Behind Mass Die-Offs, Pesticides Lurk as Culprit

[Staff]

Behind Mass Die-Offs, Pesticides Lurk as Culprit
07 Jan 2010: Report
By Sonia Shah

Behind Mass Die-Offs, Pesticides Lurk as Culprit by Sonia Shah: Yale Environment 360
excerpt from above:

Ever since Olga Owen Huckins shared the spectacle of a yard full of dead, DDT-poisoned birds with her friend Rachel Carson in 1958, scientists have been tracking the dramatic toll on wildlife of a planet awash in pesticides. Today, drips and puffs of pesticides surround us everywhere, contaminating 90 percent of the nation’s major rivers and streams, more than 80 percent of sampled fish, and one-third of the nation’s aquifers. According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, fish and birds that unsuspectingly expose themselves to this chemical soup die by the millions every year.

But as regulators grapple with the lethal dangers of pesticides, scientists are discovering that even seemingly benign, low-level exposures to pesticides can affect wild creatures in subtle, unexpected ways — and...