Will Regenerative Agriculture Change How We Grocery Shop?

Bridget Shirvell 

Look for the word "regenerative" at your local grocery store. Chances are, you'll spot it on boxes of mac and cheese, cartons of milks, or even bags of chips. Regenerative agriculture, also called carbon farming, has become the latest darling of everyone from food companies to universities to politicians. But what is regenerative agriculture? How do products made with these practices differ from others, and can buying them help consumers fight the climate crisis? Here's what you need to know about this farming philosophy.

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What Is Regenerative Agriculture?

Ask 10 different people to define regenerative agriculture, and you'll get 10 different answers. There is no one single definition, although several organizations are currently working to establish formal guidelines.

"The idea with regenerative agriculture is to make the land better than it was," says Dawn Pettinelli, associate cooperative extension educator at the University of Connecticut's Institute of the Environment.

In essence, regenerative agriculture is farming done in a way that helps build soil health, increase organic matter, store water more effectively, and draw carbon out of the atmosphere. This isn't exactly a new idea—farming with soil health in mind is a concept nearly as old as agriculture itself. It wasn't until the 1980s, however, that the Rodale Institute began using the term, and it's only recently become a buzzword.

"There's a lot of power in words, and I think people are drawn to the term because it conveys something that is missing," says Jiff Martin, associate extension educator in sustainable food systems for the University of Connecticut's College of Agriculture, Health, and Natural Resources, adding she's noticed the term being used more frequently in the past five years.

Regenerative Agriculture vs. Organic

The number of labels on our food and other products can be overwhelming, but there are some differences between organic, other labels, and those that denote products made with regenerative agriculture. Think of organic as the idea of "do no harm." Regenerative takes it a step beyond that: It's a farming philosophy focused on healing.

You may find this terminology on products under the Regenerative Organic Alliance label. Designed by Rodale Institute, Patagonia, and Dr. Bronner's, products certified by the Regenerative Organic Alliance are organic and made in a way that benefits farmers and promotes long-term soil health.

"It's soil health, animal welfare, and social fairness," says Birgit Cameron, head of Patagonia Provisions. "It goes together with organic. You can call it regenerative or not, but you can't have a truly regenerative system if organic isn't attached to it."

Patagonia Provisions partners with farmers and producers interested in regenerative agriculture that are already practicing organic farming, and the company has strong animal welfare and social fairness philosophies behind its line of shelf-stable packaged foods. While regenerative agriculture is something that many small farmers have long specialized in, that doesn't necessarily make the practice an easy one.

"It's hard because all of agriculture is hard, and you need to be viable," Martin says. "But people have different notions of what viable is, how much money you have to make to be successful, and ultimately if you can grow food in a way that meets your values while still being able to sell it."

© Provided by Food52 7 of Our Favorite Ethical Brands to Keep in the Kitchen in 2021

7 of Our Favorite Ethical Brands to Keep in the Kitchen 

Regenerative Agriculture & the Climate Crisis

More and more consumers are paying attention to the climate crisis. According to Nielsen, 73 percent of global consumers say they would change their habits to reduce their environmental footprint.

"I do think the market is there and that it can grow," Martin says.

In January, President Joe Biden rejoined the Paris Agreement, the international treaty designed to avert catastrophic global warming. Still, according to several recent studies, it will be impossible to meet the agreement's global warming benchmarks without reducing emissions from food production. So, does buying regenerative agriculture products really reduce your foodprint? It's complicated.

"Carbon farming can help to mitigate climate change to some extent," says Pettinelli.

What's not clear, at least not yet, is how much carbon the soil can hold, and for how long. It's also hard to compare the regenerative agriculture products you find at the supermarket because (for the time being) General Mills' definition will be different from Patagonia's, whose definition might be different from your local CSA farmer's.

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 The 14 Foods to Consider Buying Organic

"If at all possible, see the farm and purchase from them directly," said Pettinelli. "If you can't visit, explore their website and ask questions about their practices. It's challenging to see past the marketing."

You can explore more about the Regenerative Organic Alliance label on their website and shop for certified products there. Still, Cameron suggests looking for organic products as a start.

"Organic is the base, and regenerative helps elevate the things that are good for people and good for the planet," she says.

Review: Bill Gates offers a hopeful take on climate change
2021-02-17

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“How to Avoid Climate Disaster: The Solutions We Have and the Breakthroughs We Need,” by Bill Gates (Knopf)

Watching Bill Gates in the news over the years, his demeanour usually is that of an earnest, enthusiastic college professor, someone who draws on research and thinks before he talks. And it turns out, before he writes, too.

Gates has crafted a calm, reasoned, well-sourced explanation of the greatest challenge of our time and what we must change to avoid cooking our planet in “How to Avoid Climate Disaster: The Solutions We Have and the Breakthroughs We Need.”

