Scientists in Northern Italy are experimenting with unusual and totally eco-friendly sound and odor devices to fight off insects from their cultivated fields .

Ecosystem services are free, but often hidden. They include pollination and killing of crop pests by beneficial insects. Now, QuESSA , an EU-funded research project, due to be completed in 2017, will try and increase the visibility of such services.

Bees are perceived as cuddly animals. They appear in cartoons as friendly species. Any harm on them--whether it is potential or actual--makes people rather emotional.

Marco Lodesani is the director of the honey bee and silkworm unit at the Agricultural Research Council (CRA-API) in Bologna, Italy. He coordinated Apenet , one of the first study highlighting the role of neonicotinoids in Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD).

It does look like a resounding, spectacular success. During this year’s neonicotinoid-free maize sowing in Italy hardly a bee colony has been lost, bar a suspicious case where some leftover seed from last year may have been used.

As president of UNAAPI, the Italian Beekeepers Association, Francesco Panella is one of the most impassionate opposers of neonicotinoids and other synthetic pesticides, whether they are used as seed coating or sprayed on groves, as he blames them for weakening the bees’ immune system.

Dr. Moreno Greatti, from the Department of Plant Biology and Protection at the University of Udine in Italy, is the author of a pivotal study on the dispersion of seed coating particles containing neonicotinoids into the air and along field borders during maize sowing.

Tens of thousands of them don’t even manage to get back to their apiary. Disoriented, they lose the way home and die.

The local government of the Piedmont region listened carefully to the beekeepers’ complaints, says Giacomo Michelatti, head of the region’s agrochemical control department.