WASHINGTON (AFP) - US beekeepers have been stung in recent months by the mysterious disappearance of millions of bees threatening honey supplies as well as crops which depend on the insects for pollination.
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Bee numbers on parts of the east coast and in Texas have fallen by more than 70 percent, while California has seen colonies drop by 30 to 60 percent.
According to estimates from the US Department of Agriculture, bees are vanishing across a total of 22 states, and for the time being no one really knows why.
"Approximately 40 percent of my 2,000 colonies are currently dead and this is the greatest winter colony mortality I have ever experienced in my 30 years of beekeeping," apiarist Gene Brandi, from the California State Beekeepers Association, told Congress recently.
It is normal for hives to see populations fall by some 20 percent during the winter, but the sharp loss of bees is causing concern, especially as domestic US bee colonies have been steadily decreasing since 1980.
There are some 2.4 million professional hives in the country, according to the Agriculture Department, 25 percent fewer than at the start of the 1980s.
And the number of beekeepers has halved.
The situation is so bad, that beekeepers are now calling for some kind of government intervention, warning the flight of the bees could be catastrophic for crop growers.
Domestic bees are essential for pollinating some 90 varieties of vegetables and fruits, such as apples, avocados, and blueberries and cherries.
"The pollination work of honey bees increases the yield and quality of United States crops by approximately 15 billion dollars annually including six billion in California," Brandi said.
California's almond industry alone contributes two billion dollars to the local economy, and depends on 1.4 million bees which are brought from around the US every year to help pollinate the trees, he added.
The phenomenon now being witnessed across the United States has been dubbed "colony collapse disorder," or CCD, by scientists as they seek to explain what is causing the bees to literally disappear in droves.
The usual suspects to which bees are known to be vulnerable such as the varroa mite, an external parasite which attacks honey bees and which can wipe out a hive, appear not to be the main cause.
"CCD is associated with unique symptoms, not seen in normal collapses associated with varroa mites and honey bee viruses or in colony deaths due to winter kill," entomologist Diana Cox-Foster told the Congress committee.
In cases of colony collapse disorder, flourishing hives are suddenly depopulated leaving few, if any, surviving bees behind.
The queen bee, which is the only one in the hive allowed to reproduce, is found with just a handful of young worker bees and a reserve of food.
Curiously though no dead bees are found either inside or outside the hive.
The fact that other bees or parasites seem to shun the emptied hives raises suspicions that some kind of toxin or chemical is keeping the insects away, Cox-Foster said.
Those bees found in such devastated colonies also all seem to be infected with multiple micro-organisms, many of which are known to be behind stress-related illness in bees.
Scientists working to unravel the mysteries behind CCD believe a new pathogen may be the cause, or a new kind of chemical product which could be weakening the insects' immune systems.
The finger of suspicion is being pointed at agriculture pesticides such as the widely-used neonicotinoides, which are already known to be poisonous to bees.
France saw a huge fall in its bee population in the 1990s, blamed on the insecticide Gaucho which has now been banned in the country.
-------------------- "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication" Posts: 4005 | From: Shaolin | Registered: Oct 2005
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Are mobile phones wiping out our bees? Scientists claim radiation from handsets are to blame for mysterious 'colony collapse' of bees By Geoffrey Lean and Harriet Shawcross Published: 15 April 2007 It seems like the plot of a particularly far-fetched horror film. But some scientists suggest that our love of the mobile phone could cause massive food shortages, as the world's harvests fail.
They are putting forward the theory that radiation given off by mobile phones and other hi-tech gadgets is a possible answer to one of the more bizarre mysteries ever to happen in the natural world - the abrupt disappearance of the bees that pollinate crops. Late last week, some bee-keepers claimed that the phenomenon - which started in the US, then spread to continental Europe - was beginning to hit Britain as well.
The theory is that radiation from mobile phones interferes with bees' navigation systems, preventing the famously homeloving species from finding their way back to their hives. Improbable as it may seem, there is now evidence to back this up.
Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) occurs when a hive's inhabitants suddenly disappear, leaving only queens, eggs and a few immature workers, like so many apian Mary Celestes. The vanished bees are never found, but thought to die singly far from home. The parasites, wildlife and other bees that normally raid the honey and pollen left behind when a colony dies, refuse to go anywhere near the abandoned hives.
The alarm was first sounded last autumn, but has now hit half of all American states. The West Coast is thought to have lost 60 per cent of its commercial bee population, with 70 per cent missing on the East Coast.