His goal with this book appears to be to explain and persuade and although he doesn’t say so in the book, the implicit theme parallels something President Abraham Lincoln once said: “Give the people the facts and the nation will be safe,” meaning we Americans would make the right decisions about the problems we face if we have the facts.

Will we though?

Certainly in recent years many Americans have felt completely free to adopt their own beliefs on everything, completely unmoored from science and truth.

What should make Gates’ book compelling to climate-change skeptics however are the concise, straightforward explanations of, for example, how much carbon is produced in the making of electricity and what we can do to reduce that.

Gates works through steel, meat-production, flying and every other way we produces carbon dioxide and other gasses that are causing our atmosphere, oceans and land to retain more heat.

One conclusion sure to provoke debate is Gates’ contention that to conquer global warming, we need to produce at least some of our electricity from nuclear power, which he notes, is clean and safer than ever.

And Gates is funding multiple research projects himself focused on finding ways to, among other things, make cement without releasing carbon into the atmosphere.

Gates cautions however, that we can’t invent our way to a reprieve from catastrophic global warming.

Can we make the sacrifices and changes necessary to, for example, shift to a more plant-based diet? Cows expel great quantities of methane, which causes 28 times more warming per molecule than carbon dioxide.

Gates implores federal governments to fund more research on how we can shift to an economy that can reduce our damaging emissions to zero by 2050.

He acknowledges that the issue is complex but he says the Biden administration understands the urgency for action.

What about for the rest of us?

We can buy green products whenever possible, he asks, and we also must demand public policies that put us on a path to zero global-warming emissions.

And if we don’t? Gates’ book is high on solutions and low on dire warnings, the staple of many other writings on climate change.

Still, Gates occasionally points out the realities of inaction. Just a 2 degrees Celsius rise in ocean temperatures, he notes, could kill coral reefs and destroy the food source for 1 billion people.

To avert that, he says, “we need to accomplish gigantic things we have never done before.”

Jeff Rowe, The Associated Press

Climate change has made the Gulf Stream its weakest in 1,000 years

Stacy Liberatore For Dailymail.com and Joe Pinkstone For Mailonline 

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A system of currents in the Atlantic Ocean that acts like a massive conveyor belt redistributing warm water throughout our planet's oceans is the weakest it has been in more than 1,000 years - and human-induced climate change is to blame.

Formally known as the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), it powers the Gulf Stream that brings warm water from the Gulf of Mexico to the northeastern US coast.

Scientists determined that in 2015 it to had slowed by at least 15 percent since 1950, but the latest work paints a picture of how it will develop long term.

Experts warn that by 2100 the AMOC could weaken by as much as 45 percent, bringing humanity dangerously close to a 'tipping point' that would result in devastating weather conditions across the world.

If these predictions become our reality, sea levels will rise along the eastern US coast and Western Europe would experience extreme weather more frequently.

© Provided by Daily Mail Formally known as the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), it powers the Gulf Stream that brings warm water from the Gulf of Mexico to the northeastern US coast. Experts warn that it is slowing and could increase sea levels along the northeastern US coast

The consequences of the AMOC slowdown could be manifold for people living on both sides of the Atlantic as Levke Caesar explains: 'The northward surface flow of the AMOC leads to a deflection of water masses to the right, away from the US east coast.

'This is due to Earth's rotation that diverts moving objects such as currents to the right in the northern hemisphere and to the left in the southern hemisphere.

'As the current slows down, this effect weakens and more water can pile up at the US east coast, leading to an enhanced sea level rise.'

The AMOC was the plot of the 2004 film 'The Day After Tomorrow,' which depicted the current coming to an abrupt stop and triggered catastrophic storms worldwide.

Although the movie is deemed science fiction, the study by scientists from the Potsdam Institute, Ireland's Maynooth University and University College London suggests it could become a reality if greenhouse emissions are not curbed.

Study author Stefan Rahmstorf from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research PIK said: 'The Gulf Stream System works like a giant conveyor belt, carrying warm surface water from the equator up north, and sending cold, low-salinity deep water back down south.

'It moves nearly 20 million cubic metres of water per second, almost a hundred times the Amazon flow.



Experts warn that by the end of the century it could be so weak it reaches a tipping point which would result in devastating weather conditions across the world

3 SLIDES © Provided by Daily Mail

Experts warn that by the end of the century it could be so weak it reaches a tipping point which would result in devastating weather conditions across the world

What would happen in the US if the Gulf Stream stopped?

Paleoclimate records constructed from Greenland ice cores have revealed that AMOC circulation has, indeed, shut down in the past and caused regional climate change, according to the University of Illinois.

It caused the area around Greenland to cool by 44 degrees Fahrenheit.

In the 2004 film ‘The Day After Tomorrow,’ New York City’s temperature dramatically dropped to a point that a deep freeze appeared within a day.

Even a second outside and the movie’s characters would freeze to death.

Scientists say the film plays up the shift, which would take decades to see, but note temperatures would dramatically decrease along the eastern US coast.

