Subject: Poisoned Livestock vs Old Fashioned Values

From: [email-masked] (Pollinator)
Date: 7 Jun 1995 02:43:36 -0400

My Daddy told me, if I lived a clean life and worked hard, I would
prosper.  Daddy lied, because he assumed we live in a just society.  An
acquaintance suggested that, if the state won't let me make an honest
living;
I should try crime.  I just can't accept that. In my heart I still want to
believe my Daddy.  But I have lost some of the drive to work hard. I am
tired
of having it stolen from me.

   If any other kind of farmer had a tenth of the poisoning of his
livestock
that I have had, he would have had all kinds of support, and the poisoners
would be held accountable.  Will you help?

   I am a pollination specialist - a beekeeper who provides bees to
pollinate
our crops.  Rather than make honey, I am paid for the pollination service.
It is a reliable business, in that the demand for bees continues to
increase
rapidly.  Growers need bees more than ever.  Poorly pollinated fruit and
vegetables are often seen at the market, and account for the lousy taste
in
many cases. But, in order to maintain the business, I have to keep the
bees
alive and healthy.  Mites and other factors have hurt, but the answers are
in
my hands, if I just become more skilled.  Pesticide misuse is the only
factor
that is completely out of my hands.

   The bureaucrats have devised a perfect bureaucratic *solution* to THEIR
problem.  When a violation or bee kill is reported, they do a whole lot of
paperwork, and absolutely nothing else. After a while, beekeepers get
cynical
and no longer report incidents.  PRESTO!  *The problem is solved!   We do
not
have any bee kills or bee label violations in our jurisdiction.*  As long
as
they get away with it, nothing improves.

   I am in process of filing a million dollar civil rights claim on
certain
officials (ex officio and personally) for refusing to implement and
enforce
pesticide label directions that protect bees (my livelihood), despite ten
years of pleading for protection from illegal pesticide misuse.  This is a
seizure of my property without compensation and a denial of equal
protection
under the law.

   Every time my business begins to look good, with the hive count up,
with
healthy strong hives, I am struck down again.  My hive count is down a lot
>from  last years pesticide losses from multiple violations of label
directions.  I filmed one violation at our Clemson Extension Pee Dee
research
station on cotton.

   With the refusal to enforce the law,  the frequency of violations, and
the
increase of cotton acreage, I can see the end of my pollination business
in
sight.  So much of my hard work and productivity has gone down the drain. 
I
have no health insurance, no nest egg, no real estate, & no retirement. 
It
has been stolen from me, time and again, by pesticide misuse.  I have
fewer
hives this year, but they are in excellent shape.  Will they be at the end
of
the spray season?   I am tired, and I do not have the energy anymore to
build
back up.

   I have therefore decided to focus on those who have taken all this
away,
those who have refused to implement and enforce pesticide law.

   Clemson Extension continues to provide pesticide recommendations:
a) as if label directions for bees did not exist, thereby indicating to
applicators that these are optional and not enforceable.  Sometimes it is
actually stated in such terms.
b) for materials which are bound to be in violation of bee label
directions if not qualified, ie.  non residual materials for use on
blooming
crops without the warning that a prior determination must be made that
bees
are not foraging.
c) which plainly recommended misuse, with residual materials which will
have
bees
foraging within the residual life of the material.
d) which recommend alternatives such as notification of beekeepers to
circumvent applicator compliance with pesticide label directions.  The
labels
protect all foraging bees, whether Apis or non-Apis, whether feral or
domestic, and whether on the property of the application or off; this
circumvention protects only those who have a human defender, and only if
he
is able to do so (apparently at his own
expense!)

   For several years I have asked Clemson Extension leadership to provide
help to applicators in complying with the label directions.  I have seen
no
discernable effort to do so, and the Director of Clemson Extension has
never
bothered to answer my letters.

    The proper role of extension is to aid the applicators, by teaching
them
when bees will be foraging, so they can take steps to comply PRIOR to
application,
ie: what crops (& weeds) are attractive to bees, when they bloom, and how
to
monitor to determine when bees will not be foraging.

