7 ms·

I’ve been telling everyone I know. The number 1 concern we should all have are pesticides! The number of insects have dropped dramatically and that has impacts

I’ve been telling everyone I know. The number 1 concern we should all have are pesticides! The number of insects have dropped dramatically and that has impacts on the entire food chain. Particularly, the ability for plants to reproduce. The pesticides themselves also make it all the way up the food chain. Neonicotinoids have a half life of 5 years and we spray fields EVERY YEAR. So it’s building up in the supply chain. I live surrounded by corn fields and I basically only see wasps, Japanese beetles and some ants. Growing up we saw a ton of different insect species and numbers. Finally, all these chemicals interact and frankly we have no idea of the long term impacts when combined.

gizmondo 5y ago
> Neonicotinoids have a half life of 5 years and we spray fields EVERY YEAR. So it’s building up in the supply chain. Have they been in use less than 10 years? Or are we increasing the usage every year? Otherwise your conclusion doesn't seem to follow.
- at_a_remove 5y ago
  Okay, so with a half-life of five years, whatever you spray at year zero, you get about 87.0551% left by next year. So, let's imagine we spray just one unit per year. Year zero, one unit. Farmer Brown shows up to do his usual one-unit blast, recommended by Monsanto, but 87% of the stuff is still there. Year two, 1.870551 units are present. Year three, 2.628408673 units. Year four, 3.288162485. By year ten, you have 5.79376654 units present. If the half-life is really five years, you should do an initial one-unit dump, then just thirteen percent of that every subsequent year.
  - RandallBrown 5y ago
    Presumably most of the pesticides get removed when the plants are harvested. Some probably are still around, but if spraying less worked, the farmers would because it would be cheaper. Not saying that pesticides aren't a problem, just saying that we're probably not just flooding our fields with more and more pesticides.
    - sjwalter 5y ago
      > the farmers would because it would be cheaper As a person who just became a farmer at the start of covid, I think this is a mistaken conclusion. Farmers are, in general, not out there a/b testing concentrations of herbicides or pesticides in their fields to find the exactly optimal level. If they're anything like most of the farmers I've met--who are absolutely really smart, well-intentioned folks--they talk to the guy at the extension office or weed control office and that guy tells them what to mix and how to apply. If it works, the farmer is generally happy. If not, he'll complain. The definition of "works" is: the immediate problem is solved. So the extension office guy, who usually seems to be indirectly funded by Dow Chemical in some way, or just by chance seems to really love that concern's range of products, is motivated to maybe overshoot a little. On my farm, we're doing things a little bit, uh, differently. Our food is expensive, but it's helping heal our soil and provides actual nutrition. https://mulligan.farm https://mulligan.farm.
  - refurb 5y ago
    A quick scan says half-life can be up to 5 years, but also low as several days.
- Sharlin 5y ago
  I don't think half-life means what you think it means. A substance with a half-life of five years will not be gone in ten years.
  - gizmondo 5y ago
    I know what it means, I was too lazy to do the math properly. The point was that with such a (relatively) short half-life the total amount stabilizes quickly.
    - kbelder 5y ago
      Once you've hit the balance, you'll have saturation equal to 1 + 4/5 + 16/25 + 64/125 ... It ends up summing to 5 (what a coincidence!). So 1 dose with a halflife of 5 years, applied yearly, hits equilibrium at 5x concentration.
throwaway894345 5y ago
If you buy organic, does that imply that the crops aren't treated with pesticides? What else can a layperson do?
- gizmondo 5y ago
  No, there are organic pesticides. Some on them can be better (e.g. less stable) than some synthetic ones, that's all. And them being organic also guarantees that they can't be improved, in terms of stability or targeting, so that is entirely stupid.
  - Y-bar 5y ago
    > And them being organic also guarantees that they can't be improved Please explain this part. I was under the impression that certifications for "organic" labeling was a threshold thing and nothing prevents one brand from trying to be more efficient within limitations compared to another brand, as long as it is below or above certain levels.
    - gizmondo 5y ago
      I had in mind a relatively broad definition* from the latest Swiss public initiative on the topic. Which was forbidding any chemical alterations to the compounds already produced by plants, etc. Not really familiar with labeling requirements in the US. * intended by organizers, not spelled in the text.
      - Y-bar 5y ago
        I'm European and have not heard of something like what you are alluding to. I know certain specific categories of pesticides are either forbidden (e.g. Propargite), or limited. But given your response I still do not understand what it has to do with artificial limits of "organic" labeling of certain categories of compounds, especially since it is often NGO:s which are responsible for many of these labels and their verifications.
    - lathyrus_long 5y ago
BitwiseFool 5y ago
I know is possible to use genetic engineering to 'knock-out' a species by introducing some genes that cripple the females but allow the males to carry the bad gene forward through the rest of the population. Making species extinct on purpose sounds bad, but hear me out. What if we do the knock-out technique on the most economically destructive pests so that we no longer need broad insecticides? We should probably only do this to pests that exclusively feed on crops and not generalists. But there are a ton of specialized pests that feed on human agriculture. For instance, if you make the corn borer moth extinct in the wild, would you still need to spray cornfields? Or what about the Colorado Potato Beetle, the Boll Weevil, etc?
- gogopuppygogo 5y ago
  Outdoor farming is still incredibly resource intensive. As we move into an age where unsalted water becomes more precious and rare we should focus on hydroponic growing tech to preserve water. It is indoors so it wouldn’t require pesticides.
  - nradov 5y ago
    Israeli farmers have shown that crops can be grown outdoors in a water efficient manner.
    - BostonEnginerd 5y ago
      How have they done that? Encapsulating the soil with a barrier layer?