© Provided by Daily Mail In the 2004 film ‘The Day After Tomorrow,’ New York City’s temperature dramatically dropped to a point that a deep freeze appeared within a day. Scientists say the film plays up the shift, which would take decades to see, but note temperatures would dramatically decrease along the eastern US coast

Winters would become colder and storms more frequent that would linger longer throughout the year if the AMOC would come to a halt today.

However, scientist say it isn’t the cold temperatures that we should prepare for, it will be the rise in sea levels that will have the largest impact.

The increase would be caused by water piling up along the east coast that would have been pushed away by the northward surface flow.

But with AMOC weakened, or at a stop, experts say sea levels around the North Atlantic Basin could experience a rise up to nearly 20 inches.

This would eventually push people living along the coast from their homes and further inland to escape flooding.

A weakened AMOC would also decrease the amount of rainfalls in the North Atlantic that would cause intense droughts in areas that rarely experience such events.

'If we continue to drive global warming, the Gulf Stream System will weaken further - by 34 to 45 percent by 2100 according to the latest generation of climate models.

'This could bring us dangerously close to the tipping point at which the flow becomes unstable.'

Because direct data from the AMOC is hard to obtain, researchers instead collected information from a variety of proxy sources dating back around 1,600 years.

The team cites proxies such as surface temperature and marine productivity, and found nine out 11 show a clear weakening trend.

This works stems from the team's previous finding in 2018 that found the ocean current has slowed by 15 percent since the mid-20th century.

But Rahmstorf told The Washington Post that the latest evidence 'makes this conclusion considerably stronger.'

The team notes a recurrent 'cold blob' that was first spotted in 2015 in the Atlantic Ocean that is cooling as the rest of the world heats up is caused by shifting ocean currents and low-level cloud.

Researchers believe that this is evidence that not enough warm water is reaching the south of Greenland, where the cold blob sits, due to a weakening AMOC.

And it could be because of runoff from melting glaciers is overpowering the waters.

Separate work from the University of Arizona Department of Geosciences attributed an increase in sea levels from New York to Newfoundland to the AMOC slowing down by 30 percent from 2009 to 2010, as well as unusual wind currents that pushed ocean waters towards the coast.

Dr. Richard Wood, who leads the climate, cryosphere and oceans group at the Met Office, also warns that ea levels could rise up to nearly 20 inches around the North Atlantic Basin, which surrounds the eastern US coast as a result of a slowed AMOC.

Another team of US scientist also say the weakened AMOC explains a reduction in Arctic sea ice loss in all seasons and, in particular, a delay by about 6 years of the emergence of an ice-free Arctic in boreal summer.

AMOC is a natural way of Earth keeping water temperatures balances throughout the oceans, along with keeping weather systems stable.

Areas near the equator are hit with direct sunlight than the colder poles, which results in heat building up in the tropics.

Although a majority of the heat is redistributed by the atmosphere, the Global Ocean Conveyor Belt picks up the rest and moves it throughout the world's oceans - sending it in all different directions horizontally and vertically.

© Provided by Daily Mail The Little Ice Age, a centuries-long cold period that lasted until about 1850. Experts believe that as the North Atlantic began to warm near the end of the Little Ice Age, freshwater disrupted the system. Pictured is Thames Frost Fair, 1683–84, by Thomas Wyke

And the engine that drives this is the AMOC, which moves water at 100 times the flow of the Amazon river.

The Gulf Stream carries warm, salty water from the tropics near Florida up to the North Atlantic.

WHY ARE OCEAN CURRENTS SO IMPORTANT?

Ocean currents play a critical role in regulating the planet.

Slower circulation in the North Atlantic can yield profound change on both the North American and European climate but also on the African and Asian summer monsoon rainfall.

This transfer of heat and energy not only has direct influence on climate over Europe and North American but can impact the African and Asian monsoon system through its effect on sea surface temperature, hydrological cycle, atmospheric circulation and variation in the intertropical convergence zone.

Once the band of water hits the area around Greenland, it cools just enough to become more dense and heavier that surrounding waters, and then it sinks.

And if the AMOC slows it could spell disaster for the Northern Hemisphere's climate.

However, the weakening of the AMOC did not spark overnight.

Until the 1800s, it was relatively stable but the current declined after the so-called 'Little Ice Age' ended in 1850.

This was likely not due to human impact as the Industrial Revolution had yet to reach full tilt.

Scientists first observed a weakening in the 1950s, as huge amounts of pollution disrupted its formation.

Increased rainfall and enhanced melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet caused by global warming add fresh water to the ocean which reduces the salinity and density of the water.

This subsequently prevents the warm water which has traveled north from sinking as it cools and this breaks the convection cycle ultimately weakening the flow of the AMOC.

Dr Andrew Meijers, Deputy Science Leader of Polar Oceans at British Antarctic Survey, who was not involved in the study, said: 'This work provides new long term context and reveals that prior to the era of human induced climate change the Atlantic overturning circulation was relatively stable and stronger than it is now.