CCD has since spread to Germany, Switzerland, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Greece. And last week John Chapple, one of London's biggest bee-keepers, announced that 23 of his 40 hives have been abruptly abandoned.
Other apiarists have recorded losses in Scotland, Wales and north-west England, but the Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs insisted: "There is absolutely no evidence of CCD in the UK."
The implications of the spread are alarming. Most of the world's crops depend on pollination by bees. Albert Einstein once said that if the bees disappeared, "man would have only four years of life left".
No one knows why it is happening. Theories involving mites, pesticides, global warming and GM crops have been proposed, but all have drawbacks.
German research has long shown that bees' behaviour changes near power lines.
Now a limited study at Landau University has found that bees refuse to return to their hives when mobile phones are placed nearby. Dr Jochen Kuhn, who carried it out, said this could provide a "hint" to a possible cause.
Dr George Carlo, who headed a massive study by the US government and mobile phone industry of hazards from mobiles in the Nineties, said: "I am convinced the possibility is real."
The case against handsets
Evidence of dangers to people from mobile phones is increasing. But proof is still lacking, largely because many of the biggest perils, such as cancer, take decades to show up.
Most research on cancer has so far proved inconclusive. But an official Finnish study found that people who used the phones for more than 10 years were 40 per cent more likely to get a brain tumour on the same side as they held the handset.
Equally alarming, blue-chip Swedish research revealed that radiation from mobile phones killed off brain cells, suggesting that today's teenagers could go senile in the prime of their lives.
Studies in India and the US have raised the possibility that men who use mobile phones heavily have reduced sperm counts. And, more prosaically, doctors have identified the condition of "text thumb", a form of RSI from constant texting.
Professor Sir William Stewart, who has headed two official inquiries, warned that children under eight should not use mobiles and made a series of safety recommendations, largely ignored by ministers.
-------------------- "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication" Posts: 4005 | From: Shaolin | Registered: Oct 2005
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posted
Whatever the cause, it spells real trouble for the human race and most of the large land animals of the Earth......maybe ultimate disaster.......
These things, disappearing bees, global warming, etc. are far more dangerous than any war or means of waging war and, sadly, their realities are essentially ignored by political forces that only see Party loyalties and profit margins.
Greedy little minds with giant egos, intellectual nincompoops and bullies, run the world.
Posts: 11304 | From: Fort Worth, Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
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The Varroa mite was bad enough but this is just plain scary what's happening right now.
-------------------- No longer eligible for government service due to lack of tax issues. Posts: 5178 | From: Up North | Registered: Dec 2005
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there have been a lot of studies conducted on migration/direction finding neurochemicals in animals all the way down to the amoeba like animals...
they DO have the ability to sequester iron into neurotransmission systems...(even single-celled oraganism have been shown to have this ability)
ant and termites are hymenoptera, same family a bees and wasps:
Comparative magnetic measurements of migratory ant and its only termite prey
D. M. S. EsquivelCorresponding Author Contact Information, E-mail The Corresponding Author, a, E. Wajnberga, G. R. Cernicchiaroa and O. C. Alvesb Abstract
Termites and ants are social insects living organized in nests in castes. Behavioral studies with the migratory ant Pachycondyla marginata have shown that it conducts well-organized predatory raids toward nests of its only prey, the termite Neocapritermes opacus. The magnetic materials in these two insects were studied using a SQUID magnetometer for two orientations. The Jr/Js and Jr/χ0, ratios were calculated from the two insects hysteresis curves. These ratios are in the range of magnetite pseudo-single or multi-domain particle values. The magnetic material are distinguishable by Hc values (30 Oe for ants and 100 Oe for termites) and by the magnetization magnitude, which is about two magnitude orders higher in the termite than in migratory ant. The Pachycondyla marginata SQUID results show an anisotropy in the magnetic material arrangement while for Neocapritermes opacus termite it is revealed by FMR spectra.
posted
"they DO have the ability to sequester iron into neurotransmission systems...(even single-celled oraganism have been shown to have this ability)
ant and termites are hymenoptera, same family a bees and wasps:"
In "Lame-mans terms" please???
-------------------- "Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication" Posts: 4005 | From: Shaolin | Registered: Oct 2005
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Danger to them all....ants, bees, wasp. termites.....the world we live in (even so much as most of us like to assume this sort of nasty stinging beast is just a thing to be away from) is ddominate the ecosystem, which needs it to carry on without failing.
