Message from your National Office:

Welcome to b-TALK and the latest information on the activities of the Canadian Honey Council. Below is the current news on some of the issues we are working on this month.

Regards,

Rod Scarlett, Executive Director

Featured Stories:

• Manitoba Beekeepers’ Association, Canadian Honey Council and
Canadian Association of Professional Apiculturists
CANADIAN BEEKEEPING ANNUAL CONVENTION
The Fort Garry Hotel, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, January 26 – 28, 2012
For further information
• Team shows how the honey bee tolerates some synthetic pesticides
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — A new study reveals how enzymes in the honey bee gut detoxify pesticides commonly used to kill mites in the honey bee hive. This is the first study to tease out the precise molecular mechanisms that allow a pollinating insect to tolerate exposure to these potentially deadly compounds.
The findings appear in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Previous studies have shown that honey bee hives are contaminated with an array of agricultural chemicals, many of which the bees themselves bring back to the hive in the form of contaminated pollen and nectar, said University of Illinois entomology professor and department head May Berenbaum, who led the new research.
"There are agricultural pesticides everywhere," she said. "They accumulate in the wax of bee hives, so bees in particular are exposed. And their habit of foraging very broadly across a staggering diversity of plant species also tends to expose them to many different types of habitats, which may also have different types of chemical residues."
Other chemicals are applied directly to the hives, she said. For the past 20 years, beekeepers have used acaricides – chemicals designed to kill mites but not bees – in the hive.
While evidence so far does not support the idea that exposure to synthetic pesticides is a cause or significant contributor to colony collapse disorder, the massive die-off of honey bees first reported in late 2006, "it's abundantly clear that pesticides aren't really very good for any insect," Berenbaum said. "So we figured it was about time somebody knew something about how pollinators process toxins."
The researchers focused on cytochrome P450s, enzymes that are well-known agents of detoxification "in most air-breathing organisms," Berenbaum said. Other studies had shown that cytochrome P450s in honey bees play a key role in their tolerance of pyrethroid pesticides, such as tau-fluvalinate, which is used to kill mites in the hive. But no previous study had identified specific cytochrome P450s in bees or in other pollinating insects that contribute to pyrethroid tolerance, Berenbaum said.
In a series of experiments, the team identified three cytochrome P450s in the honey bee midgut that metabolize tau-fluvalinate. They discovered that these enzymes also detoxify coumaphos, a structurally different organophosphate pesticide that also is used to kill mites in bee hives.
"This suggests that these honey bee cytochrome P450s are not particularly specialized," Berenbaum said. "That raises the possibility that a nontoxic dose of tau-fluvalinate may become toxic if an enzyme that is principally involved in its detoxification is otherwise occupied with a different chemical."
The evidence also suggests that honey bees were "pre-adapted" to detoxify pyrethroid pesticides, Berenbaum said. Pyrethroids are similar in structure to naturally occurring defensive compounds, called pyrethrins, produced by some flowering plants. Honey bees have likely had a long history of contact with pyrethrins, which are found even in some flowers in the daisy family. It appears that the same enzymes that helped the honey bees detoxify the pyrethrins in nature may also help them tolerate this relatively new pesticide exposure.
The new findings should enhance efforts to develop mite control methods that are even less toxic to bees, Berenbaum said.
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Also on the study team were U. of I. cell and developmental biology professor Mary Schuler and postdoctoral researcher Wenfu Mao.

• The August issue of the WAS Journal has now been posted. Please visit and click on the line for the current issue as directed. Don't forget the 2011 WAS conference in Hawaii September 12 - 15th.

•EU Audit

The Food and Veterinary Office (FVO) of the European Commission will be conducting an audit of Canada's control of residues and contaminants to assess whether these systems offer adequate  assurance that the products and animals concerned are within the specified residue limits laid down in EU legislation.
Since the national rules governing the authorisation, distribution and use of  veterinary medicinal products and feed additives have an impact on residue monitoring, the control systems in these areas will also be part of the audit. 
The audit team will also review the follow-up actions from the previous audit  which took place in 2007.

The audit will take place September 12 - 23, 2011 and will cover the following commodities:

-cattle,
-sheep and goats,
-pigs,
-horses,
-poultry,
-aquaculture,
-rabbits,
-farmed game,
-wild game,
-milk,
-eggs and honey,
-hormone free beef and pork, and
-horse meat destined for the EU market.

The auditor(s) will review data and documents, interview government officials
and other appropriate parties and carry out on-site visits to CFIA and private
laboratories, farms, feedlots, slaughter houses, and veterinary drug
wholesalers and suppliers.  No visits to bee keeping or honey facilities are
planned for the purposes of this audit.

A copy of the final report and recommendations from the audit carried out in
2007 is available in this website: