There has been a lot in the
news lately about massive disappearances of honeybees in the US and around the world. This is of particular importance, as bees are major pollinators responsible for pollination of approximately one-third of the food consumed in the United States. The phenomenon is called
colony collapse disorder but the cause for it is unknown. Some possibilities being investigated are:
- habitat loss
- climate change (drought)
- pathogens carried by mites
- pesticides
- electromagnetic radiation from cellphones or power lines (2006 study shows that such radiation can affect bee behaviour and ability to return to the hive [pdf])
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14 comments:
I also suspect:
-GMO crops
-atheists
-evolutionists
-margarine
-aspartame
-Al-Qaeda
-Wallmart
-Michael Moore
-video games
-liberals
-gays
-aliens
-korean scientists
-ipods
-running room
-red smarties
did I forget anything?
A bee rapture?
GMO crops are one of the things mentioned in the wiki article. I guess the bottom line is that nobody has any real idea what's going on.
It might be this elite team of Japanese hornets. The action starts around the 2 minute mark.
"If the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe then man would only have four years of life left. No more bees, no more pollination, no more plants, no more animals, no more man."
Albert Einstein
First the bees leave us, then Einstein starts posting messages on bayblab from beyond the grave. What a strange world we live in...
Reagarding the Einstein bee quote: http://www.snopes.com/quotes/einstein/bees.asp
Thanks for the comment. There is definitely some interesting reading over there on the subject.
Top agricultural worldwide agricultural products (metric tons):
Sugar Cane 1,324
Maize 721
Wheat 627
Rice 605
Potatoes 328
Sugar Beet 249
Soybean 204
Oil Palm Fruit 162
Barley 154
Tomato 120
Crops that require bees:
apples
peaches
pears
pumpkins
cucumbers
cherries
raspberries
blackberries
strawberries
almonds
zucchini
melons
Note the lack of overlap between the two lists.
Sources:
Insect Pollination Of Cultivated Crop Plants,S.E. McGregor, USDA
Wikipedia
I made a similar comment at John Blatchford's site (see link above) about bees and pollination of major crops, such as corn (though mine was in the context of GM foods).
The list of insect pollinated crops at the above link is quite extensive and includes 3 of the top 10 agricultural crops (soybean, oil palm and tomato, though the contribution of bees is generally <10%). There's no doubt that corn and sugar cane are extremely important crops, both in the food chain and their use in ethanol/biofuel production, and I certainly don't think humanity is doomed with the recent bee disappearances (depsite the "Einstein" quote), but I for one wouldn't mind a little peanut butter with my cornbread.
Reading a lot of the information out there, there are definitely parallels between the 'bee crisis' and the 'climate crisis', the most obvious being the arguments that these phenomena are cyclical.
The mysteriousness of colony collapse, whether agriculturally significant or not makes it an interesting topic for discussion/investigation.
I agree. Plus bees are just cool.
"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."
Interesting. Where is that quote from?
I thought part of the mystery of colony collapse disorder was that the bees had actually disappeared (i.e. there were no piles of dead bees around).
Hmmmm...sounds like a black hole. Maybe the bees are in another galaxy on the other side of the universe.
Looks like colony collapse isn't a new phenomenon: The Simpsons reported on it years ago.
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