Without either variety, everything else has problems......serious existance problems....
Posts: 11304 | From: Fort Worth, Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
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quote:Originally posted by rimasco: "they DO have the ability to sequester iron into neurotransmission systems...(even single-celled oraganism have been shown to have this ability)
ant and termites are hymenoptera, same family a bees and wasps:"
In "Lame-mans terms" please???
layman's terms?
lots of creatures use magnetism to "map" their environment..
man-made electromagnetic waves can affect their mapping abilities... the solution could simply be a switch to another (similar) set of frequencies...
there is a good chance that the bees that are (for whatever reason) not affected will reproduce quickly to replace the missing bees, and we c/should, (desperately need to?) help...
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posted
Experts may have found what's bugging the bees
A fungus that hit hives in Europe and Asia may be partly to blame for wiping out colonies across the U.S.
By Jia-Rui Chong and Thomas H. Maugh II, Times Staff Writers April 26, 2007
A fungus that caused widespread loss of bee colonies in Europe and Asia may be playing a crucial role in the mysterious phenomenon known as Colony Collapse Disorder that is wiping out bees across the United States, UC San Francisco researchers said Wednesday.
Researchers have been struggling for months to explain the disorder, and the new findings provide the first solid evidence pointing to a potential cause.
But the results are "highly preliminary" and are from only a few hives from Le Grand in Merced County, UCSF biochemist Joe DeRisi said. "We don't want to give anybody the impression that this thing has been solved."
Other researchers said Wednesday that they too had found the fungus, a single-celled parasite called Nosema ceranae, in affected hives from around the country — as well as in some hives where bees had survived. Those researchers have also found two other fungi and half a dozen viruses in the dead bees.
N. ceranae is "one of many pathogens" in the bees, said entomologist Diana Cox-Foster of Pennsylvania State University. "By itself, it is probably not the culprit … but it may be one of the key players."
DOA Has New Theory On Why Bees Are Dying, Disappearing
May 18, 2007
Honeybees have been dying and disappearing all over the country, which is bad news for farmers who rely on them to pollinate their crops.
There have been several theories as to why, including cell phone radiation, but the federal government is looking at something else.
According to WTAE Channel 4's news exchange partners at the Tribune-Review, the latest theory has to do with the same chemical that recently made hundreds of pets sick across the country.
Bees drink nectar and collect pollen. They also stock up on honey in case food becomes scarce, but there is also something called commercial bee feed.
Like pet food and fish food, bee feed is protein-rich.
-------------------- One is never completely useless. One can always serve as a bad example. Posts: 2430 | From: CA | Registered: Jun 2005
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Can't we just ban any agricultural imports from that country please?
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"Federal scientists are researching whether the same industrial chemicals blamed for sickening and killing thousands of pets are responsible for decimating the honeybee population.
No link has been found, but researchers at the Department of Agriculture's Bee Research Laboratory and the Food and Drug Administration's Center for Veterinary Medicine are testing commercial bee feed for melamine-related compounds and doing feed tests on honeybees. "
Notice it DOES NOT say there is any finding of contaminated bee feed.
I hardly believe a world wide decrease in bees could be reasonably attributed to contaminants in any comercial bee feed, as artificially feeding bees is more than extremely rare and also extremely non-profitable.
"The use of supplementary protein feeds for commercial bee keeping is not recommended"
and
"The feeding of commercial bees, has to be done for a profit. A crop of honey, a pollination contract or queen bee breeding must be carefully targeted. To use supplementary bee foods to produce strong hives, without a target crop is poor management bad economics, and will only lead to disappointment and a disbelief in the value of supplementary feeding."
Posts: 11304 | From: Fort Worth, Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
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LONDON (Reuters) - A passenger plane was forced to land after flying into a swarm of British bees Thursday.
The Palmair Boeing 737, with 90 passengers on board, had to return to Bournemouth Airport in southern England shortly after take-off following an engine surge.
The pilot decided to abort the flight to Faro in Portugal and returned for safety checks. The plane's engine was thought to have become clogged with bees, the company said Friday.
Huge clouds of bees have been seen around Bournemouth over the past few days, a spokeswoman said.
-------------------- One is never completely useless. One can always serve as a bad example. Posts: 2430 | From: CA | Registered: Jun 2005
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posted
Swearming is the natural way that bees reproduce hives. It is not abnormal. It is abnormal to fly a plane into one. Darn difficult to do, actually.
