Pesticide Deaths
A major Florida citrus grower, Ben Hill Griffin Inc., has been illegally spraying pesticides since 2006 to kill the tiny Asian citrus psyllid, an insect responsible for spreading the lethal citrus disease called greening that has devastated some groves. Collateral damage has been the lives of millions of honeybees. This apparently has been the first case in recent years where a pesticide application by a grower has been determined to be the cause of a bee kill (and it has been happening since 2006). The fine is the thing that gets my temper buzzing, a measly $1,500. I swore off blogging about bees because I have written about them a couple of times over the past year but the fine levied by the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services is so small in relation to the actual amount of damage that I had to write about the plight of bees one more time. $1500, that's less than a millionth of a penny for each life of the couple million bees killed. There is definitely something wrong with this that no amount of honey coating can hide.