General Discussion

pnwmom

(108,955 posts) Sat Feb 11, 2017, 04:57 PM Feb 2017

First it was puppies and kittens. Now DT's going after bumblebees.

Because he doesn't want the pesticide manufacturers to have to deal with pesky regulations.

http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2017/02/trump-bumble-bees-neonics-enadangered

The administration just delayed endangered status for a bumblebee species that's on the brink of extinction.

The official announcement of the delay cites a White House memo, released just after Trump's inauguration, instructing federal agencies to freeze all new regulations that had been announced but not yet taken effect, for the purpose of "reviewing questions of fact, law, and policy they raise." The Fish and Wildlife Service, which oversees the endangered species list, acted just in the nick of time in delaying the bumble bee's endangered status—it was scheduled to make its debut on the list on February 10.

Rebecca Riley, a senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, told me the move may not be a mere procedural delay. "We don't think this is just a freeze—it's an opportunity for the administration to reconsider and perhaps revoke the rule entirely," she said.

Why would the Trump administration want to reverse Endangered Species Act protections for this pollinating insect? After all, the rusty patched bumble bee has "experienced a swift and dramatic decline since the late 1990s," with its abundance having "plummeted by 87 percent, leaving small, scattered populations in 13 states," according to a December Fish and Wildlife Service notice. And it's not just pretty to look at—the Fish and Wildlide Services notes that like other bees, rusty patched bumblebees "pollinate many plants, including economically important crops such as tomatoes, cranberries and peppers," adding that bumblebees are "especially good pollinators; even plants that can self-pollinate produce more and bigger fruit when pollinated by bumble bees."

The answer may lie in the Fish and Wildlife Service's blunt discussion of pesticides as a threat to this bumblebee species. Like commercial honeybees, bumblebees face a variety of threats: exposure to pesticides, disease, climate change, and loss of forage. FWS cited all of those, noting that "no one single factor is likely responsible, but these threats working together have likely caused the decline." But it didn't mince any words about neonicotinoids, a class of insecticides widely used on US farm fields.

SNIP