Poultry Talk Ontario (pto.ca)

evey single field iv seen planted around here is 100% sprayed. not sure exactly with what but across the road was a, I dont know, 100 acre clover field last year. they came in and sprayed it and the next day it was all dead golden brown. then plowed twice with a crazy huge 12 wheel articulating tractor. then planted and sprayed again.

I see lots of bumble bees around here and the occasional honey bee.

i must be living in some sort of bubble...those of you that have been to my place know that my house/garden etc is smack in the middle of cash crop field....and the cutworm and wireworm issues out here are astoundingly frightening. so treated seed..and spray....and yesterday i had to herd the honey bees out of my greenhouse (the door stays open in daytime, plus the window is open with auto opener) so i could get in there and water without drowning any! and our corn went in last week....and planting in my area is now on to beans from corn, and it looks like 50% corn 50% beans out my way this year. so all the seed dust has to be everywhere.....
my tomatoes are blooming in the greenhouse already but the greenhouse was FULL of honey bees. and we have tons of sand wasps - they look like angry blue striped honeybees, don't sting, are good pollinators and eat bad yellow jackets so they're friends of mine! lol. we also have tons of the b52 bomber type real bumblebees...and carpenter bees. so i have to say i am not seeing fewer bees this year....

thegawd wrote:QR_BBPOST evey single field iv seen planted around here is 100% sprayed. not sure exactly with what but across the road was a, I dont know, 100 acre clover field last year. they came in and sprayed it and the next day it was all dead golden brown. then plowed twice with a crazy huge 12 wheel articulating tractor. then planted and sprayed again.

I see lots of bumble bees around here and the occasional honey bee.

It will be herbicides. Round -up kills plants on contact. Green GROWING weeds. Then they spray with either a pre-emergence, OR Post emergence. Pre-emergence allows corn to come up, but any weeds that germinate will die, giving corn enough time to grow up and form a canopy. But if weeds take over... as in a dry year, when the spray just sits ontop of the ground, and not down a few cm's, it will usually be round up ready corn, and they can go in a spray for that. Post, is usually round-up, with round up ready corn.... and other neat cocktails to kill weeds on conventional corn. Which if you sprayed with round up, it would die.

So, I don't know why people get so freaked out with GMO's.... and round up. Corn has been modified to resist dying with a whole lot of other BAD chemicals...., not just round up.

Beans the same.

OF course, if corn doesn't have the BT gene, which takes care of the ear worm... and one must plant a refuge for the worm, or it would become resistant..... refuge seeds come in the bag with BT gene'd corn....OR the round up ready gene bred into them, occassionally it does get sprayed with a pesticide. But, usually by planes, wheat the same... as if in something comes in and attacks it, like armyworms/aphids/japenese beetles, etc. Although with lower growing crops, those big bug looking sprayers can be called in too.

WLLady wrote:QR_BBPOST i must be living in some sort of bubble...those of you that have been to my place know that my house/garden etc is smack in the middle of cash crop field....and the cutworm and wireworm issues out here are astoundingly frightening. so treated seed..and spray....and yesterday i had to herd the honey bees out of my greenhouse (the door stays open in daytime, plus the window is open with auto opener) so i could get in there and water without drowning any! and our corn went in last week....and planting in my area is now on to beans from corn, and it looks like 50% corn 50% beans out my way this year. so all the seed dust has to be everywhere.....
my tomatoes are blooming in the greenhouse already but the greenhouse was FULL of honey bees. and we have tons of sand wasps - they look like angry blue striped honeybees, don't sting, are good pollinators and eat bad yellow jackets so they're friends of mine! lol. we also have tons of the b52 bomber type real bumblebees...and carpenter bees. so i have to say i am not seeing fewer bees this year....

Same here Kathy ....

they use those tall legged/wheeled sprayers in my area....sometimes they corner too fast at the end of the road LOL.
i'm waiting on the neighbours kid to try to drive his mom's car underneath one. he would too....
yeah, we were nitrogen'd (fertilizer) then cultivated, then planted with treated seed, they'll be in to do the round up in a about 3 weeks-because the weeds are growing like mad. no rain here...yet.
we usually are round up, then plant with seed corn or bean....then sprayed once for aphids or earworm (if they show on time to spray) and thats it....pretty good considering what i see some places do. if we are lucky in the spring we can just cultivate and plant without the need for weed killers.

you know how hard it is to take a pic of a flying bee? about as easy as taking decent pics of chickens. LOL put the camera on sport setting n it gets a bit easier. I got a few.

Terrible crime that's occurring against nature. I've seen two honey bees this year. I'm outside all the time and that's it.

Had a good showing of bumblebees when the apple trees were blooming, but no bees at all.
Our wild bees in a hollow cedar didn't make it thru the winter, really missing them.
wish we could have bee hives, but with bears around and having seen the damage they can do, we just couldn't protect them.

Last year in our area there were few Bumblebees and the few I saw were stunted looking. This year there are more and looking healthy.