'This indicates that the slowdown is likely not a natural change, but the result of human influence.

'The AMOC has a profound influence on global climate, and particularly in North America and Europe, so this evidence of an ongoing weakening of the circulation is critical new evidence for the interpretation of future projections of regional and global climate.

'Additionally, the AMOC is frequently modeled as having a tipping point below some circulation strength, a point at which the relatively stable overturning circulation becomes unstable or even collapses.

'The ongoing weakening of the overturning means we risk finding that point, which would have profound and likely irreversible impacts on climate.'

The study was published in Nature Geoscience.

Maxim Seferovic: Blame deregulation, not green energy, for Texas power failure
Special to National Post 4 days ago

HOUSTON — In his column on the freezing temperatures and resulting power outages in Texas last week, Rex Murphy argued that the overzealous concern progressives have for global warming is pushing us toward dangerous green investments (Hurling Public Money at Renewables is Dangerous, Rex Murphy, Feb. 18). Environmentalists, he argued, have been “harassing everyone from schoolchildren to government officials for the near 30 years” with an “alarmist narrative.”

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Our false alarm, according to Murphy, has led to menacing political interference in North America’s fossil-based energy infrastructure. He cites the failure of Texas green energy in last week’s severe winter weather as the latest example of policymakers “hurling vast sums of public money on renewable energy, (which) is not only a folly, but dangerous.” But is he right that Texas’ winter misery, the failure of its power grid and the boil-water advisories in some parts of the state is the fault of green energy and its reckless proponents?

Last week in Texas, wind power performed comparatively well relative to the winter prediction models developed by the ironically named Electric Reliability Council of Texas, the entity that operates the vast majority of the state’s power grid. Its own automated reporting immediately revealed that half of natural gas production was offline when the rolling blackouts began. Some wind power was out due to freezing, but in total, less than 10 per cent of Texas’ winter power capacity (seven gigawatts) was expected to come from wind and solar. On the other hand, 66 per cent (56 gigawatts) was supposed to come from gas.

Much of state’s thermoelectric generators failed. A nuclear power plant went down, partially, then about half the state’s natural gas generators failed. Most failed not because they couldn’t operate, but because they ran out of fuel. Pipelines and gas production facilities froze. Almost all of the grid’s surge capacity comes from natural gas, so when the supply of gas runs dry, the system has no ability to meet spikes in demand. How could this be?

Federal regulators have a rule that energy infrastructure must be built to a winterized standard. Texas operates its own grid, partly out of pride, but also because energy companies with the ear of politicians don’t want to have to listen to federal regulators. Former governor Rick Perry is already appealing to Texans’ pride, but really shilling for his corporate and political benefactors, and being laughed at for suggesting that avoiding federal rules is worth the cost of watching Texans freeze in the cold.

The windmills in Texas are not winterized, as they are in my home town in southern Ontario and everywhere else in the United States, including neighbouring states like Oklahoma and New Mexico. Natural gas pipelines do not freeze in Edmonton or Alaska. The nuclear power plant failed because of frozen cooling lines that are not housed indoors.

Texas also does not store much natural gas, because prodigious ground reserves can be pumped on demand. But that system failed, too. Natural gas soared from a few bucks to a record US$1,000 ($1,260) per MMBtu, but even at that price, they still could not deliver enough of it to electric plants in order to meet demand.

Texas’ energy independence also means that there is limited interconnectivity to grids to the east and west, so when the state’s electric generation failed, we couldn’t import power properly, either.

Texas didn’t go down because of green energy, it did so because no one planned to deal with a winter storm, even though this happened in 1989, and again in 2011. It happened because it is a highly deregulated, privatized market that does not incentivize investment in winter resilience. It was made all that much worse by the fact that corporate political influence shields private energy infrastructure from the federal standards that mandate it.

The system allows energy companies to save on investment, and the public to save a few cents on their electricity bills, but those savings all get wiped out when a massive disruption, like we saw last week, causes widespread outages and insanely high prices that people are forced to pay so they don’t freeze to death.

Consumers who were fortunate enough to have power flowing during the peak of the crisis, and whose electric bills are tethered to open market prices (an estimated 25 per cent of households), are now receiving shocking four-figure bills. Before the power was even restored, it was announced that the price of electricity would be going up for everyone in the coming year to recoup the costs. It would be more correct to say that the cost of a failed gamble is being passed on to consumers.

Yet Gov. Greg Abbott and other Republicans are attacking green energy, in order to deflect from any discussion about why the system failed and how to ensure it doesn’t happen again.

Rex Murphy picked up their talking points — likely in a warm house with reliable, regulated power in frozen Canada — and recycled them for a domestic audience, understandably eager to believe that our climate challenges are overblown and that the solutions do more harm than good. In reality, however, the reason that Texas is now experiencing such severe winter storms is because climate change has made polar vortex disruptions more common, and more severe.

