Wednesday at 4pm UK i'm giving a talk to Cornell CALS about bees and co-formulants. Hop on if you're free! cals.cornell.edu/threat-pose…

Thanks!

ATTENTION ECOTOX PEOPLE: We wrote a primer on bee and pesticide science! Specifically written to be an accessible short guide for post / undergrads. It explains all the basic lingo and concepts in simple language. @DaraStanley doi.org/10.1111/1365-2664.14…

New blog from me!! A step-by-step guide* on getting your science paper glued to the front of a pesticide company's door in a protest! (*ok not quite, but an interesting dissection of what SciComm on social media actually looks like). appliedecologistsblog.com/20…

If you do think your bees are suffering from pesticides, you can report it to the gov here (hse.gov.uk/pesticides/reduci…) and they may send someone to investigate. You could also ask at a local beekeeping group if anyone could come visit the hives to see if there's anything to be done

Lots of different pesticides can impact bee behavior in a myriad of ways. Rarely would you see multi-year impacts be driven by just 1 pesticide. Very possible declines have other causes also though, pesticides aren't always the problem.

If I get any funding I’ll drop you a message so we can compare notes?

I was thinking of putting a microphone in there as a measure of activity. A vibration sensor would also be a good option. I’m planning this out for a grant application to build this system. Not actually clear on how I’ll make the weight robust to getting clogged up.

If you could stick a bunch of sensors into a bee colony placed out in farmlands, what would you want to measure? I've got temperature, humidity, colony weight and bee entry/exit down, but I imagine there are other metrics that'd be super interesting. Thoughts?

Good report btw. Interesting read

Yeah, I appreciate that council budgets are stressed and pesticides are cheap. But I’m ok with less weed control in towns/cities. Weeds in pavements vs pesticide contamination of dense urban areas is a good trade-off for me.

Insect-borne diseases aren't exactly a large problem in the UK. Infrastructure does need protecting, go ahead and spray motorway bridges. But in a city, alternative methods can be used. As in farming, if there's a viable alternative to chemical control, do that first.

Given almost all glyphosate products contained an endocrine disruptor until 2016 (POEA), we should probably adopt the precautionary principle and say 'Maybe let's only spray this stuff where it's necessary' i.e. crops.

Pesticides are inherently dangerous. They should only be used for good purposes i.e. making food. Spraying kerbs isn't a good enough purpose. Regardless of human exposure, spraying impermeable concrete causes waterway pollution. Alternatives exist, why no IPM requirement here?

Banning pesticides in towns just makes sense. We can control weeds without them, and it’d make our civic spaces safer. Proud to support this initiative. theguardian.com/environment/…

Fantastic project at UCD, great funding body, great project! Come join Darren in a project that'll build on some super exciting work we've been doing lately on bumblebee's response to pesticides.

doi.org/10.1289/EHP13954. PFAS coformulant paper. POEA was also used in EU pesticides until 2020ish. Only banned in glyphosate products in 2016.