August 2020 - 8
MSUE VEGETABLE NOTES
Vegetable pollinator stewardship takes hold with project
By Ana Heck and Meghan Milbrath
Michigan State University Pollinator
Initiative
Growers can play a role in supporting
pollinator health on their farms. Bees
and other pollinators face many issues
that can affect their health, including
parasites, diseases, lack of forage and
pesticide exposure. Bees often face
multiple stressors at the same time,
which can make it difficult for them to
thrive and survive.
Ana Heck, Extension educator from
the Michigan State University (MSU)
Pollinator Initiative, is developing
pollinator stewardship guides for
growers. The goal is to create guides
that address specific ways that growers
can promote healthy pollinators,
while still maintaining healthy crop
production. She is looking for input and
suggestions from vegetable growers and
those who are familiar with the pest
control challenges they face.
If you would like to offer suggestions
and feedback for vegetable pollinator
stewardship guides, or if you would be
willing to discuss common practices
and obstacles associated with your
particular crop, please contact Ana at
heckanar@msu.edu.
A honeybee on a cucumber flower. Photo: Ana Heck
Which pesticides are safe for
bees?
We know that some pesticides are highly
toxic to adult honeybees, but for most
pesticides we don't know enough about
their effects to claim that they are " safe " for
bees. Many pesticides are only tested on
adult honey bees. These tests do not tell us
how developing honeybees or how other
bee species, such as bumble bees, may be
affected by the pesticide. Some pesticides
that do not kill adult honeybees in the
field may be toxic to developing honeybee
larvae and pupae or to other bee species.
Most pesticides aren't evaluated for
sublethal effects, which may lead to
reduced lifespan or immune response.
Sublethal effects on individual bees can
cause ripple effects through the hive,
leading to eventual colony death. If we
wanted to know if a pesticide is safe, we
would have to test every chemical on every
species of pollinator and measure every
potential health outcome, from every
formulation in every context.
While many of these studies are
ongoing, growers have to make pest
management decisions before we have all
of the science on each pesticide risk to
pollinators.
Since most effects of pesticides
on pollinators are unknown, we
unfortunately can't always offer a " safe "
alternative application. Growers should
be cautious when applying all pesticides,
even if they aren't labeled as highly toxic
to pollinators, and they should follow the
pesticide's label for every application.
8 | VegetableGrowersNews.com
http://www.VegetableGrowersNews.com
August 2020
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