   I have a flow chart, which is part of an educational package for
applicators, which I cannot send electronically, but which I will gladly
provide anyone for SASE

   I would be glad to answer any other questions.

Here is a paper on some common misinterpretations and circumventions of
bee
label directions:

>>PESTICIDE LABELS AND BEES
   What the Labels Clearly Do and Do Not Say 
  (- Often Misrepresented and Misunderstood)
  Along with Logical, Common Sense Implications

   There are two types of  messages about bees on many insecticide labels,
which
are placed under environmental hazards.  These give specific instructions
which are statements of the pesticide law for that particular pesticide. 
One
indicates hazard by direct contact only.  Example:  (Imidan  -Trade Mark)
*This product is highly toxic to bees exposed to direct treatment on
blooming
crops or weeds. Do not apply this product or allow it to drift to blooming
crops while bees are actively visiting the treatment area.*

    Others also indicate a hazard by direct contact and by residues.
Example:  Penncap M  -Trade Mark) *THIS PRODUCT IS HIGHLY TOXIC TO BEES,
exposed to direct treatment or residues on crops or blooming weeds.  Do
not
apply this product or allow it to drift to blooming crops or weeds if bees
are visiting the areas to be treated.*

    Both types prohibit application while bees are foraging. obviously the
ones with no residual effect are safe for use around bees, provided that
they
are not foraging at the time of application. Those that are clearly marked
as
residual would logically be prohibited if bees forage within the residual
activity period of the pesticide, in other words
on any plant that is attractive to bees, during the bloom period of that
plant.

1.  It is the applicator's responsibility to comply with the label
directions.  This responsibility cannot be transferred to beekkeepers or
any
other party.  The applicator has chosen to use a material with
environmental
hazards, in this case hazards to pollinators, and it is his responsibility
to
use it safely by complying with label directions.

2.  The directions refer to the foraging bees, not the bee hives.  It is
irrelevant therefore whether the hives are placed on the property to be
sprayed, or whether they come from other properties within foraging range
of
the bees.  Removing hives from the property where application will occur
does
not necessarily indicate compliance with label directions, bees may be
coming
>from  adjacent properties or unknown colonies on the property.

3.  The label directions protect the foraging bees in the application
area,
whether the bees are kept or feral, and they protect all bees, whether
honeybees, solitary bees, or bumblebees (non-Apis bees).

4.  Many crops and even weeds are highly attractive to bees during their
blossom period. Compliance with label directions would logically indicate
a
necessity for applicators, who use materials with bee protection
directions,
to have a minimum knowledge of what blooms are attractive, and to have
some
system of monitoring to see if foraging bees are present.  Failure to
monitor, prior to application,  when there is bloom attractive to bees, is
negligent. The proper role of extension and other pesticide advisors would
be
to educate applicators on situations where bees will be foraging, and help
him monitor, so that he can avoid violations.

5.  Communication with beekeepers, while certainly a good idea, does not
release applicators from compliance with label directions, and demands
that
beekeepers take the responsibility for protection of the bees indicates
intent to wilfully misuse a pesticide, which changes violations from civil
to
criminal status.

6.  A public official, who encourages applicators to demand that
beekeepers
take the responsibility for protection of bees is:
     a.  Recommending pesticide misuse - he is substituting an alternative
in
lieu of compliance with pesticide label directions.
     b.  He is committing a malfeasance, in substituting a system that
only
protects the bees which have a human defender.
     c.  He is seizing the property of the beekeepers involved, without
compensation, in violation of Ammentment V of the Constitution of the
United
States of America. It is the  proper and logical role of public pesticide
advisors to teach
applicators how to comply with label directions, ie. how to establish
whether
bees will be foraging in the application area.

7.  On crops which are known to be attractive to bees, it is a negligent
recommendation of pesticide misuse, to recommend use of an insecticide
which
has a direct contact type of label direction, without a warning that use,
while bees are foraging, is in violation.  It is even more a
recommendation
of misuse to recommend a pesticide with a residual type of label direction
at
any time during bloom, because bees will be foraging during the residual
life
of the pesticide.

