Honey Bees all Over The Earth Are Disappearing!

[skatss]

Frenchtowner.com note: Significant portions of the post below were taken from the PBS Nature program website here.


I think I am reading too many newspapers and watching too many PBS specials.

I really don't want to be the voice of doom, but I just read about a special going on PBS. It's called "The Silence Of The Bees" and I am worried about it. Honey bees all over the earth are disappearing!

In the winter of 2006, a strange phenomenon fell upon honeybee hives across the country. Without a trace, millions of bees vanished from their hives.

A pollinator of fruits and vegetables, the disappearing bees left billions of dollars of crops at risk and threatened our food supply. The epidemic set researchers scrambling to discover why honeybees were dying in record numbers -- and to stop the epidemic in its tracks before it spreads further.

I don't know why there isn't more being said about this on the news since we are already inside this disaster. In the winter of 2006/2007, more than a quarter of the country's 2.4 million bee colonies -- accounting for tens of billions of bees -- were lost to CCD, Colony Collapse Disorder.

Honeybees pollinate about one-third of crop species in the US. Honeybees pollinate about 100 flowering food crops. Essentially all flowering plants need bees to survive.

If the bees die out -- we might too!

The PBS show can be seen on TV and after the first airing, you will probably be able to watch it online too. Just go to your local PBS station and see when it will be on. There is also a follow up show that they will air that asks if other bees can take over the job of the honeybee.

It's an important issue!

Silence of the Bees airs on PBS Sunday, June 15 at 8 p.m. (check local listings).

Before we all get too filled with doom and gloom, I read to see if there is anything that individuals can do to help the situation with the bees. PBS even has a website that answers this question too.

Here's the link -- thank heavens:


NATURE. Silence of the Bees| How can you help the bees? | PBS

In short they tell people to get closer to nature. If you have a garden you can become a bee feeder! Backyard gardens can offer a supply of nectar and pollen for honeybees.

Cultivate plants that will attract bees. Choose flowers that bloom successively over the spring, summer, and fall seasons in order to provide pollen and nectar resources to the native bees of all seasons.

Keep part of your backyard wild because bees prefer that to a manicured space. Go for a "planted by nature" effect rather than a perfectly pruned garden. Remember: bees don't discriminate between weeds and cultivated flowers, so let those dandelions grow.

Anyone who makes a snide remark about how messy your lawn is can be answered by telling them in a voice filled with amazement, that your gardern/lawn is that way because you are doing your best to support honeybees around the world. Then tell them about the special and the dire situation with the disappearing honeybees and watch their reaction.

And of course keep your bee garden free of pesticides -- a danger in any garden. Some pesticides can kill the bee before it returns to the hive; other pesticides get carried back and can harm the rest of the hive.

Something else the average person can do is to write to their senators and representatives in congress on the federal level and to do the same on the state level to support funding of honeybee research. This support has fallen off over the years.

One more thing we all can do even if we don't have a green thumb or garden: buying pesticide-free foods at the market also protects humans and bees.


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honey photo above from Wikipedia by Scott Bauer, USDA photo, public domain

[Coda1108]

This topic has made my local news at least twice. There's a school of belief that says it's caused by cell phone and other signals traveling through the air. Not sure how much science there is to back that up.

[Meander]

There is another theory that it is a fungus. I think it's caused by gross damage to the environment and probably associated with mass pesticide use over the last century.

I wrote a little poem about it a few months ago which suggests a possible scenario if this goes on.


I Cried When the Bugs Died

Fields where flowers once grew
overflow with dust.
No frogs or crickets grace the night
with love songs
and the terrible silence of darkness
screams louder than the breeze.
No mosquitoes bite
but there's no honey for my tea.
There's no fruit on the vine
and the only blooms are in the Spring
on trees too ignorant to die.

[DianaR]

I have read several articles and forum posts about the bee problem.

Then, last week a swarm oaf bees took up residence in one of our trees. They didn't stay and build a hive, though. Apparently they all flew off somewhere else in the neighborhood, then visited our yard for a second time, and haven't been seen since.

I wonder if the misguided attempt to breed them with African bees has anything to do with the die off?

[Meander]

I also heard that it is some kind of mite that is attacking the honey bees. It seems to me it must be something extremely subtle if it hasn't been pinned down yet.

[DianaR]

I think it is too late for me to crate a bee garden this summer, but I can plan for next summer.

The weird thing is that a couple of weeks ago a swarm of bees visited our trees on two separate days. I wonder if they were having a difficult time finding a good place to build a hive because they couldn't locate food easily?

[bubble]

Over in my part of the world we have companies that breed bees, there are two just in town. They use them in the giant greenhouses to help pollenate the crops.

I am wondering where all the wild bees have gone.

[skatss]

It's interesting to note that in China, since one area has lost its bees, they actually have people come in, gather pollen from their trees and use what looks like a feather duster to pollinate flowers that they also gather. They then let the female flower parts dry in the sun and they collect what remains to be planted the next year.

And it has been working!

The real problem there is two fold. That hard work can only be done in China because elsewhere, in other countries, it would be far too expensive to pay people to do the work.

The second problem is that it's getting to be too hard to find people who will do the work in China too. The lowest paid people are leaving their old homes and gong to the cities where they can get better jobs. Soon getting anyone to do the job will cost too much in China too.

So getting people to do the bees' job is going to be even more impossible soon.

Many experts on the show mentioned that many foods don't need bees in order for the farmers to get a crop. But they also say that if the bees aren't around to do their job, humans are going to get very bored with the few foods left that don't need bees.

At least the CDC is now also working on the problem. They have a few theories about the breakdown of the bees hives, but so far don't have the real answers and can't tell us what is really happening or what can be dome to help.

I think I read that another special about bees will be on PBS soon. I'll be on the lookout for it.

[DianaR]

I think nothing is impossible if they will pay people enough to live on, regardless of what the job is. There has to be a fundamental shift in how we view income, education, wealth before we see changes that make the world more humane.

With pollination being a necessary component in crop , tree, and plant growth, the shift may have to come sooner than later, with humans who replace bees being seen as more valuable and the pay for their work reflecting that shift.