BeesDying

How we came up with our solution

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After having found out about this year's research project for the FLL,

we thought about which animal to focus on.

Within a few days, we decided on bees as our research subject and we

had a closer look at problems regarding the coexistence  of bees and

humans.

Over the course of our research we learned that the bee is in danger of becoming extinct in Germany and that there are two major reasons for this: the Varroa mite on the one hand and our intensive agriculture on the other - with the latter being the more serious threat.

 

Our first idea

Our initial idea of how to protect bees was to develop a new pesticide which can be sprayed onto the crops without harming bees. The problem with current pesticides is that they affect the bees' nervous systems and damage their ability to navigate back to the hive.

We wanted to develop a pesticide which protects the plants but doesn't harm the bees. 

So, we consulted our chemistry teacher on how to go about it. However, he told us that our school had neither the chemicals nor the devices or the financial funds to work on such a project.

Moreover, animal testing would have been necessary to find out how bees react to the substances. Endangering the bees' lives was a risk we didn't want to take. 

Therefore, our scientific research in this field did not promise success and was a dead end.

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Our second idea

In our second attempt to protect bees we considered

biological means to protect crops and thus to make the use

of pesticides unnecessary. 

We learned that a ladybird eats up to 50 aphids a day. So

we came up with the idea of using ladybirds as a natural

protection of crops.

But there is one problem. Aphids are the ladybird's only

diet, whereas there is a wide range of pests. These cannot

be dealt with by distributing ladybirds. So, a whole range of pest-eating animals would be necessary and it would take time. 

Therefore, this method also had to be dismissed as we had only winter time to work on the project.

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Our third idea

Our third idea was to focus on the Varroa mite as a dangerous bee

parasite.

We considered breeding bees with a strong immune system. This

would allow them to fight the Varroa mite. 

However, just as in our first idea, we had neither the materials nor the

devices or the money necessary to undertake such an attempt. Time

was another issue since the result of having a bee resistent to the

parasite would have been aparent only after several generations.

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Our final solution

Having hit dead ends in chemical and biological attempts to

protect bees, we focused on revolutionizing the application of

pesticides in a mechanical way. 

The common form of applying pesticides is to spray them onto

the fields. As a result, the pesticide is spread in the air and also

finds its way onto the flowers and plants next to the field. There,

bees come in contact with it when they collect nectar. 

And since the pesticide is converted into tiny almost-invisible

particles which are easily blown away by the wind, the toxins can

be transportedover several kilometres. 

This is where we saw a chance to contribute to the protection of bees: we wanted to develop new form of pesticide application. 

Instead of spraying the pesticide as a mist onto the plants, we developed a method of specifically coating the targeted crops with the help of a brush.                        
With our method, pesticides can be applied more specifically

because the pesticide is converted into larger droplets, goes onto

the brush and from there directly onto the plant. 

Our model shows how the coloured liquid (representing pesticide)

is transferred from the brush onto the field of cress (representing

commercial crops). The pesticide application device stores the

liquid in a hopper, from there it goes through four drinking straws

onto the bristles. In oder to control the amount of pesticide, we

decreased the diameter of the straws, so that there's no waste

pesticide.

The chassis is constructed in a way that allows the plants to pass

under the machine without being damaged.

This type of pesticide application device can be adjusted to work on any size of field or for any crop with the undeniable advantage of reducing pesticide consumption and preventing it from being spread by wind.

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