    I have seen hundreds of bee kills from pesticides.  Every single case
has
involved a violation of label directions.  NO EXCEPTIONS.  If bee
directions
on pesticide labels are scrupulously followed, the poisonings of our
pollinators will drop to negligible levels.

   The law is a good one, but it is given only lip service.  It has not
been
implemented into pesticide recommendations, which often give applicators
an
alternative to circumvent label directions - that of sloughing off
responsibility to beekeepers.  This is the pre-FIFRA system, which never
did
work, and has cost billions in lost pollination by killing off feral bees
and
making beekeeping unprofitable.

   FIFRA set aside the previous precedent.  It made the applicators
responsible by specific label directions, directions which they often find
inconvenient, and have sought to evade ever since.  They have been aided
by
authorities, who advise alternatives to compliance, and who refuse to
enforce
the clear meaning of the label directions.  It is time for reform.

    Public officials who advise applicators how to circumvent compliance
with
label directions must be held responsible for this seizure of the property
of
the beekeepers without compensation, a violation of Ammendment 5 of the
Constitution of the United States.

   *All the world's people can be divided into three groups; those who
make
things happen, those who watch things happen, and those who haven't the
vaguest idea what's happening.*

[email-masked]                                   Dave Green
Dave's Pollination Service         Eastern Pollinator Newsletter
PO Box 1215, Hemingway, SC    29554

---

From: "K.J.M.Hooker" <[email-masked]>
Date: 9 Jun 1995 11:59:49 +0100

You have my sympathy regarding poisoning.  In this country the 
expansion of Oil Seed Rape has caused considerable problems with 
poisoning.  Fruit crops have been the traditional bad boys.  

All these occasions are as you recognise due to either not reading the 
labels or a total lack of forthought.  As the ex-manager of 300 acres 
of top fruit with 40 colonies + queen raising going on around the 
orchards we seldom poisoned any of my bees.

Until there is a successful high profile case brought against someone 
the situation will I think continue.  This was the situation here until
a small scale beekeeper (I hate that hobbyist expression) that happened 
to be a barrister got severely damaged.  He fought the case on the 
grounds of negligence towards neighbours (if I remember right), first he 
established ownership of flying bees (as people pay to hire them for 
pollination they must have an owner when free flying), then he established 
the right to expect consideration of these by neighbours.  

The resulting compensation was not tremendous by modern standards but 
it was sufficient to stir the farming insurance companies to pass the 
message on to growers.

What concerns me even more than honeybee losses due to poisoning is the 
un recorded losses of solitary bees many of which only have one life 
cycle per year.  These could be totally eliminated in some areas and 
this could be the cause of a number of the reports being posted ie 
Where have all the bees gone?  Who is going to speak for these bees?  
Are they destined to become a picture in a book or a sample kept in a 
museum case?

Keith JM Hooker BA MIPD

Technology Management Ltd
Whitstable, Kent, UK, EC (just)

---

From: [email-masked] (Andy Nachbaur)
Date: Thu, 8 Jun 1995 01:37:00 GMT

worked hard, I would
Subject: Poisoned Livestock vs  Ol

P>From: [email-masked] (Pollinator)

P>    My Daddy told me, if I lived a clean life and worked hard, I would
 >living; I should try crime.  I just can't accept that. In my heart I
 >still want to believe my Daddy.  But I have lost some of the drive
 >to work hard. I am tired of having it stolen from me.

Hello Mr. Pollinator Beekeeper,

If you get into trying to work with government bureaucrats to protect
your bee's from pesticides, bears, or some other government agency's
plan's for a new highway, park, dam, or whatever; in time you will get
your wish at being treated like a criminal. After all they know you rob
your bee's of their honey, and you can charge poor farmers for
pollination, something that bee's have been doing for free for thousands
of years. And today at anytime your bee's could turn into real
"killer's" and attack the public killing hundred's if not thousands. No
thank's to a few so called (BS), bee scientists, and regulator's who
have promoted that big lie.