With new optimism for constructive change, and North American green energy plans surely to be discussed when U.S. President Joe Biden meets with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Tuesday, it would be to our advantage to deal in facts.

National Post

Maxim Seferovic is a Canadian and proud Houstonian who did not have heat, power or water for 65 hours last week.

Bats, birds among wildlife pummeled during Southern freeze

DALLAS — As many people in the southern U.S. hosted neighbours who had no heat or water during the vicious February storm and deep freeze, Kate Rugroden provided a refuge for shell-shocked bats.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Starving and disoriented, the winged mammals tumbled to the snow-coated ground as temperatures plunged to levels rarely seen in the region.

“They burned through their energy reserves as they tried to wake up and get away from the cold and ice," said Rugroden, of Arlington, Texas, one of numerous rehabilitation specialists nursing stranded bats plucked up by sympathetic people. “And there aren't any insects out there for them to eat yet."

Bats are among numerous wildlife believed to have taken a beating in the South, a region unaccustomed to such a severe and prolonged cold snap. Many species migrate there for winter precisely because of its normally mild weather.

It might take weeks or months to determine the extent of the harm, but anecdotal evidence is already turning up — including dead robins on yards and sidewalks.

Alligators in Oklahoma's Red Slough Wildlife Management Area were photographed with snouts protruding from frozen waterways — a survival manoeuvr enabling them to breathe while their bodies go dormant to conserve energy.

Fish kills were feared in Arkansas and Louisiana. The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department said it expected casualties among exotic deer and antelope. Across the Gulf of Mexico coast as far east as Florida, naturalists worried about monarch butterflies and the milkweed plants essential to their survival as they prepare to migrate northward.

“Animals can respond to events like this by moving elsewhere, but if it's beyond your flight range or your walking range you have to hunker down,” said Perry Barboza, a wildlife biologist at Texas A&M University. “Some animals like small birds can do it just a night or two. The duration becomes the killer."

Sea turtles stunned by frigid Gulf coastal waters were still being cared for at facilities this week. More than 10,600 had been found and officials were tabulating how many died, said Donna Shaver, Texas co-ordinator for the Sea Turtle Stranding and Salvage Network.

Sea Turtle Inc. took in so many that it used the South Padre Island Convention Center to accommodate the overflow, executive director Wendy Knight said.

“Our hospital is now completely filled to the gills,” Knight said.

Fish kills along the Texas coast were expected for recreational favourites such as spotted sea trout and red drum. In Louisiana, officials said it could take a week for dead fish to wash ashore.

The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission warned anglers to expect die-offs of threadfin shad, a primary food source for lake species such as bass, walleye and crappie.


While extreme weather is particularly dangerous for imperiled species, the whooping crane — listed by the federal government as endangered — appears to have weathered the storm, said Joe Saenz, manager of the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge in Texas.

About 500 of the majestic birds spend winters at the refuge before returning to Canadian nesting grounds. During the cold spell, some were spotted feasting on dead fish floating on the Gulf waters.

Biologists are concerned about monarch butterflies, which the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in December designated as a candidate for endangered or threatened status because of a sharp decline in recent decades.

The biggest monarch population winters in Mexican mountains and begins its northward trek in March. Had the cold spell happened a few weeks later, the orange-and-black butterflies could have been devastated, said Ray Moranz, an Oklahoma-based scientist.

They still might not escape unscathed. Some typically spend winters along the Gulf coast, where their odds during the deep freeze were poor, said Moranz, of the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation.

Another potential danger is to milkweed, which provides spots for female monarchs to lay eggs and food for their larvae. If the plants' growth across the South is stunted, more young would not survive.

That situation underscores a hazard for wildlife across the region: Even those that made it through the freeze might see damaged habitat and less food.

In South Texas, bur clover, a winter weed crucial for deer in spring, was showing freeze burn.

Long-term, the biggest concerns are for birds and bats, both of which had absorbed heavy blows even before the storm.

Breeding bird populations in the U.S. and Canada have plummeted nearly 30 per cent in the past 50 years — primarily because of habitat loss. Spring population counts will offer the first indication of how many succumbed to the cold, said Barboza of Texas A&M.

Migratory birds don't bother fattening up for winter because food in the South is plentiful, he said. During the storm, many probably burned through their meagre energy reserves and died of exhaustion. About 20 dead brown pelicans were found on Texas’ Chester Island.

“You worry about food sources covered in snow — seeds and berries — and a decrease in insect life,” said Ben Jones, executive director of the Texas Conservation Alliance, who found five dead birds in his yard last weekend. Robins, bluebirds, hermit thrushes and gray catbirds were among hard-hit types, he said.

Frozen songbirds also were spotted on streets in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where temperatures plunged to minus-13 degrees last week.

Bats have their own challenges, including a fungal disease called white-nose syndrome that has killed millions. To those struggling to save them, every bat is precious. They eat huge numbers of insects that consume farm crops and carry diseases.

