Bayer's pesticide blamed for killing German, and other, honeybees

Tests on dead bees showed that 99% of those examined had a build-up of [the
chemical] clothianidin ... Clothianidin, like the other neonicotinoid pesticides
that have been temporarily suspended in Germany, is a systemic chemical that
works its way through a plant and attacks the nervous system of any insect it
comes into contact with. Source: The Guardian, UK, published May 24
2008) via CommonDreams May 26,
2008,

Germany has banned a family of pesticides that are blamed for the deaths of
millions of honeybees

An explanation of 'systemic pesticide' follows below.

This is not the first time that Bayer, one of the world’s leading producers
of pesticides, with sales of €5.8bn (£4.6bn) in 2007, has been blamed for
killing honeybees. Other, international customers are not happy with Bayers products.

In the United States, a group of beekeepers from North Dakota is taking the
company to court after losing thousands of honeybee colonies in 1995,

Bayer’s best selling pesticide, imidacloprid, sold under the name Gaucho  in
France, has been banned as a seed dressing for sunflowers in that country since
1999, after a third of French honeybees died following its widespread
use.

So what is the meaning of  'systemic pesticide'?

The Canadian Oxford Dictionary (1998) offers two definitions of systemic:
'physiological', meaning to do with the body, but our interest is the second,
the horticultural definition of 'systemic'.

... of an (insecticide,fungicide, etc.) entering the plant via the roots or
shoots and passing through the tissues.

There is other assistance to explain technical details from dkm:

dkm, (the writer's online identity) identifies himself as a botanist, and he
offers a succinct explanation in "Comments" of the main CommonDreams / Guardian
article as to the meaning of 'systemic' pesticides:

"These pesticides are systemic pesticides, which means they are “taken up”
into the tissues of the plant to which they are applied. They are therefore
present in the entire plant, having been absorbed by the roots from the soil
surrounding the coated seed.

Do you have a cat or a dog? If you use Frontline to guard against fleas,
you’re also using a systemic pesticide that disperses throughout the skin
of your pet to kill fleas that try to draw its blood. Systemic pesticides can be
extremely effective, but they can also be extremely dangerous precisely because
they are systemic.

Bayer’s line that the failure of the seed company to correctly use a
“glue-like substance” to keep the chemical from going airborne seems a little
weak to me: while nicotinoids are somewhat volatile, the effect on honeybee
populations of an airborne toxin doesn’t (well, I’m a botanist, not a zoologist,
mind you) seem like it’d be enough to wipe out even 30% of the population, much
less the higher percentages reported. Nicotinoids are readily absorbed through
mammalian skin, but I have no idea how transmissible they’d be amongst insects
from one individual to another.

I’d be more apt to believe that it’s perhaps an over-application of the
systemic pesticide which then is present in sufficient quantities in the plant
tissues (including pollen) that leads to fatal exposure for honeybees. A
systemic pesticide is best when it travels freely and un-noticed by the host
organism, so over-application may not have been readily apparent based on
observations made on the crop itself".

No mention is made in the Alison Benjamin story as to deaths to other
creatures, animal or even human, or whether other crops are likely to have been
contaminated.