Poisoning page 2

But what if the weather is okay; and the apples drop and the squashes don't set fruit? The bumblebees and yellow-jacket wasps and other insects will cross-pollinate all the flowers they can, but absent the h oneybees they just can't get the job done. I don't know about squashes and such, but in the case of apples I do know that they are either not self-fertile or you wouldn't want them to be. Very few apples will be produced by self pollinated flowers; and they will be poor. The point is that even in the case of a plant that can pollinate itself, this is not the desirable case. The well-being of cross-pollinating plants depends on the dispersal of DNA from one population of the plant to another. Isolated populations of any organism deteriorate genetically. These plants cannot shift gears now - it is far too late. They have been evolving in partnership with the bees for so long now that neither can survive without the other. Did you catch that? Cross-pollinating plants and bees. NEITHER can survive without the OTHER. Are you aware that most of our vegetables and fruits are in this group? Now: when we have killed off the bees, what then? What do your children eat?

There are many other beneficial insects being devastated. I want to move along, but should mention, briefly at least, such critters as praying mantises and mud-dauber wasps (kill grasshoppers and caterpillars*); assassin beetles(ditto) and ladybird beetles (kill aphids, mealybugs, spider mites, or practically any other insect that size); and let's not forget the butterflies and moths. Do you really want your children to live in a world of very few butterflies? And without the moths flying around at night, what do the whippoorwills eat?
*update Sept 99 - recently I read that the Diamond-backed moth has developed resistance to BT. What about the claim that genetically engineered BT cotton and BT corn and BT cauliflower would have no ecological impact? What other insects are evolving the same resistance? So it was okay to kill the caterpillar-killing wasps because now we have genetically altered crops, huh? HUH?

Does it stop with insects? It does not. Reptiles and birds and fish are devastated as well. And amphibians. Here's where it gets truly grim. Salamanders and frogs and toads and treefrogs are declining all over. In the case of the mosquitos, there are the mosquitofish. Practically every other disagreeable insect is controlled by some amphibian, from the frog by the water to the tree frog above the garden to the toad under the bush by your window. Or should be. And there's the rub. Increasingly, as we toxify our environment, the amphibians are permanently impacted or for a long term; while the insect pest bounces right back, and thrives in the absence of its control predator. More bugs. So use more poison, right? This is NUTS!