      - lathyrus_long 5y ago
        The Israelis invented modern drip irrigation and use it extensively. They also make good use of low-quality water, like treated wastewater and not-totally-desalinated seawater, by developing salt-tolerant varieties and carefully optimizing plant nutrition under their constraints. Of course they do lots of hydroponics too, for the usual hydroponic crops (tomatoes, cucumbers, etc.). The science in hydroponics and science in sophisticated soil culture aren't really that different--you'll see mostly the same chemical fertilizers, the same EC and pH measurements in the field, the same lab analyses by ICP, etc. Some water still drains to the aquifer and is "wasted". It needs to be though, or else unwanted ions (from impure source water or fertilizer, including but not limited to Na+ and Cl-) would accumulate and kill the plant. Israel has a significant problem with salinization of their soils and groundwater, and lots of interesting work modeling that.
pfdietz 5y ago
> The number of insects have dropped dramatically Are you referring to the 2017 "Insect Apocalypse" paper? It has not done well under subsequent examination. https://ecologyisnotadirtyword.com/2019/12/20/moving-on-from-the-insect-apocalypse-to-evidence-based-conservation/ https://ecologyisnotadirtyword.com/2019/12/20/moving-on-from... "From a scientific perspective, there is so much wrong with the paper, it really shouldn’t have been published in its current form: the biased search method, the cherry-picked studies, the absence of any real quantitative data to back up the bizarre 40% extinction rate that appears in the abstract (we don’t even have population data for 40% of the world’s insect species), and the errors in the reference list. And it was presented as a ‘comprehensive review’ and a ‘meta-analysis’, even though it is neither."
- spiderfarmer 5y ago
  This was clear within weeks after publishing it. Years later it’s still cited or paraphrased in every article about bees or other flying insects. Sigh.
- mandmandam 5y ago
  Anyone with eyeballs can tell there are far far far far far fewer insects than there were thirty years ago. This isn't a fuddable topic.
  - rootusrootus 5y ago
    I'd prefer actual science, human memory is extremely unreliable and often tends to be self-serving.
    - Dumblydorr 5y ago
      When does preference for "actual science" become satisfied, given we on HN skeptically pick apart all presented evidence of anything? The above is in Nature for goodness sakes, is that too weak of a journal? If so I'm weaker than a weak scientist who publishes there. I'd say entomologists should judge what is actually good science, the rest of us? We do have valid if flawed memories of more insects previously. Combined with the invasive species, widespread pesticide use, and all this evidence, I don't think it's wise to slow-walk our response to such a pivotal biological foundation's crisis. We slow walked cigarettes, millions died. We slow walked climate, and we're on a path of worst outcomes. Shall insects be another failure of humans to respond? When do the skeptical technicians lay down their doubtful instincts and push for change?
User23 5y ago
I don't now where you live, but perhaps you're not looking very hard? Where I live the wild plants, which is to say weeds, are showing absolutely no problem reproducing whatsoever and when the clover blooms there are so many bees it's uncomfortable to be outside. And while I'm no entomologist, I see far more insect species than can be counted on both hands.
manachar 5y ago
No. The point is the number 1 concern is we're destroying insect ecosystems to anthropoform the world. Pesticides are a problem, but almost always secondary to wholesale habitat destruction in order to make farmland (mostly to grow feed for cattle in this country) and suburbs. Pesticides are just a tool to make those new "more profitable" landscapes. Modern commercial farming leaves no room for nature, and suburbans folks seem to think ants and spiders shouldn't exist. Turns out the same things that kill "pests" and "weeds" generally make it tough for the cute things we like. We're reshaping the world, often in ignorance on how much we actually depend on these ecosystems we are destroying.
- harpersealtako 5y ago
  In the developed world, total acres of farmland have been shrinking for about a half century. And in North America, suburbs are usually overpopulated with cute things (e.g. deer, squirrels, raccoons), not underpopulated. The issue IS pesticides. There is broad consensus that this is the case among experts. Harmful pesticide overutilization is a LOT more practical to fix than getting rid of farms and suburbs.
BostonEnginerd 5y ago
Since we bought our house, we're saturated in ads for pest control companies who want to spray our entire property to kill bugs. It's unbelievable that this is actually legal. I think that the use of pesticides should be strictly limited to acute infestations -- or small specific things like a barrier placed on the foundation of the house for termite prevention.
- handrous 5y ago
  A time when cities had trucks drive around dousing entire neighborhoods in pesticide is well within living memory.
  - RandallBrown 5y ago
    That's definitely still a thing in Michigan where I grew up. There are county departments dedicated to mosquito control.
- trophycase 5y ago
  Yep, it's just lovely living in an apartment complex that sprays poison everywhere on the property every month.
lmilcin 5y ago
It is not just pesticides. We are killing all flowering plants around us that are not crops or garden flowers. Bees do not care whether it is a weed or crop. But they do care that there is always something flowering. When there is little variety in plants around bee nest they can't pollinate entire season but rather most of the time there is very little to pollinate and then suddenly there is too much and they can't keep up and make good use of it.
Demonsult 5y ago
> Neonicotinoids have a half life of 5 years This is nonsense. When exposed to light, which most of it is, the half-life is 39 days. It may last 1 year in the soil. Any claim that makes farmers stupid or wasteful is immediately suspect. They are neither. They can't be on those margins.
herbst 5y ago
The upgoing issues people have with wheats could be linked to the pesticides and not the wheat itself. (According to a recent documentation from Arte) I personally believe the reason I can't drink beer today is glyphosat. The more I can be sure it's glyphosate free the less likely I get a headache. Honestly one of the worst things we face these days in my opinion