Posts: 11304 | From: Fort Worth, Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
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LEWISBURG, Pa. - Scientists investigating a mysterious ailment that has killed many of the nation's honeybees are concentrating on pesticides and microorganisms as possible causes of the disorder, and some beekeepers are refusing to place their hives near chemically treated fields
Scientists from Penn State University and the U.S. Department of Agriculture are leading the research into the disease, which has killed tens of thousands of bee colonies in at least 35 states.
The die-off has threatened the livelihood of commercial beekeepers and strained fruit growers and other farmers who rely on bees to pollinate more than 90 flowering crops, including apples, nuts and citrus trees.
After months of study, researchers cannot tie the ailment to any single factor. But scientists are focused on a new, unnamed pathogen found in dead bees, and on the role of pesticides, said Maryann Frazier, a senior extension associate in the university's entomology department.
David Hackenberg was the first beekeeper to report the disorder to Penn State last fall after losing nearly 75 percent of his 3,200 colonies.
He has rebuilt his business to 2,400 colonies but now asks growers whether they use the chemicals because he is convinced the bees are being harmed by pesticides, especially a type called neonicotinoids.
"I'm quizzing every farmer around," Hackenberg said. "If you're going to use that stuff, then you're going to have go to somebody else."
If bees continue to die, he said, Hackenberg Apiaries may have to raise prices to replace dead hives. The business charges about $90 a hive to "lease" bees in fields. Replacing a hive with new bees costs $120.
Neonicotinoids do not contain nicotine — the addictive drug found in tobacco — but they are named after it because they target nerve cells in a similar way.
Bayer Crop Science is one of the nation's top producers of neonicotinoid pesticides, which have been on the market since 1994. But company spokesman John Boyne said neonicotinoids are not the cause of the honeybees' demise.
"We have done a significant amount of research on our products, and we are comfortable this it is not the cause," Boyne said. He said "a number of nonchemical causes may be to blame."
-------------------- One is never completely useless. One can always serve as a bad example. Posts: 2430 | From: CA | Registered: Jun 2005
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posted
If G.M. crops end up having anything to do with this I'm gonna be so pissed.
-------------------- No longer eligible for government service due to lack of tax issues. Posts: 5178 | From: Up North | Registered: Dec 2005
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quote:Originally posted by The Bigfoot: If G.M. crops end up having anything to do with this I'm gonna be so pissed.
not likely BF, but they are looking at it..
the crops are modified using a gene from bacillus thuringiensis which is a very common soil microbe...
one of the things to keep in mind about GM crops is that nobody is creating NEW GENES (yet), they are simply moving genes from one place to another, and? even tho the scientists like to take a lotof credit (and cash) for their work? they are using tools they found in nature to move the genes around. it really is more like "less random" evolution than anything else...
if anything? GM crops are our best chance to get rid of "nozzlehead" farming operations...
unless you have a plan to totally restructure teh world's food production economy? we aren't going to be changing the monoculture farming model any time soon....
-------------------- Don't envy the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise. Posts: 36378 | From: USA | Registered: Sep 2003
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posted
You are probably right. I just know how much G.M. corn can screw with non G.M. corn when it comes to pollinazation and have heard enough stories of huge problems that have occured when Ag companies have introduced GM seeds to other parts of the world like Indonesia that I have a very poor opinion of them.
I don't think they are unsafe to eat like some but I think we would be better off without. Did you know that some heritage seeds (think 500 yrs old) have been tested and found to have three times the nutritional value of the contemporary varieties? We've selectively bred our crops for hardiness and bushel size without thinking of the detrimental cost to nutritional value.
I would love to revolutionize the food production economy to be more of a "three sisters" model where complementary crops are farmed together but it could never be done on a large scale operation without huge labor intensive costs. Plots would have to dramatically reduce in size and that ain't gonna happen. Not in today's economy.
-------------------- No longer eligible for government service due to lack of tax issues. Posts: 5178 | From: Up North | Registered: Dec 2005
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posted
I do not have the references now, but years ago(maybe about 1980....later, IN THE 90S, I saw a program about him and his farm on PBS TV) there was a splendid report in the agricultural journals of an Alabama man that, on an 11 acre plot of land, on which his house took up its own part, had managed, via careful and non-chemical management of his agricultural assets, had supported his family with middle class income, put three children through college, and set aside a reasonable retirement funds for he and his wife.
