Monday May 25, 2009, 3:15 pm
The usual result of politicians acting before thinking. Farmers have problems with income and many barely make enough to survive. This playing around with their income is totally appalling and the birds suffer.

Monday May 25, 2009, 6:46 pm
Here is another reason to add to where have the birds gone? carbofurans are used as insecticides on crops and are extremely toxic. One has to wonder if this contributes to human cancers and diseases from the use of poison in our food sources.

Toxicity to humans
Carbofuran has one of the highest acute toxicities to humans of any insecticide widely used on field crops (only aldicarb and parathion are more toxic). A quarter teaspoon ( 1 mL) can be fatal. Most carbofuran is applied by commercial applicators using closed systems with engineered controls so there is no exposure to it in preparation. Since its toxic effects are due to its activity as a cholinesterase inhibitor it is considered a neurotoxic pesticide.

Bans
It is legal to buy over-the-counter in Kenya.[2] In 2008, the United States Environmental Protection Agency announced that it intends to ban carbofuran.[3]

In December 2008, FMC Corp., the sole US manufacturer of carbofuran, announced that it had voluntarily requested that the United States Environmental Protection Agency cancel all but 6 of previously-allowed uses of that chemical as a pesticide. With this change, carbofuran usage in the US will be allowed only on corn, potatoes, pumpkins, sunflowers, pine seedlings and spinach grown for seed.[4]
Toxicity to vertebrates
Oral LD50: Rats 8–14 mg/kg, Dogs 19 mg/kg. (kill rate in animal testing)

Carbofuran is also known to be highly toxic to birds. In its granular form, a single grain will kill a bird. Birds often eat numerous grains of the pesticide, mistaking them for seeds, and then die shortly thereafter. Before the granular form was banned by U.S. Environmental Protection Agency‎ in 1991,[5] granular carbofuran was blamed for millions of bird deaths per year. The liquid version of the pesticide is less hazardous to birds since they are not as likely to ingest it directly, but it is still very hazardous. The EPA announced on July 25, 2008 it intends to ban all forms in the US.[6] The ban requires that no residue be present on domestic or imported foods. [7]

Carbofuran has been illegally used to intentionally poison coyotes and other wildlife in the US and Canada. Secondary fatal poisoning of domestic and wild animals has been documented,[8] [9] specifically, raptors (bald eagles and golden eagles), domestic dogs, raccoons, vultures and other scavengers. On November 24, 2008 Leslie Owen Collier was pardoned by George W. Bush for unlawfully killing three bald eagles in southeast Missouri with carbofuran (unauthorized use of a pesticide and violating the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act).[10]

Environmentalists have also expressed concern that Kenyan farmers are using carbofuran to kill lions and other predators.[2][11]

Monday May 25, 2009, 8:56 pm
Bring back the hedgerows!

Wildlife areas are obviously important to ecology and intensive farming
ends up backfiring by destroying biodiversity.

I think we are in trouble when birds start disappearing.