Scientists have come up with an ingenious idea to get the bees to do the job of farmers. The idea is to have these tiny insects spread pesticides around to the plants. After all, the bees are going to the flowers anyway. It all sounds a bit sci-fi, but it's actually quite a simple concept.
My Notes
Commercial bees are fast becoming the sloggers of modern day farming. The usual role of bees is that they pollinate fields and fields of crops in their pursuit of the tasty nectar they love so much. None of this is anything new. And since they’re already making the journey from hive to stamen (the male fertilizing organ of a flower), scientists thought it would be a good idea to piggyback on their efforts.
Les Shipp is a scientist for Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada. He and his colleagues worked out an ingenious way to get bees to carry pesticides right to the source plant. Here's how it works, as explained by Shipp in an interview with CBC News:
“What we have is a little tray, we have an inoculum tray that we attach to the hive. And, as the bees exit the hive they walk through this tray, picking up the inoculum on their hairs and on their feet. And then they leave this inoculum tray, go out to the plants and fly around, and when they’re buzz pollinating—they’re grabbing that flower and they’re vigorously shaking that flower—they’re releasing this inoculum on the flowers, and also it gets on the leaves too.”
It's an incredibly simple concept but then the best ideas often are. You can read the full interview at CBC News: Canadian researchers use bees to drop pesticides on crops
No Harm to Bees
It's important to point out that no harm comes to the bees during this process. There are plenty of concerns with Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) as it is. We certainly don't need anything else that contributes to the bee's decline. None of the pesticides and anti-fungal agents that Shipp coaxed the bees into carrying posed a threat to the insects themselves. So why does this matter? Well, this is a type of targeted delivery that could reduce the amount of pesticides that are currently used with conventional farming methods. There are two positive results to this. One is that there will be a huge reduction in the amount of chemicals used on the actual crops. This means considerable savings for farmers over the long term. And perhaps more importantly is that there will be much less of these chemicals blowing around in the wind.
Summary
The theory behind this sounds ingenious and resourceful beyond belief. But it would take a lot of bee and manual, distribution of the pesticides to keep operations running to any great effect. For small-holdings it's probably a perfect solution, but to a large-scale industrial farm? There's no question of doubt that this is a potentially more environmentally friendly approach to farming. It will be interesting to see where it will all lead in the not too distant future.