Bees Delivering Pesticides

The relationship between pollinators and crop protection strategies has always pitted them against each other, with concern about how insecticides and herbicides might affect charismatic non-target insects like bees. A new technology by the company Bee Vectoring Technologies rewrites the definition to the relationship.  In this approach, bees exit the hive to deliver a fungicide to the flower, a biological control that competes against pathogenic fungi that start their damage early in fruit development.  In this episode I speak with representatives from the company about the technology, its application, and its safety with regard to pollinators and the environment.