Welcome to the Devon Beekeepers Association
 Our aim is to promote and further the craft of beekeeping and to advance the education of the public in the importance of honeybees in the environment.
We plan to achieve this with our eleven Branch Associations by:
- Promoting and supporting good beekeeping practice.
- Educating with courses, lectures and study.
- Collaborating with organisations such as the National Bee Unit.
- Ensuring that the latest information, underpinned by research, is available for all our members through the Devon 'Beekeeping' journal and our website.
As part of the British Beekeepers Association (BBKA) our members enjoy a range of benefits including - BBKA News, Insurance and much more.
Many of us are now considering how we can live more sustainably. There is a growing interest in where our food comes from and the key part in which bees play. The health of our bees has a direct impact on our own wellbeing so it is vital that we care for them properly. Our interests also extend to other pollinators, local flora, the climate and environment as the fate of honeybees is clearly linked to these.
The nerve poison harming our bees
Lethal spray: Victorian gardeners used harmful nicotine as a pesticide, but it has now been replaced with neonicotinoids, often used to treat fields of oilseed rape Photo: ALAMY
By Ken Thompson
Telegraph - May 11, 2012
Neonicotinoids were hailed as safe and effective, but they are far from benign. Victorian gardeners were familiar with the alkaloid nicotine as a pesticide, and very good it is too at killing almost anything that moves. Unfortunately that includes people – the nicotine in three or four cigarettes would kill you if you absorbed all of it. As a result, nicotine has not been available to amateur gardeners for some time, and approval for professional use was withdrawn in 2009. But in the Seventies chemists developed a new class of insecticides that, although not closely related chemically to nicotine, share the same mode of action and were thus christened neonicotinoids.
Link to article on Telegraph |
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