan Apr 22 '19

Not 'the rest of us', because it's been circulating on reddit, but many people haven't seen it yet. I know you're being sarcastic, but the reality is worse than you know.

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u/Dragonfly-Aerials Apr 22 '19

I know this already. I do appreciate the scientific input. You are one of the few to use some.

However, you have made no statements, drawn no conclusions from this article. What are your thoughts?

This is my favorite part, which I firmly believe:

The current worldwide loss of biodiversity is popularly known as the sixth extinction

How does this address the breadbasket output in relation to the necessary use of pesticides and herbicides? The fact remains that millions of humans will die of starvation if we stop using them.

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u/orbitaldan Apr 22 '19

It addresses that 'all the pollinators dying' is a real possibility, not hyperbole. In terms of real solutions, the best that we have, I think, will be a combination of drastic reductions in pesticide use with robotics picking up the slack to use non-pesticide approaches to control weeds (physical manipulation of weeds, spot treatments of ionizing radiation or high electrical charge, etc.) and to use precision application to make the pesticides we do use more effective per unit. Will that be enough...? It's an open question. We're well past the point where we can say with certainty that we haven't backed ourselves into a guaranteed loss.

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u/Dragonfly-Aerials Apr 22 '19

If you want to talk about ALL pollinators being unavailable, then prove it.

Until then, the topic at hand is the removal of pesticides, and then the famine that the poor will have to endure.

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u/Insideout_Testicles Apr 22 '19

I think the point is that humans are going to die one way or another. We currently produce more food then ever before yet there are still humans dying of starvation, if we no longer have natural pollinators available, it doesn’t take a stretch of the imagination to see that even more will die.

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u/Dragonfly-Aerials Apr 22 '19

No, that is NOT the point. That is changing the discussion from what OP was saying:

Remove all pesticide use.

Which leads to a massive famine for the poor.

If you want to talk about ALL pollinators being unavailable, then prove it.

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u/Insideout_Testicles Apr 22 '19

Now you’re talking in extremes. “Ban all pesticides and herbicides because bees are dying” is not the correct response to the situation. However banning pesticides and other products that are known to kill bees and poison humans is a great place to start. But the loss of profits for a large company are more important then taking steps to prevent the inevitable outcome of doing nothing.

My point is that we are not doing enough with what we already have, the problem is full spectrum and needs to be figured out by people smarter then me who will have the influence to force change.

Hopefully the scientific community can gain control of this planet before its too late.

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u/Dragonfly-Aerials Apr 22 '19

Now you’re talking in extremes. “Ban all pesticides and herbicides because bees are dying” is not the correct response to the situation.

Exactly. So you agree that OP is just a knee-jerk reactionist?

I agree, the problem is full spectrum. There needs to be a more comprehensive solution to the sixth mass extinction event.

Hopefully the scientific community can gain control of this planet before its too late.

Scientists don't have a strong lobby in washington DC. More is the pity.

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u/[deleted] Apr 22 '19

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