He rotated crops (not just annually, but seasonally) and never planted in large blocks, whenever possible (corn requires it to polenate), maintained bees, grew the food for his animals and family, and, according to quotations from him and his family, was as healthy and happy as any man they knew of half his age.
Posts: 11304 | From: Fort Worth, Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
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posted
i agree, bdgee, but the "problem" is that you have to raise people to understand how to do that...
i would definitely prefer to be able to live like that, and we may have to/be able to in the future,
big agro-biz is not good for humanity IMO either, and there's alot of reasons it's bad, starting with govt subsidies and going out from there.. as long as the Govt subsidizes the big operations like ti does now? the small operations can't compete...
as for GM crops? corn, or more properly, Maize, has no "wild" counterpart. it's been GMed by human selection for so long that it's nothing like the "original" source stock..
there's a few things in the Americas that are like that: Chihuauha's? how many generations did it take to make them from wolves? my bet is more than the current 5 to 15 thousand years "guess" that is currnetly accepted.. i bet it's more like 100K years..
Vanilla has no known pollinator besides humans...
GM crops are produced using a "tool" that was found in the "wild", in fact? it was first isolated in maize... see Barbara McClintock: During the 1940s and 1950s, McClintock discovered transposition and used it to show how genes are responsible for turning physical characteristics on or off. She developed theories to explain the repression or expression of genetic information from one generation of maize plants to the next. Encountering skepticism of her research and its implications, she stopped publishing her data in 1953. Later, she made an extensive study of the cytogenetics and ethnobotany of maize races from South America. McClintock's research became well understood in the 1960s and 1970s, as researchers demonstrated the mechanisms of genetic change and genetic regulation that she had demonstrated in her maize research in the 1940s and 1950s. Awards and recognition of her contributions to the field followed, including the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine awarded to her in 1983 for the discovery of genetic transposition; to date, she has been the first and only woman to receive an unshared Nobel Prize in that category.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_McClintock
-------------------- Don't envy the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise. Posts: 36378 | From: USA | Registered: Sep 2003
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posted
Isn't it more like you have to raise them not to believe it can't be done, glass.....?
Or at least not to demand it be done the way it is now.
Of course, that is the case with so many things. There is no reason with wind and solar energy and using storage methods beyond the same batteries that great granddaddy had that we could not build homes (and other buildings) that simply wouldn't need to be tied to a wire to some power company, thereby, saving the overall economy billions every year to just maintain the existing lines.
Add to that some serious effort to perfect and improve combustion engines and fuel cells that use only hydrogen and we are talking a savings of many trillions per year while we make a real effort to clean up and save the environment.
Personally, I really like the idea of using the "Sterling Cycle" (http://www.reference.com/search?q=sterling%20cycle) for air conditioning, both cooling and heating. they are far more efficient than what we have now and can be powered by just about anything from water pressure to a Great Dane harnessed on a treadmill and teased to action with a raw pork chop held just beyond his reach.
Consider the possibility of spending the day powering a Sterling engine, for cooling, with solar power and using the excess electricity from a tall building covered in solar cells to pump water in a storage tank in the basement to another atop the building, then through the night powering that Sterling engine with the stored energy of the water on the roof.
There are so many ways to improve our plight by forgetting the stagnation that we have come to accept as absolute......and not just in improved agricultural practices.
It may not be a question of "raising people to understand how to do that", but raising politicians to understand that the General Electrics and Alabama Powers and ConEds and Enrons do not have or want real answers.
Posts: 11304 | From: Fort Worth, Texas | Registered: Mar 2005
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Regulatory commission cuts Entergy Arkansas' rate increase request Saturday, Jun 16, 2007 By Jason Wiest Arkansas News Bureau LITTLE ROCK - The state Public Service Commission on Friday denied Entergy Arkansas' $106.5 million rate increase request and instead ordered the state's largest electric utility to reduce rates by $5.67 million.
In the 131 page opinion, the PSC denied the utility's request to recover from ratepayers expenses that included tickets to sporting events and concerts, golf balls and golf tournament expenses and dinners and alcohol to entertain political figures.
The regulatory panel also reduced the level of incentive pay and stock options requested by the utility by more than $21 million.
The commission approved the utility's request to recover costs relating to projects and organizations that promote new technologies and research and development investment.
