Insect conservation NGO the Xerces Society recently petitioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to expand its requirement of data to evaluate pesticides can that hurt bees.
Scientists say improving pesticide safety for bees would benefit many other pollinators, including the iconic monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus), which was recently proposed for protection under the U.S. Endangered Species Act.
Current EPA regulations require that pesticide manufacturers submit data on impacts on adult honeybees only, said Rosemary Malfi, director of conservation policy at the Xerces Society.
“Where the requirement doesn’t exist is for larval honeybees and for other species of bees,” Malfi told Mongabay by phone.
She said some pesticides used in the U.S. are also used in Europe, where safety testing is required. Those companies share their testing data in the U.S., but the EPA doesn’t uniformly require safety data.
Some pesticide manufacturers make a class of chemicals called insect growth regulators, which an EPA environmental risk assessment says are “practically non-toxic to adult honeybees”. However, because the pesticides target insects as they develop, “larval insects are expected to be much more sensitive … than adult bees,” yet toxicity data on larval bees hasn’t been provided by the companies, EPA the assessment notes.
Also, testing on honey bees, which aren’t native to the U.S., isn’t necessarily a good indicator of how native wild bees will respond to the same chemicals, Malfi added.
There are more than 2 million managed honey bee colonies in the U.S. used for pollinating crops. Each colony is made of up tens of thousands of bees. However, the vast majority of the native bee species are solitary, with just one female creating a nest, foraging and bringing food back for her babies. “If she is compromised, if her health is compromised or she dies, that is it. The nest is just done,” Malfi said.
Numerous studies have found that pesticides contribute to the decline of wild bees, including a study that found a 43% decrease in bees in areas with high use of pesticides.
With the recent proposal to add monarch butterflies to the ESA, Malfi said now is the time to expand how pesticides are tested. Studies have found that pesticides can be toxic for butterflies.
Mongabay reached out to the EPA and CropLife America, a national trade association for the pesticide industry, but didn’t receive a response from either organization.
Tierra Curry, a senior scientist and the endangered species coordinator with the Center for Biological Diversity, said there’s no deadline for the type of petition the Xerces Society filed with the EPA, and added she’s skeptical the current administration will take the requested action.
“Someone will need to knit the devil a sweater if Trump’s EPA puts forth a rule to protect pollinators, or anyone else, from pesticides,” she said in an email to Mongabay.
Banner image of a honey bee by Louise Docker via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0).
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