(Have you noticed that we don't hear to much from those prophets of
doom who used the "killer" bee story to generate public support for
public fund's and their own personal gains.)

>From  my own and other beekeeper's experience in California, a state
that has a history of every beekeeping problem there is, [you know we
have had the "purest" African bee's found outside of Africa years before
it became fashionable to call them "killer" bee's, and these feral
colonies and kept hives have remained un molested by regulators].  If
you want to protect your bee's, you are on your own. For regulatory
bureaucrats it boils down to the "Value of the bee's vis the value of
the (other persons interests)". There are not very many interests that
are not higher on the scale of value then the beekeepers. After all
bee's themselves are renumerial, that is, like any farm crop, if they
die they can be replaced. It's really the beekeeper's who are at risk,
and there are law's to protect all of us, we just have not learned how
to use them because we have fallen into the old socialistic trap of
letting "big brother" do it. You may win a action to force regulation of
pesticides to protect bee's, but you will still have bee losses from
pesticides. Because to win you will have to give up something, or give
something, like moving your bee's out of the area that is going to be
treated.. or covering your bee's, or some other plan that does not
work..

We must move away from the agricultural regulation or agricultural law
into civil law if we want protection for the "people" who keep bee's.
Any one can protect their bee's from pesticide damage now, just load
them up and more them every time someone want's to treat. You protect
the bee's and go bankrupt doing it.

If you want to do something to protect your bee's, study law, hire a
attorney, an environmental one who can deal with regulators, if you can
find one you can live with, because if you expect to win you will have
to just about move in with your attorney. And get involved politically.

California beekeepers are less bothered by regulators, and are having
less bee losses because a few, (5) beekeepers out of 500 commercial
beekeepers spent $30,000.00 cash of their own and other beekeeper's
money, and five year's of their time, fighting the state in court.
They not only had to fight state bureaucrats, the chemical interests,
farm organizations, they also had to fight their own 100 year old state
beekeeping association, and 3 of the five were past presidents.

In the end they were able to give the testimonies backed up by the
courts that resulted in cutting the funding to California bee regulatory
agency's. We still have bee law's but only a few [3-5] of our 58
counties enforce them. They still have to enforce the pesticide laws,
now knowing now that the beekeepers could at any time seek relief from
the courts and/or the legislature. And we still have bee loss from
the legal regulated use of pesticides, but it is not nearly so bad as
it once was. Most of the time we can live with it, our bee's suffer
but they do come back. I am not saying that even a little loss is right,
as I believe that any loss, ONE BEE, from the use of pesticides by
persons other then the owner of the bee's is a mis use and someone other
then the beekeepers should have to pay the bill for that loss. Maybe
someday we will see a change in attitude to match my own, but not in
my lifetime I am sure.

I would be the first to admit our's was not a pretty solution, but in
a large state like California it was our only practical one. When you
have so many state government employees like we do, it is all most
impossible to remove or make changes to law's with out the support
of the people who's job it is to enforce them, we lost that support
year's ago. The bureaucrats have built in job protection because of
the close relationship between the government agency's and the
legislature. There are also few in the regulatory, research, and
agricultural education that are not beholding to the chemical industry
for their support, jobs, and education. We call them dusty's here, they
are not going to sting the hand that feed them, just because they call
themselves bee scientist or bee regulator or bee educator.

We went through two generations of beekeeper's who had no meaningful
input into California bee law changes. You went along or were dragged
along by the counties and state. Any individual who dared to oppose the
system was automatically branded an "outlaw", and believe it or not was
given "special" treatment and "special" action was taken to make that
individual an example to keep the other in line. A few beekeeper's have
been destroyed by regulators to protect their arbitrary powers over
beekeepers. The only thing that has saved many more beekeepers is that
to date the state has refused the request of the agricultural regulatory
industry to be made peace officers's so they can carry guns. If that
ever happen's you can bet there will be a lot fewer beekeepers.

Good Luck with your action!

                                ttul Andy-

(c) Permission to reproduce, granted.
Opinion is not necessarily fact.