Agriculture committee  Thank you very much for inviting us here today. I'm a fourth generation beekeeper. My brother and I run the operation. My son is also involved. We have about 3,000 hives. About a third of them were hit with corn spray this year. What's happened in our instance, and I have some

Agriculture committee  In terms of this issue, the bees were in excellent shape. Beekeepers were watching them. If they were hungry, they'd feed them. If they needed a pollen substitute, they'd feed them. It was a little earlier in the year, but when the dandelion season came, they were in great shape.

Agriculture committee  It was Purdue University.

Agriculture committee  I've talked to some beekeepers down in the States. I was talking to a David Hackenberg down there. He said that in New York State about 1,900 hives are affected, and Michigan is having problems. All across the Corn Belt beekeepers are actually moving out of those areas to try to

Agriculture committee  I can tell you one thing. They're not offering it to farmers. Some farmers are looking to get something that's more bee-friendly, and the big companies are saying that they can't get it in. They're treating every piece of corn with this product.

Agriculture committee  You don't need all these chemicals on the corn.

Agriculture committee  You can grow corn without chemicals.

Agriculture committee  There is not that I know of.

Agriculture committee  No.

Agriculture committee  I don't think it's happened yet.

Agriculture committee  In my case, I'm not sure if it's in the hive. They tested the bees on the outside. I lost probably 30% to 40% of the flying bees. That's like shooting the father and leaving the rest of the family at home and there's nobody to bring in anything for them to eat. That's basicall

Agriculture committee  We've had more contact with the EPA than we've had with the Canadian Honey Council. The Americans want to talk to us. They're calling us asking us what's going on.

Agriculture committee  I just found out about Quebec over the last few days, so I haven't. They might still be planting. They must still be planting, so—

Agriculture committee  We kind of have a problem with that because I think most of those private labs are owned by these big corporations that developed this product. That's what happening in the United States.

Agriculture committee  Most of the labs are owned by Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer. They're all owned by those companies so how are you going to get a fair assessment of it? You need a government-run one that's not connected with it.