Wisconsin is home to many pollinators including bee species, hummingbirds, butterflies, and moths. Yet, their populations are in decline, which can have large impacts across the state.
Pollinators play an important role for Wisconsin’s wildflowers, ecosystems, agricultural crops and natural areas, which depend upon them. Strawberries, currants, plums, cucumbers, squashes, and many more fruits and vegetables rely on native pollinators.
Pollinators transport pollen from plant to plant, which helps plants produce fruits and seeds vital to the state. Many native plants, as well as many food crops, rely on pollinators.
Currently, the State Legislature has drafted three important bills that seek to protect our native pollinators, and in turn, our food sources:
LRB 2436/1: Allows municipalities to regulate pesticides to protect pollinators and pollinator habitats.
Current law prohibits a political subdivision (a city, village, town, or county) from prohibiting the use of or otherwise regulating pesticides, but provides numerous exemptions. For example, a political subdivision may enact an ordinance that regulates pesticides pursuant to a stormwater management program or that relates to the storage, treatment, or disposal of solid waste that contains pesticides.
The bill adds an additional exemption that allows a political subdivision to regulate pesticides in order to protect pollinators and pollinator habitats. “Pollinator” is defined in the bill as an insect that pollinates flowers.
Currently, local communities are prohibited from regulating pesticides fully. This bill seeks to give local communities the ability to regulate pesticides at their own will, and in order to protect pollinators and their habitats.
LRB 2476/1: Prohibits the use of insecticides in the neonicotinoid class by the Department of Natural Resources within a one-mile radius of any pollinator habitat located on land maintained by the DNR.
The Department of Agriculture and the Department of Natural Resources were consulted to ensure that this bill both advances pollinator protection efforts and meets existing agreements and infestation challenges.
This bill prohibits, with limited exceptions, the Department of Natural Resources from using any insecticide from the neonicotinoid class within a one-mile radius of any pollinator habitat located on land maintained by DNR. Under the bill, this prohibition does not apply to uses of this insecticide that are 1) pursuant to existing cooperative farming agreements or contracts or 2) for forest insect control on forested lands, state forest nurseries, or seed orchards or in designated zones of infestation.
Neonicotinoids, a widely used class of insecticides are particularly harmful because like traditional insecticides applied to the surface of plants, neonicotinoids are absorbed into plant tissue and can be present in pollen and nectar, making them accessible to pollinators. Use of Neonics shows a negative impact on bee navigation, reproduction, immune function, and growth rates.
This bill ensures that neonicotinoid class insecticides, which are particularly harmful to pollinators, cannot be used within a one mile radius of any pollinator habitat located on land maintained by the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.
LRB 2871/1: This bill prohibits a person who sells plants at retail or provides plants from labeling or advertising the plant as being beneficial to pollinators if the plant has been treated with and contains a certain concentration of insecticides that contain warnings about pollinator hazards on their labels.
This bill ensures truth in advertising and protects pollinators as it prohibits retailers and Wisconsinites from labeling or advertising plants as beneficial to pollinators when they have been treated with certain insecticides.
Through their transportation of pollen to plants across the state, pollinators such as bees, butterflies, hummingbirds, and moths are of the utmost importance. We must ensure that these species are able to continue to not only survive, but thrive throughout Wisconsin. The Sierra Club strongly supports these bills.
Written by Will Keenan, Sierra Club Legislative and Electoral Project Aide