Bee Kind to Pollinators!

Bees provide a vital ecological service i.e. pollination. Pollinators help in the reproduction of plants which provide food and shelter to diverse wildlife. Even if one local pollinator is removed it may affect us directly and indirectly!

The decline in numbers of European honeybees, bumblebees, and other native pollinators has been well known for over a decade. Studies addressing pollinator decline kicked into high gear in 2006 when Bee Colony Collapse Disorder first appeared. The highest loss from April 2018 to April 2019 is reached up to 40%. The use of agricultural pesticides is a damaging piece of this puzzle.

Neonicotinoids are popular amongst the news in recent months. They are now widely known as a nicotine-derived category of pesticides and captures 1/4th of pesticide use. These pesticides are absorbed directly into the plant’s tissue by drenching the soil, directly injecting into the plant’s steam, or applied as a seed coating. If these pesticides are absorbed by plant tissue, pollen, and nectar they become toxic, and pollinators who visit the flowering plants are exposed to those harmful pesticides.

The environmental impacts of Neonicotinoids go well beyond honey bees, including mortality in birds, mammals, and a variety of non-target insects. 

 Many scientists have linked the mass bee die-offs to an increase in the use of pesticides.

Let’s have a look at some shreds of evidence!

Legal threat over bee-harming pesticide use

BBC News | January 27, 2021

In 2018, the EU banned the outdoor use of neonicotinoid pesticides, which harm pollinating insects such as bees. But following Brexit, the government approved the emergency use of one neonicotinoid to combat a crop disease.

Multiple studies, including large-scale field trials, have found that neonicotinoids harm pollinators and aquatic life. Research has also shown that they can be linked to the wider collapse in biodiversity.

The government says it allowed the use of the neonicotinoid thiamethoxam because of the “potential danger” to the sugar beet crop from beet yellows virus, which is spread by aphids.

It stressed that the use of the chemical would be strictly limited, and the risk to bees was “acceptable” because sugar beet doesn’t flower. Alternative chemicals should be used to kill any wild flowering plants in and around the crops, the government said.

Neonicotinoids are the most widely-used class of insecticides in the world and they work by disrupting the insect central nervous system.

Using neonicotinoids not only threatens bees but is also extremely harmful to aquatic wildlife because the majority of the pesticide leaches into the soil and then into waterways. Worse still, farmers are being recommended to use weedkillers to kill wildflowers in and around sugar beet crops in a misguided attempt to prevent harm to bees in the surrounding area. This is a double blow for nature.

The pesticide that caused bee colonies to collapse is killing birds now

Salon | August 18, 2020

Neonicotinoids thought to be responsible for colony collapse disorder, have detrimental effects on birds, too. Environmentalists and farmers were relieved to discover that the mysterious and sudden drop in bee populations in the past decade turned out to be linked to neonicotinoids, a class of insecticides that are chemically akin to nicotine. Solving that mystery was not merely important to ecologists, but also crucial to human survival: if major bee communities become extinct or near-extinct, it could devastate human food sources. 

Yet as history shows, pesticides applied to kill one type of pest don’t generally stay confined to those animals. (See also: DDT.) Horrifyingly but perhaps unsurprisingly, scientists now believe that bees aren’t the only animals that are adversely affected by neonicotinoids. Many bird species, too, appear to be in decline as a result of neonicotinoids trickling up through the food chain. 

According to a new research paper published in Nature Sustainability, the rising use of neonicotinoids led to a drop in bird biodiversity in the United States between 2008 and 2014, scientists say. While bird populations have been steadily dropping anyway the authors note that the bird population in the United States has dropped by an estimated 29 percent since 1970. The researchers were able to separate the general drop in bird biodiversity from the specific drop that appeared to be due to neonicotinoid spraying. 

Till now, we all know that pollinators are facing several harms, from habitat extinction and increased chemical use to parasites and climate change. Many study experiments have been performed to find the root of population declining and consequences of pollinator’s extinction, only one conclusion being repeatedly drawn i.e. to ban those pesticides! 

But we did not even take a step ahead to stop this nuisance. Many countries have banned such harmful pesticides to be distributed within their country. A ban on manufacturing and exporting them was not restricted. This allowed industries to make huge profits by selling them in other countries.

Even we humans face the consequences of these pesticides. The physical effects which are visible after immediate exposure include burning of eyes and fingers, rashes and allergies are very common. Oral ingestion leads to nausea, vomiting, and other carcinogenic diseases.

It is more important now to stop the already gruesome situation from becoming worse and we know enough to act now! 

We at C Tech Corporation provide a range of bio-safe, non-toxic and non-hazardous pest aversive products which can be used as an alternative against those toxic pesticides.

Our products offer the perfect solution for pest nuisance, which may lead to reduce the use of harmful pesticides and protecting our mother nature from its adverse effects.

Combirepel^TM is an insect, animal, and bird aversive repellent which does not kills but repels the pest. The product works on a repellency mechanism which indirectly helps to maintain the balance in the ecosystem.

Combirepel^TM is available in various forms such as masterbatch, liquid concentrate, lacquer, wood polish additive, and spray.

Masterbatch can be combined with polymeric applications such as pipes, greenhouse films and floating covers, etc. The liquid concentrate can be mixed with paints in a specific ratio and can be applied to fences in farms or gardens to keep pests away. The lacquer is a topical application that is compatible with most surfaces like concrete, metal, polymer, wood, ceramic, etc. Lacquer can be applied on already installed drip irrigation lines, walls of a warehouse where harvested crops are stored, thus protecting them from pest damage. Wood polish additive can be applied on wooden fences to increase their durability. The spray can be used directly anywhere to repel the desired pest.

Combirepel^TM spray is safe for use in farms and warehouses.

Combirepel^TM is cost-effective, inert, and thermally stable and does not degrade on exposure to heat and sunlight. It is RoHS, RoHS2, RoHS3, REACH, NEA, EU BPR, APVMA compliant and FIFRA exempted.

Contact us at technical.marketing@ctechcorporation.com to know more about the use of our repellent products against pest menace and let’s contribute towards a sustainable environment!