“We're seeing a large population hit,” including migratory bats just arriving from Mexico, said Rugroden, the rehabilitation specialist. A well-known colony living in a Houston bridge appears to have taken big losses.

______

Flesher reported from Traverse City, Michigan.

John Flesher And Jamie Stengle, The Associated Press

Insecticide decimates popular pollinator, the squash bee, Ontario research suggests

A popular insecticide used on farms across Canada has been shown to have dire effects on ground-nesting bees, according to new research from the University of Guelph.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Female hoary squash bees, workhorse pollinators on pumpkin and squash farms, dug 85 per cent fewer nests when exposed to crops treated with the neonicotinoid insecticide imidacloprid, the research indicates. Those bees also collected significantly less pollen and produced 89 per cent fewer offspring, the study shows.


"These populations just plummet," said lead author Susan Willis Chan, a post-doctoral fellow at the school.

The study, published recently in Scientific Reports, is the first of its kind to look at ground-nesting bees in a real-world setting, the researchers said.

Ground-nesting bees are notoriously difficult for researchers to work with, Chan said, partially because their nests cannot simply be moved as they are underground.

Chan said they captured female squash bees that had already been mated and introduced them to enclosures at a greenhouse on a farm near Guelph, Ont.

They planted squash crops and applied three treatments and left one without pesticide treatment.

Imidacloprid was applied to the soil when squash seeds were planted. Seeds treated with thiamethoxam, another neonicotinoid, was examined, as was the non-neonic, chlorantraniliprole, which was sprayed on the foliage of the plants.

The researchers followed the treatment guidelines given to farmers by the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs.

Chan then recorded foraging and nesting behaviour after they introduced the bees in the summer of 2017. They repeated the experiment the next year using the offspring of those bees to measure the effect of the pesticides on their reproduction.

The majority of bees in the world are solitary, ground nesting-bees and the research fills in a knowledge gap for them, Chan said.

Bayer, which makes Admire, the imidacloprid used in the study, said the research requires "significant additional effort to determine the relevance of the findings under realistic conditions."

"No measurable treatment effects were found on either fruit set or fruit yield in all treatments (including imidacloprid) compared to the control, and the bee populations were not affected," said Bayer spokesman Komie Hossini in an email.

"This could suggest that there is not an ecologically relevant impact of the treatments, since bee pollination is essential for squash production."

He also said forcing the bees to nest in the treated plot for two consecutive years "may not be the case under normal farming practices, where squash production is rotated with other crops."

Much of the previous research on the deleterious effects of neonics has focused on honeybees, which nest in colonies away from soil.

Neonics attack the bee's brain by preventing signal transmission between neurons. Exposure has led to death and paralysis in honeybees. Honeybees exposed to neonics take longer foraging trips as they age, suggesting they are unhealthy, can’t fly as fast or have a hard time remembering how to fly home, research has shown.

Bumblebees, which also live in colonies, have experienced deleterious effects due to neonics as well, research indicates.

Bee populations have been declining worldwide for years as scientists try to understand why. Research points to neonics among the factors contributing to the decline.

About a third of the crops eaten by humans depend on insect pollination, with bees responsible for about 80 per cent of that figure, research has shown.

Hoary squash bees are a "large pollinating workforce," Chan said.

"Pumpkin and squash farmers don’t even have to think about pollination because they are so ubiquitous and common," Chan said.

Farmers use imidacloprid to battle the cucumber beetle, which damages squash and pumpkins.

"From a farmer perspective the thought of losing an effective product for pest control is unnerving, but we also realize that we need to be doing what's right," said Keith Currie, the first vice president of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture.

"We know that there are some studies that have shown that neonics in the ground and in the water aren't positive and so we want to make sure that we're using products that are safe to use while still serving the purpose of protecting our crops from pests."

There is a silver lining, Chan said, with the other neonic, thiamethoxam, which coated the squash seeds.

"We saw no effect on any of these measures with thiamethoxam," Chan said.

Squash bees exposed to the non-neonic chlorantraniliprole collected substantially less pollen, but there was no effect on nest establishment or offspring production, she said.

The results points to the "important sublethal effects" of exposure to neonics in the soil on bee behaviour and reproduction.

"Soil must be considered a potential route of pesticide exposure in risk assessments, and restrictions on soil‑applied insecticides may be justified, to mitigate impacts on ground‑nesting solitary bee populations and the crop pollination services they provide," the researchers wrote.

Health Canada has launched a special review of the use of various insecticides, including imidacloprid, on pumpkins, squash and watermelon to determine the risk to the squash bee.

It said the review is expected to be completed this spring.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 26, 2021.

Liam Casey, The Canadian Press

New Zealand backs drone project to protect endangered dolphins


By Praveen Menon

WELLINGTON (Reuters) - New Zealand's government said on Friday that it was backing a new project that uses drone technology to understand and protect the endangered Māui dolphins in the country.

