Activists’ claims that the cultivation of GMO crops have harmed bumblebee colonies have been upended by a study just published in Britain. The study casts doubt on the suggestion that neonicotinoid pesticides, used in conjunction with GM crops, are a major factor in the decline of bumble bee colonies. The UK’s Food & Environment Research Agency studied bumblebee colonies placed near fields of canola crops that had been grown from seeds treated with the insecticides in question, and compared them with colonies near untreated crops. The result: “bumblebee colonies remained viable & productive in presence of neonicotinoid pesticides under field conditions.” Read the full study here.