In reply to Phil1919:
> I just took this post from the beekeepers site on Fakebook......
> This is about neonicotinoids (neonics). These are insect nerve poisons currently used as insecticides by farmers throughout Britain (and the world). Their names are thiomethoxam, clothianidin imidacloprid etc. Three nanograms (3 thousand millionths of a gram) will kill a honey bee. You may also apply them in liquid form to your cat or dog's nape to kill fleas.
> Biking through Suffolk near Peasenhall. Wonderful rolling agricultural land, good hedges and lots of trees lining the roads and in coppices. But - we heard nor saw a single songbird - no swallows swooping over the wheat, no yellow-hammers on bush-tops telling us about 'a little bit of bread and no cheeeese', no whitethroats bubbling their song in the woods, no chiff-chaffs to time our pedalling, no thrushes singing their hearts' out in the treetops.
> No insects.
> Birds need insects to feed their nestlings or they die.
> The land is dead and deserted except for acres of wheat, rape setting its seed, barley for our beer and beet for our sugar.
> Fields of beans already in flower devoid of pollinators.
> Prof Goulson gives an astonishing statistic showing the 80% reduction in insect life in Germany since 1990 when neonics started. ** Is it the same here?
> Am I wrong to worry? Am I the only one to fear that this Tory government will reverse the 'ban' on neonics when we leave the EU? ('Ban' in inverted commas because neonics are allowed on wind pollinnated crops like cereal and maize).
> They are water soluble and remain in the soil for between 6 months and 20 years. Only 5% of seed dressings of neonics are absorbed by the plant. 95% washes off into the soil where it is dispersed into hedgerows, woods and rivers by the rain. In some circumstances of pH and temperature * etc, the 'magic' chemical groups that make these poisons specific to insects are lost. They then become more directly toxic to birds and fish. More terrifyingly they revert to become toxic nerve poisons that effect mammals. We are mammals. We take river water to supply some of our drinking water. Some treatment plants let the modified neonics through to the tap.
> Have we gone completely mad?
> I really don't trust Gove to sort this out.
Given the attitude of most posters on UKC towards him I'm surprised he hasn't been blamed yet
On a more serious note, that's a horrifying read.