gizmondo 5y ago

> Neonicotinoids have a half life of 5 years and we spray fields EVERY YEAR. So it’s building up in the supply chain. Have they been in use less than 10 years? Or are we increasing the usage every year? Otherwise your conclusion doesn't seem to follow.

at_a_remove 5y ago
Okay, so with a half-life of five years, whatever you spray at year zero, you get about 87.0551% left by next year. So, let's imagine we spray just one unit per year. Year zero, one unit. Farmer Brown shows up to do his usual one-unit blast, recommended by Monsanto, but 87% of the stuff is still there. Year two, 1.870551 units are present. Year three, 2.628408673 units. Year four, 3.288162485. By year ten, you have 5.79376654 units present. If the half-life is really five years, you should do an initial one-unit dump, then just thirteen percent of that every subsequent year.
- RandallBrown 5y ago
  Presumably most of the pesticides get removed when the plants are harvested. Some probably are still around, but if spraying less worked, the farmers would because it would be cheaper. Not saying that pesticides aren't a problem, just saying that we're probably not just flooding our fields with more and more pesticides.
  - sjwalter 5y ago
    > the farmers would because it would be cheaper As a person who just became a farmer at the start of covid, I think this is a mistaken conclusion. Farmers are, in general, not out there a/b testing concentrations of herbicides or pesticides in their fields to find the exactly optimal level. If they're anything like most of the farmers I've met--who are absolutely really smart, well-intentioned folks--they talk to the guy at the extension office or weed control office and that guy tells them what to mix and how to apply. If it works, the farmer is generally happy. If not, he'll complain. The definition of "works" is: the immediate problem is solved. So the extension office guy, who usually seems to be indirectly funded by Dow Chemical in some way, or just by chance seems to really love that concern's range of products, is motivated to maybe overshoot a little. On my farm, we're doing things a little bit, uh, differently. Our food is expensive, but it's helping heal our soil and provides actual nutrition. https://mulligan.farm https://mulligan.farm.
- refurb 5y ago
  A quick scan says half-life can be up to 5 years, but also low as several days.
Sharlin 5y ago
I don't think half-life means what you think it means. A substance with a half-life of five years will not be gone in ten years.
- gizmondo 5y ago
  I know what it means, I was too lazy to do the math properly. The point was that with such a (relatively) short half-life the total amount stabilizes quickly.
  - kbelder 5y ago
    Once you've hit the balance, you'll have saturation equal to 1 + 4/5 + 16/25 + 64/125 ... It ends up summing to 5 (what a coincidence!). So 1 dose with a halflife of 5 years, applied yearly, hits equilibrium at 5x concentration.

