By Laura McCamy, Oakland Local
This is a bigger problem than we previously thought,” said Lisa Archer, Food and Technology Program Director at Friends of the Earth. She is talking about neonicitinoids, the pesticide implicated in the collapse of thousands of honeybee colonies over the past decade. It has come as a shock to some local gardeners that they may be unwittingly planting this neurotoxin in their yards.
A recent study by Friends of the Earth and the Pesticide Research Institute found traces of neonicitinoids (called neonics for short) in garden plants sold at some Bay Area big-box stores. Most of the local garden stores in Oakland contacted for this story didn’t know whether the flowering plants they sell contain neonics. Calls to wholesale nurseries who supply plants to East Bay retailers revealed that some of them continue to apply the pesticide in what they believe is a “bee safe” manner, by soaking the roots rather than spraying the plants.
Read the complete story at Oakland Local.