Maui dolphins live in a small stretch of ocean off the west coast of New Zealand's North Island and current estimates suggest that only 63 dolphins older than one year remain, raising concerns that they may soon become extinct.

The new Māui Drone Project is a one-year collaboration between the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI), non-profit wildlife technology organisation MAUI63 and WWF-New Zealand.

The unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) is capable of finding and tracking Māui dolphins using artificial intelligence.

The technology has the potential to compile detailed data on the habitats, population size and distribution and behaviour of the dolphins, along with many other types of marine species such as other dolphins, seabirds, and whales, officials said.

"There has been unfortunately for many years disputes over how to best protect Maui dolphins," Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said after announcing the initiative, adding that the government has stepped in to fund the project and help protect the dolphins. "But we need everyone to come together."

Fishing companies Moana New Zealand and Sanford Limited are also supporting the project. The government has already moved to restrict fishing around the areas Maui dolphins frequent.

“By advancing our understanding of how Māui dolphins behave during the day and throughout the year this project will help us ensure the measures our Government has already put in place to protect our Māui dolphins are robust and appropriate,” said Oceans and Fisheries Minister David Parker.

The drone ensures dolphins remain undisturbed as they fly at an altitude of over 120 metres (394 feet).

(Reporting by Praveen Menon; Editing by Christian Schmollinger)

Europe-bound migrants found amid broken glass, toxic ash


MADRID — Something seemed wrong to the guard inspecting sealed bags of toxic ash in the port of Melilla, one of Spain’s two small territories in North Africa. So he pulled a knife, cut the bag open and found a motionless leg, confirming his suspicion that a person was inside.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

He lifted and dropped the leg a few times, with no reaction. A few moments passed. Suddenly the leg pulled back, and a young man emerged from the ashes — frightened and disoriented, but alive.

The disturbing scene from a video released Monday by Spain’s Civil Guard highlighted the great lengths and risks that migrants and asylum seekers take in their desperate attempts to reach Europe.

The survivor was among 41 people found hiding amid cargo in Melilla’s port area on Friday, attempting to sneak aboard a ship that would take them across the Mediterranean Sea to mainland Spain.

Four of them were discovered buried in recycling containers beneath glass bottles, some broken with sharp edges.

Surrounded by Morocco, the tiny enclaves of Melilla and nearby Ceuta have been a target for many African migrants for years. But the two territories fall outside the Schengen area of free mobility across much of Europe, so many of them become trapped in their effort to reach European soil.

The port of Melilla, where trucks and containers begin a trip to Spain that can take up to seven hours, gives many a way to escape. Some try to enter the fenced area of the harbour by swimming there or by hiding underneath vehicles, jumping onto them when they slow down or stop at the gates of the port.

Others try to climb the perimeter fences and walls, sometimes falling and getting seriously injured.

With the help of search dogs and microphones to detect heartbeats, police often find people hiding amid the cargo, from containers to cement mixers. This year alone, the Civil Guard said it has identified 1,781 migrants trespassing in Melilla port’s security perimeter; last year, the number was 11,700.

Still, discoveries like those last week are unsettling for the most experienced officers.

“We’ll never get used to it,” said Juan Antonio Martín, a spokesman with the Civil Guard in Melilla.

Because the border between Spain’s North African territories and Morocco has been closed since the pandemic began in March, it is more difficult for migrants to slip in. According to Spain’s Interior Ministry, nearly 1,500 people crossed illegally into Melilla last year, down from more than 5,800 in 2019.

But those who tried to leave Melilla last week were already in the enclave, Martín said. They were unable to take the passenger ferries or the flights to reach the mainland, either because they didn’t have travel documents or because they entered Spain illegally in the first place.

Their nationality was not released, but the spokesperson said most were of Moroccan origin.

While Morocco’s closure of the land border with Ceuta and Melilla came on the heels of years of stepping up border security, which had already led to a big drop in illegal crossings, Spain’s Canary Islands in the Atlantic Ocean have emerged as the main landing point for people fleeing North and West Africa to Europe.

Last year, some 23,000 people reached the archipelago, most of them plucked from the waters by Spain’s Maritime Rescue Service, and more than 500 died or disappeared in the attempt.

And there, too, rescuers sometimes faced the unthinkable. In December, Spain’s El País newspaper reported how a 14-year-old from Nigeria spent two weeks clinging to an oil tanker’s rudder before he was found by a patrol boat near the port of Las Palmas, Gran Canaria island.

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Brito reported from Barcelona, Spain.

Renata Brito And Aritz Parra, The Associated Press

NATIONALIZE PG&E

 Wildfire victims sue former PG&E executives alleging neglect

 “PG&E has been a terror, T-E-R-R-O-R, to the people of California," 

SAN RAMON, Calif. — A trust representing more than 80,000 victims of deadly wildfires ignited by Pacific Gas and Electric’s rickety electrical grid is suing nearly two dozen of the utility’s former executives and board members, alleging they neglected their duty to ensure the equipment wouldn’t kill people.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

The complaint filed Wednesday in San Francisco Superior Court is an offshoot of a $13.5 billion settlement that PG&E reached with the wildfire victims while the utility was mired in bankruptcy from January 2019 through June last year.

