HFI: Important!! Neonicotinoids Do not, I repeat, do not buy plants treated with Neonicotinoids. Bees take the pollen back to the hive and feed it to the brood.  This is the number one cause of colony collapse! They are banned in Europe! Avoid these toxins and Save the bees! Neonicotinoids are also known to kill our earthworms. 
Save our food supply. Purchase local seeds and plants from local farmers and nurseries. Better yet save your own and grow at home!

Toxic ‘witches brew’ of pesticides and fungicides is killing Up To Half Of America’s Bees

This headline appeared in the Popular Science Magazine in March of 2013. Now four years later, BEES have been added to the endangered species list in the United States.Bees don’t just make honey, remember, but pollinate a ton of what we eat–as much as a fourth of it. That could lead to less food and higher food prices.

In 2013 Quartz published these frightening facts:
 

…The mysterious mass die-off of honey bees that pollinate $30 billion worth of crops in the US has so decimated America’s apis mellifera population that one bad winter could leave fields fallow. Now, a new study has pinpointed some of the probable causes of bee deaths and the rather scary results show that averting beemageddon will be much more difficult than previously thought.

Scientists had struggled to find the trigger for so-called Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) that has wiped out an estimated 10 million beehives, worth $2 billion, over the past six years. Suspects have included pesticides, disease-bearing parasites and poor nutrition. But in a first-of-its-kind study published today in the journal PLOS ONE, scientists at the University of Maryland and the US Department of Agriculture have identified a witch’s brew of pesticides and fungicides contaminating pollen that bees collect to feed their hives. The findings break new ground on why large numbers of bees are dying though they do not identify the specific cause of CCD, where an entire beehive dies at once.

When researchers collected pollen from hives on the east coast pollinating cranberry, watermelon and other crops and fed it to healthy bees, those bees showed a significant decline in their ability to resist infection by a parasite called Nosema ceranae. The parasite has been implicated in Colony Collapse Disorder though scientists took pains to point out that their findings do not directly link the pesticides to CCD. The pollen was contaminated on average with nine different pesticides and fungicides though scientists discovered 21 agricultural chemicals in one sample. Scientists identified eight ag chemicals associated with increased risk of infection by the parasite.

Most disturbing, bees that ate pollen contaminated with fungicides were three times as likely to be infected by the parasite. Widely used, fungicides had been thought to be harmless for bees as they’re designed to kill fungus, not insects, on crops like apples.

BEES ADDED TO US ENDANGERED SPECIES LIST FOR THE FIRST TIME

Toxins affect EVERYTHING! Bees & Earthworms

Neonicotinoids : From Beecharmers.org

Below is a summary of the chemical and brand names of the commonly used neonicotinoids. These are toxic to our honey bees. We are asking growers who are using these materials and who are dependent on honey bees for pollination, not to use these products currently until more research is done .
Actara, Platinum, Helix, Cruiser, Adage, Meridian, Centric, Flagship, Poncho, Titan, Clutch, Belay, Arena, Confidor, Merit, Admire, Ledgend, Pravado, Encore, Goucho, Premise, Assail, Intruder, Adjust and Calypso (This list was generated by The Senior Extension Associate at Penn State)
Never use a neonicotinoid pesticide on a blooming crop or on blooming weeds if honey bees are present.

• The use of a neonicotinoid pesticide pre-bloom, just before bees are brought onto a crop is not recommended. If one of these materials MUST be used pre-bloom (for example at pink in apples), select a material that has a lower toxicity to bees (acetamiprid or thiacloprid) and apply only when bees are not foraging, preferably late evening.
• Do not apply these materials post bloom (example petal fall) until after the bees have been
removed from the crop. For the full report clicke here.

Preserving the Bees: 

•  *In the United States, a group of beekeepers from North Dakota is taking Bayer to court after losing thousands of honeybee colonies in 1995, during a period when oilseed rape in the area was treated with imidacloprid. A third of honeybees were killed by what has since been dubbed colony collapse disorder.
• *The Dutch government has banned Imidaclprid completely in open-air situations. The product evidently also leaves a residue in the soil that completely destroys the Earthworm population that is so important to soil conservation. It also gets into weeds and other crops grown in the same ground. French beekeepers maintain they have lost thousands of colonies to this pesticide and a sister organo-phosphate called Fibronil produced by Aventis and are calling on the French government to remove both products from the market.
• *PARIS – “Gaucho”, a broad-spectrum insecticide made by the Germany-based chemical giant Bayer, was banned in France in 1999 due to its toxicity to bees and other forms of life — including humans — but its replacement, “Regent”, from another German giant, BASF, is just as dangerous say beekeepers and biologists.