Court Opinion

ID: 9853899
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:57:03.294386+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:20:13.711084
License: Public Domain

MEYER, Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent from the majority’s conclusion that a beekeeper enjoys a common law action for damages to bees that forage on another’s land. I do not agree with the broad principle of law on which the majority builds its holding that “[l]andowners owe a duty to use their property so as not to injure the property of others ” (citing to Dan B. Dobbs, The Law of Torts § 231 (2000) (emphasis added)). Neither this court nor any of the authoritative treatises on tort law have ever recognized such a broad duty to others’ property. A landowner’s duty to others is more fairly and narrowly stated as a duty not to create “a serious interference with [neighboring landowners’] use and enjoyment of land by pollution or the like.” Id. All of the cases cited by the majority in support of a broad duty to others’ property involve either a violation of agency standards or a circumstance where one landowner’s use was interfering with a neighboring landowner’s use of *193their own property. The cases simply don’t address the very unique situation presented here.
The traditional common law rule regarding negligence claims for injuries to trespassing animals is that “[ujnless otherwise required by statute, a landowner owes no duty with respect to trespassing animals except to refrain from willfully or wantonly injuring them.” 65A C.J.S. Negligence § 431. The unique situation presented here is the fact that bees fly onto a neighboring landowner’s property, the bees remove a substance from the landowner’s property, and bring it back to their hive. Only two appellate courts have addressed what duty landowners owe to bees foraging on their property. Both the Wisconsin Supreme Court and the California Court of Appeals have addressed this question, and both courts have concluded that there should be no common law duty owed to bees foraging on a landowner’s property. See Bennett v. Larsen Co., 118 Wis.2d 681, 348 N.W.2d 540, 547 n. 3 (Wis.1984); Lenk v. Spezia, 95 Cal.App.2d 296, 213 P.2d 47, 51 (1949). The Wisconsin Supreme Court explained this rule in Bennett:
[Bjecause land possessors have the right to reasonably use their property as they see fit, and because bees tend to enter property and there is little the land possessor can do to prevent their entry, there should be no common law duty owed to protect the bees on the property, except that the land possessor cannot intentionally or wantonly destroy the bees.
Bennett, 348 N.W.2d at 547-48 n. 3.
Common law liability for damage to bees has been limited to those cases where pesticide spray has drifted onto a neighbor’s land and caused damage. The majority is plowing new ground in tort law by recognizing a common law duty owed to foraging bees. The majority concludes that a common law duty to foraging bees springs from the existence of comprehensive federal and state regulation of pesticides. The common law is “the body of law derived from judicial decisions, rather than from statutes or constitutions.” Black’s Law Dictionary 293 (8th ed,2004). It makes no sense to say that a newfound common law duty springs from a duty arising from state or federal regulation — it is more appropriate to grant a remedy to the beekeepers under the principle of negligence per se, which “usually arises from a statutory violation.” Black’s Law Dictionary 1063 (8th ed.2004).
The claim of negligence per se is that pesticides were applied in violation of federal and state regulations. Since the majority concludes that the beekeepers do have the remedy of negligence per se available, there is no reason to create a duty owed to beekeepers, independent from the provisions on the label. It is difficult for me to imagine how a jury could determine that spraying was conducted in a manner that creates an unreasonable risk of harm without reference to the label’s requirements. The court should not create a common law duty of care owed to foraging bees.