throwaway894345 5y ago

If you buy organic, does that imply that the crops aren't treated with pesticides? What else can a layperson do?

gizmondo 5y ago
No, there are organic pesticides. Some on them can be better (e.g. less stable) than some synthetic ones, that's all. And them being organic also guarantees that they can't be improved, in terms of stability or targeting, so that is entirely stupid.
- Y-bar 5y ago
  > And them being organic also guarantees that they can't be improved Please explain this part. I was under the impression that certifications for "organic" labeling was a threshold thing and nothing prevents one brand from trying to be more efficient within limitations compared to another brand, as long as it is below or above certain levels.
  - gizmondo 5y ago
    I had in mind a relatively broad definition* from the latest Swiss public initiative on the topic. Which was forbidding any chemical alterations to the compounds already produced by plants, etc. Not really familiar with labeling requirements in the US. * intended by organizers, not spelled in the text.
    - Y-bar 5y ago
      I'm European and have not heard of something like what you are alluding to. I know certain specific categories of pesticides are either forbidden (e.g. Propargite), or limited. But given your response I still do not understand what it has to do with artificial limits of "organic" labeling of certain categories of compounds, especially since it is often NGO:s which are responsible for many of these labels and their verifications.
  - lathyrus_long 5y ago

BitwiseFool 5y ago

I know is possible to use genetic engineering to 'knock-out' a species by introducing some genes that cripple the females but allow the males to carry the bad gene forward through the rest of the population. Making species extinct on purpose sounds bad, but hear me out. What if we do the knock-out technique on the most economically destructive pests so that we no longer need broad insecticides? We should probably only do this to pests that exclusively feed on crops and not generalists. But there are a ton of specialized pests that feed on human agriculture. For instance, if you make the corn borer moth extinct in the wild, would you still need to spray cornfields? Or what about the Colorado Potato Beetle, the Boll Weevil, etc?

gogopuppygogo 5y ago
Outdoor farming is still incredibly resource intensive. As we move into an age where unsalted water becomes more precious and rare we should focus on hydroponic growing tech to preserve water. It is indoors so it wouldn’t require pesticides.
- nradov 5y ago
  Israeli farmers have shown that crops can be grown outdoors in a water efficient manner.
  - BostonEnginerd 5y ago
    How have they done that? Encapsulating the soil with a barrier layer?
    - lathyrus_long 5y ago
      The Israelis invented modern drip irrigation and use it extensively. They also make good use of low-quality water, like treated wastewater and not-totally-desalinated seawater, by developing salt-tolerant varieties and carefully optimizing plant nutrition under their constraints. Of course they do lots of hydroponics too, for the usual hydroponic crops (tomatoes, cucumbers, etc.). The science in hydroponics and science in sophisticated soil culture aren't really that different--you'll see mostly the same chemical fertilizers, the same EC and pH measurements in the field, the same lab analyses by ICP, etc. Some water still drains to the aquifer and is "wasted". It needs to be though, or else unwanted ions (from impure source water or fertilizer, including but not limited to Na+ and Cl-) would accumulate and kill the plant. Israel has a significant problem with salinization of their soils and groundwater, and lots of interesting work modeling that.

pfdietz 5y ago

> The number of insects have dropped dramatically Are you referring to the 2017 "Insect Apocalypse" paper? It has not done well under subsequent examination. https://ecologyisnotadirtyword.com/2019/12/20/moving-on-from-the-insect-apocalypse-to-evidence-based-conservation/ https://ecologyisnotadirtyword.com/2019/12/20/moving-on-from... "From a scientific perspective, there is so much wrong with the paper, it really shouldn’t have been published in its current form: the biased search method, the cherry-picked studies, the absence of any real quantitative data to back up the bizarre 40% extinction rate that appears in the abstract (we don’t even have population data for 40% of the world’s insect species), and the errors in the reference list. And it was presented as a ‘comprehensive review’ and a ‘meta-analysis’, even though it is neither."

