Added by Editor:As has been pointed out by super reader BPM, this Monterey Herald Article was a hoax, written as an April Fools Joke. Thank you for pointing this out, BPM. I’m guessing many other people didn’t realize this:

It may be that everyone has already seen this Monterey Herald article, but I only found it today. How is it that the USDA was willing to admit that this small town has plenty of birds and bugs to take care of LBAM, but somehow, no town in California does?

Read this article

As a birder, I can attest that the Bay Area has ABUNDANT bird life. Marin, set to be aerially sprayed monthly beginning this August, is one of the world’s great migratory bird stops. Or at least, it has been. After the spraying, it may become a wild bird cemetery.

As a gardener, I can attest that you can’t turn over a shovelful of ground in the Bay Area without finding a few earwigs and beetles.

Every night, beneficial bats leave their perches underneath freeway overpasses, roof ledges, trees, caves and abandoned structures and circle the night sky, consuming vast quantities of moths.

We have all of the natural predators here in California. They have been keeping LBAM populations balanced for decades.

But if we spray our birds, spray our bats, spray our bugs, we lose, possibly forever, the very beings who keep our planet healthy. This is the crisis of imbalance created by agricultural pesticide use, and it is the negligent and destructive situation CDFA and the USDA is intentionally creating with their actions. The more they spray, the more they get paid. It’s abhorrent.

We must keep fighting to protect our bats, our birds, our helping bugs and ourselves.