usda

The Beekeeper

If Bees are Worth $215 Billion, Why Can't We Pay to Study Colony Collapse Disorder?

September 16, 2008 at 3:11PM By Kim Flottum | comment

One branch of the USDA has finally let go of some of the $1.4 million they are supposed to distribute to researchers for the study of Colony Collapse Disorder. They are still sitting on some of it though, I hear, not because they haven’t got it but some mid level manager hasn’t got around to doing the paper work. It’s been more than a month ... fiddling while Rome burns, and bees die.

But this $1.4 million is still a drop in the bucket for what’s needed, and while the industry has been generous in volunteering funds and spending money it was supposed to spend on other things, it’s a small industry and the well isn’t infinitely deep.

And, it seems, that if the farm bill money is to be released it will only be so if there is pressure from the people who pay the bills ... that would be you, by the way. Below is only a partial list of what is desperately needed to begin or continue studies from only one of the groups in this arena. Others still need funds too, and they are waiting for the release of these funds, or at least making them available for competitive grants.

Backlog

There are currently just over 4,000 samples waiting to be analyzed for pathogens and pesticides that have been collected from 8 different studies, surveys and volunteered samples sent in by beekeepers. It’ll cost a total of $250,000 to do this.
Pesticides

Researchers still need to conduct toxicity tests of individual pesticides to discover their relationship with CCD, if any, and determine the sub-lethal effects of pesticides and selected combinations of pesticides on bees and other pollinators. And an important study is to determine if pesticides, when combined with other problems, like viruses are responsible for, or aid in causing CCD. ...

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tags: science, money, usda, pollination, colony collapse disorder, pesticides, research, genetics, pathogens, parasites

How $4 Million For Bee Research Is Spent

July 18, 2008 at 9:57AM By Kim Flottum | comment

On July 17, Ag Secretary Shafer announced that the University of Georgia had been awarded a $4.1 million grant to study CCD.

This is a four year CAP (Coordinated Agriculture Project) grant, funded through USDA's Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service (CSREES), which aims to improve the health of managed bee populations in agricultural systems. The research, according to Shafer, will address genomics, breeding, pathology, immunology and applied ecology to explain the causes behind dwindling bee populations. Researchers will work closely with the extension community and other stakeholders to develop and implement mitigation strategies for CCD and other significant problems.

The research team that put together the proposal is spread out over much of the country, coming from 16 Universities and two USDA Honey Bee Research Labs. That they just got this money isn’t a surprise since we outlined their goals some time ago, but I’ll bet you haven’t heard of most of these scientists, and I’d like to give a short introduction for some of them, so you know who is in charge of finding out the answers to Colony Collapse Disorder. ...

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tags: science, money, usda, bees, colony collapse disorder, research, scientists

One Year Later, USDA Still Hasn't Funded Bee Research

May 21, 2008 at 7:17AM By Kim Flottum | comment

There’s a lull in the Colony collapse disorder world at the moment. But things have been happening on the government front that are interesting. The $4 million grant we’ve talked about before that’s been waiting is a step closer to being granted as one of the three teams competing for the funds has been chosen to be the golden child. But the fat lady hasn’t sung yet and they have to go and explain more fully what it is they intend to do, and who will be doing it. (Isn’t that what a grant proposal is supposed to do? So who pays for the scientists to go to D.C. and stay at expensive hotels and eat well for a couple three days while all this goes on? Just guess.)

The way this has been handled should be an embarrassment to the USDA because they have mishandled nearly every aspect of this from beginning to end, including who they let bid, and then the reviews of the programs. Their only saving grace is that everyone of the groups vying for the funds are better qualified to handle this operation than those in charge. This certainly leaves a bad taste in the mouths of anyone trying to do business with this government agency. ...

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tags: science, money, usda, bees, colony collapse disorder, research, farm bill

Does the USDA Even Care About the Bee Crisis?

April 29, 2008 at 3:30PM By Kim Flottum | comment

Yesterday Paul Bedard, a reporter for US News and World Report magazine, had an interview with Ed Schafer, the Secretary of the Department of Agriculture, regarding the farm bill, which is getting somewhat messy, or not, depending on who you talk to. Lots of money is still on the table and where it ultimately will go is getting interesting. But one of the questions Paul asked was about funding for Colony Collapse Disorder. If you read his latest you’ll see what the head guy thinks, and that is, the scientists have it under control. Or rather, "We already have it in the labs. We have this great bee guy who's tinkering away in the lab to see what's going on," Schafer said.

A great bee guy? Tinkering? Already have it in the labs? ...

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