As part of that deal, PG&E granted the victims the right to go after the utility's hierarchy leading up to and during a series of wind-driven wildfires that killed more than 100 people and destroyed more than 25,000 homes and businesses in Northern California in 2017 and 2018.

John Trotter, the trustee overseeing the $13.5 billion settlement, is now following through with an action that targets a litany of former executives and board members.

The list includes two of PG&E's former chief executives, Anthony Earley and Geisha Williams, who were paid millions of dollars during their reigns. The company is now being run by a former Michigan utility executive, Patricia Poppe, with a board of directors that was overhauled during PG&E's bankruptcy case.

PG&E acknowledged the lawsuit without commenting directly on the allegations. “We remain focused on reducing wildfire risk across our service area and making our electric system more resilient to the climate-driven challenges we all face in California," the company said in a statement.

The wildfire victims' lawsuit is seeking to tap into the $200 million to $400 million in liability insurance that PG&E secured for the former executives and board members, said Frank Pitre, the lawyer handling the case. He told The Associated Press that he hopes to resolve the lawsuit within the next year to help wildfire victims still struggling to rebuild their lives.

If the lawsuit is successful, it could help make up for a roughly $1 billion shortfall that the wildfire victims' trust faces because half of the promised settlement consisted of PG&E stock that is currently worth less than what was hoped for when the deal was struck toward the end of 2019.

Trotter acknowledged the problem in a Jan. 26 letter to the wildfire victims — many of whom had balked at a settlement that required half of the promised $13.5 billion to come in stock in a company with a history of negligence.

But none of the PG&E shares have been been sold by the trust so far, leaving time for the stock to rebound.

PG&E's stock price closed at $11.41 on Wednesday. The shares have ranged from a low of $3.55 to $25.19 during the tumultuous past two years.

The complaint against PG&E's former executives and board members seeks to tie them to acts for which the utility has already accepted responsibility.

That includes the company pleading guilty to 84 felony counts of involuntary manslaughter for causing a 2018 wildfire that wiped out the town of Paradise, California, along with the surrounding area. PG&E was fined $4 million in that case, the maximum penalty allowed.

“If there was ever a corporation that deserved to go to prison, it's PG&E,” Butte County Judge Michael Deems said at the time of the utility's sentencing eight months ago.

Deems' condemnation is included in the wildfire victims' lawsuit alongside scorching criticism from U.S. District Judge William Alsup, who is overseeing PG&E's probation in another criminal case. That case stemmed from the utility's neglect of natural gas lines that blew up an entire neighbourhood in a San Francisco Bay Area suburb in 2010.

Alsup has repeatedly ripped PG&E for not doing more to maintain its power lines in recent years, including during a court hearing earlier this month cited in the victims' lawsuit.

“PG&E has been a terror, T-E-R-R-O-R, to the people of California," Alsup said during the Feb. 3 hearing.

Pitre said it's time to hold people hired to manage and oversee the company responsible for PG&E's recklessness. “We are talking about a massive dereliction of duty."

Michael Liedtke, The Associat

Washington court strikes down law that made unintentional possession of drugs a crime

"RCW 69.50.4013, also known to as simple drug possession, is no longer an arrestable offense. It also cannot be used as a legal basis to seize an individual," 

Cameron Jenkins 

The Washington Supreme Court this week struck down a law that made it a felony to unknowingly possess illegal drugs in the state.

A majority of justices ruled Thursday that the "strict liability" drug possession law, which made any illegal drug possession a felony, was unconstitutional.

"The court correctly recognized the injustice of convicting people for innocent conduct," Richard Lechich, who argued the case before the court, told The Seattle Times. "While the decision cannot rectify the harm this law caused to so many communities, particularly communities of color, it at least puts an end to it."

The state initially adopted the "strict liability" law in the 1950s and upheld it as "simple possession" in two instances since then. On Thursday, the justices decided that a felony conviction in a case where a person may have obtained drugs through "innocent, passive conduct" was a harsh penalty.

Mark Middaugh, who represented the Washington Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers in a friend-of-the-court brief, told the Times that the old law had been used previously against communities of color and he hopes that the new ruling can be applied retroactively for people who were previously convicted of "simple possession."

"This is a huge ruling that is going to involve thousands and thousands of cases," Middaugh said.

The Seattle Police Department said it would follow the ruling immediately, saying officers would not arrest people, or confiscate drugs, under the simple possession law.

"RCW 69.50.4013, also known to as simple drug possession, is no longer an arrestable offense. It also cannot be used as a legal basis to seize an individual," the department said in a press release.