News – A survey of bee health released Tuesday revealed a grim picture, with 36.1 percent of the nation's commercially managed hives lost since last year.
I read recently that bees are on the verge of extinction. What will happen to our pollenation when that happens. Bees are very important little buggers.
True N2N, but aren't there privately owned, and independent bee-keepers to make sure that the bees are multiplying, and thriving?
As far as I know everybody is affected.
The last I heard, Australian bees weren't affected as of yet and it's where N. American and European bee keepers have been replenishing their lost stocks from.
Australian Honey Bees Threatened?
Four swarms of Asian bees found in Cairns, Australiahave been cleared of carrying the dreaded Varroa destructor mite but the intruders themselves could pose the beginning of a serious threat to Australian honey bee populations.
Asian bees are known to have found their way into Australian ports at least half a dozen times in the last decade.
This time it's a Javanese strain of the bee and because the latest incursion had lain undiscovered for at least three months, it is unknown how many more swarms might exist and how far afield they may have flown.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/06/07...
The Aussies are trying to keep out Asian bees but it's extremely difficult
Bronx,
Private beekeepers usually place their hives for a fee, and the only people who pay their fees are commercial growers. All well and good, but we also need our hinterlands populated by bees to keep up the health and pollination of various trees, flowers, vines, berries, etc. It's that latter aspect that is of concern because those plants are part of the food chain for all kinds of animals and insects.
I don't think we as a society fully appreciate what bees do and what our continent would be like without them.
We're DOOMED! DOOMED, I TELL YOU!
Wouldn't it be ironic if instead of some wild apocalyptic scenario or MAD nuclear exchange that we could be rendered extinct by the loss of the ordinary honey bee...but it isn't really so far fetched. They are a critical link in the cycle of life.
It isn't just about Haagen-Daas but about the sustainability of human life itself....
This problem isn't unique to the US. I've read that its affecting europe aswell, with similar numbers of overall loss of hives.
Is this just another nail in coffin of humanity, or is it just a temporary anomaly?
Are we willing to spend some green in finding out just what the reasons are, or, is it going to be bussiness as usual, where few people give a hoot?
Cell phones?
I'm left speechless by the number of people who don't know that bees pollinate every piece of fruit that they eat. I used to work with a very well educated lawyer - all the best private schools, won many multi-million dollar cases, a real bright lady - she had no idea that bees pollinate stuff. Amazing.
Since I'm talking about amazing how about those folks who get their lawns treated and then the lawn company leave those little signs not to go on the lawn. Who wants a poison lawn?
Stoners, There were Honeybees around the side of my house getting pollen early last month. I haven't seen them since. It might help to encourage a bee watch in neighbor hoods. A national Bee Watch.
I saw 1 honey bee the other day, wasn't buzzing around the flowers, kept coming to us sitting on our porch, 2 different people almost killed it, I yelled NOOOOOOOOO leave it alone, it's a honey bee....one lone honey bee. Last year I had to use q-tips to pollinate my tomato plants, didn't see any bees and my little flowers just kept falling off and dying.
Save the bees!!!
Ivofwolves, I know what you mean, having to pollinate the tomato plants, I have been doing that for several years now! I wash my hands good, then go out and use my finger to cross pollinate the tomato blooms. I don't know where the bees go, between spring flowers and my fall fig tree producing fruit. My fig tree is usually covered with bees in the fall when the figs are ready to pick.
You need to put something tasty out there to attract them. Do you grow any flowers, if not plant some. Tomato flowers are borrrring.
When I worked in a hydroponic greenhouse we had two hives in it to pollinate the plants. Bees are wonderful workers and companions. I never even minded getting stung. When they died the woman I worked with used to take them home and bury them. Kind of strange, but who am I judge a burier of bees.
I always have plenty of flowers out there, I've read a few studies where they say putting the color red near your tomato plants produces better tomatoes, don't know if it's true or not, but it looks pretty anyhow :-) plus there is plenty of clover in the yard, don't know about others but I can't even count how many times I've been stung as a kid going barefoot in clover.
Great story Stoners!
Something many people stopped paying attnetion to after the last round of reports
The situation is pretty grim in the UK also
Honeybees may be wiped out in 10 years
Honeybees will die out in Britain within a decade as virulent diseases and parasites spread through the nation's hives, experts have warned.
The decline in bee numbers is going to affect the production af some plants but there are alot that would not be affected, most of the grains are from grasses and they do not need bees to pollinate and I know some fruit varieties also will produce with out bees but it would be in our better interest to keep them around.
I wonder if some of this is not being cause by gene manipulation that we are doing to certain plants, they have developed corn bore resistant varieties and maybe the gene is more deadly than they know and is affecting other plants and insects.
GMO plants may play a role. It is unrealistic to say that self-pollenators will not be affected, for the simple reason that the web of life is astonishingly complex and intricately interconnected.
So a species dies off - what bacteria, fungi, etc lived in its rhizosphere, and what role did they have in the life cycle of plants around them? Were they nitrogen-fixers? Did they repel or kill harmful nematodes?
We should admit that we don't really know where this could end up.
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"Last year's survey commissioned by the Apiary Inspectors of America found losses of about 32 percent."