spiderfarmer 5y ago
This was clear within weeks after publishing it. Years later it’s still cited or paraphrased in every article about bees or other flying insects. Sigh.
mandmandam 5y ago
Anyone with eyeballs can tell there are far far far far far fewer insects than there were thirty years ago. This isn't a fuddable topic.
- rootusrootus 5y ago
  I'd prefer actual science, human memory is extremely unreliable and often tends to be self-serving.
  - Dumblydorr 5y ago
    When does preference for "actual science" become satisfied, given we on HN skeptically pick apart all presented evidence of anything? The above is in Nature for goodness sakes, is that too weak of a journal? If so I'm weaker than a weak scientist who publishes there. I'd say entomologists should judge what is actually good science, the rest of us? We do have valid if flawed memories of more insects previously. Combined with the invasive species, widespread pesticide use, and all this evidence, I don't think it's wise to slow-walk our response to such a pivotal biological foundation's crisis. We slow walked cigarettes, millions died. We slow walked climate, and we're on a path of worst outcomes. Shall insects be another failure of humans to respond? When do the skeptical technicians lay down their doubtful instincts and push for change?

User23 5y ago

I don't now where you live, but perhaps you're not looking very hard? Where I live the wild plants, which is to say weeds, are showing absolutely no problem reproducing whatsoever and when the clover blooms there are so many bees it's uncomfortable to be outside. And while I'm no entomologist, I see far more insect species than can be counted on both hands.

manachar 5y ago

No. The point is the number 1 concern is we're destroying insect ecosystems to anthropoform the world. Pesticides are a problem, but almost always secondary to wholesale habitat destruction in order to make farmland (mostly to grow feed for cattle in this country) and suburbs. Pesticides are just a tool to make those new "more profitable" landscapes. Modern commercial farming leaves no room for nature, and suburbans folks seem to think ants and spiders shouldn't exist. Turns out the same things that kill "pests" and "weeds" generally make it tough for the cute things we like. We're reshaping the world, often in ignorance on how much we actually depend on these ecosystems we are destroying.

harpersealtako 5y ago
In the developed world, total acres of farmland have been shrinking for about a half century. And in North America, suburbs are usually overpopulated with cute things (e.g. deer, squirrels, raccoons), not underpopulated. The issue IS pesticides. There is broad consensus that this is the case among experts. Harmful pesticide overutilization is a LOT more practical to fix than getting rid of farms and suburbs.

BostonEnginerd 5y ago

Since we bought our house, we're saturated in ads for pest control companies who want to spray our entire property to kill bugs. It's unbelievable that this is actually legal. I think that the use of pesticides should be strictly limited to acute infestations -- or small specific things like a barrier placed on the foundation of the house for termite prevention.

handrous 5y ago
A time when cities had trucks drive around dousing entire neighborhoods in pesticide is well within living memory.
- RandallBrown 5y ago
  That's definitely still a thing in Michigan where I grew up. There are county departments dedicated to mosquito control.
trophycase 5y ago
Yep, it's just lovely living in an apartment complex that sprays poison everywhere on the property every month.

lmilcin 5y ago

It is not just pesticides. We are killing all flowering plants around us that are not crops or garden flowers. Bees do not care whether it is a weed or crop. But they do care that there is always something flowering. When there is little variety in plants around bee nest they can't pollinate entire season but rather most of the time there is very little to pollinate and then suddenly there is too much and they can't keep up and make good use of it.

Demonsult 5y ago

> Neonicotinoids have a half life of 5 years This is nonsense. When exposed to light, which most of it is, the half-life is 39 days. It may last 1 year in the soil. Any claim that makes farmers stupid or wasteful is immediately suspect. They are neither. They can't be on those margins.

herbst 5y ago

The upgoing issues people have with wheats could be linked to the pesticides and not the wheat itself. (According to a recent documentation from Arte) I personally believe the reason I can't drink beer today is glyphosat. The more I can be sure it's glyphosate free the less likely I get a headache. Honestly one of the worst things we face these days in my opinion