In the order, the commission stated that it wanted to establish a policy to promote "new technologies which could provide more efficient utility operation" that will lead to "direct ratepayer benefit."
The order allows for the recovery of the cost of Entergy Arkansas' recently deployed "broadband over power lines" project, which is designed to study the feasibility of utilizing this new technology to enhance service delivery, outage detection and service restoration, as well as the potential future deployment of cost-effective and efficient demand response technology and advanced metering capabilities.
The commission also reiterated its intent to continue to fight a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission order that requires Entergy Arkansas to make payments to the other Entergy operating companies to "roughly" balance production costs at plants throughout Entergy's four-state service area.
-------------------- One is never completely useless. One can always serve as a bad example. Posts: 2430 | From: CA | Registered: Jun 2005
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posted
New Article out. Seems the cell phone tower hypothesis is losing prominence.
quote: Dead Bees Have Local Farmers Swarming
POSTED: 3:21 pm EDT July 18, 2007 UPDATED: 6:17 pm EDT July 18, 2007
Scientists are desperately trying to find out what's killing honeybees, which have been disappearing by the millions.
The first beekeeper to notice the problem was in Erie, Pa., but soon after, keepers across the country started losing their bees.
If it doesn't stop, much of the country's food supply could be in danger since most of what we eat every day wouldn’t be here without the help of honeybees.
"These hives are all dead except three of four," said master beekeeper Bob Jenereski, who lost about 200 hives.
Losing more than 175 hives, Jenereski said, translates into almost two million dead honeybees.
Some Pennsylvania keepers said they lost 80 to 90 percent of their hives this year, calling it colony collapse disorder
It's an urgent problem scientists all over the country are working to solve but right now, it's still a mystery.
They're looking at viruses, weather, mites and cell phones as possible causes.
"It could be a combination," said Jenereski. "The latest craze was cell phone towers. I think they put that to bed. That's not going to be a problem, but they really don't know."
"Very scary again, because so much of our food crop depends on it," Jenereski said. "Now, if you want to eat corn and wheat and barley and rice, the honeybee doesn't pollinate that. And that's what's going to be left if we don't have more bees out there."
Soergel's Orchard said it has lost its honeybees, too. They used the bees to pollinate their crops.
"This is the first time in 20 years. All of them swarmed within a week, packed their bags and left," said Reed Soergel. "The honey means a lot to a beekeeper, but the pollination is actually the big dollar. If an apple blossom doesn't get pollinated, there is no apple the rest of the year."
While scientists try to figure out the problem, Soergel said he is trying out bumblebees this year for pollination, but only time will tell how well they work.
-------------------- No longer eligible for government service due to lack of tax issues. Posts: 5178 | From: Up North | Registered: Dec 2005
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posted
Asian parasite killing Western bees: scientist
By Julia Hayley
MADRID (Reuters) - A parasite common in Asian bees has spread to Europe and the Americas and is behind the mass disappearance of honeybees in many countries, says a Spanish scientist who has been studying the phenomenon for years.
The culprit is a microscopic parasite called nosema ceranae said Mariano Higes, who leads a team of researchers at a government-funded apiculture centre in Guadalajara, the province east of Madrid that is the heartland of Spain's honey industry.
He and his colleagues have analyzed thousands of samples from stricken hives in many countries.
"We started in 2000 with the hypothesis that it was pesticides, but soon ruled it out," he told Reuters in an interview on Wednesday.
Pesticide traces were present only in a tiny proportion of samples and bee colonies were also dying in areas many miles from cultivated land, he said.
They then ruled out the varroa mite, which is easy to see and which was not present in most of the affected hives.
For a long time Higes and his colleagues thought a parasite called nosema apis, common in wet weather, was killing the bees.
"We saw the spores, but the symptoms were very different and it was happening in dry weather too."
Then he decided to sequence the parasite's DNA and discovered it was an Asian variant, nosema ceranae. Asian honeybees are less vulnerable to it, but it can kill European bees in a matter of days in laboratory conditions.
-------------------- One is never completely useless. One can always serve as a bad example. Posts: 2430 | From: CA | Registered: Jun 2005
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posted
That's good news if that's truly the cause. If you read the whole article you'll see that the treatment would cost about 2.80 per hive per year.
Posts: 5729 | From: Wisconsin | Registered: Sep 2003
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posted
They're Bees........Who the **** cares......I'm more concerned about soldiers in Iraq disapearing....
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