Bees are disappearing!

Originally posted by frayed1

As best I can tell, we still have the European bees, not the killer bees here ( N GA )....at least they tolerated me digging around the honeysuckle without attacking.

Yeah but in N.Ga you have Yellowjackets, the A-holes of the insect community...god I hate yellow jackets. I wish they started vanishing...a curse of God I tell ya. They are the only thing I miss about living in Alpharetta.

This article suggests the chemicals sprayed on crops may be the cause of this problem.

Honeybees are killed by synthetic chemicals
Scientists, for now, have primarily attributed the honeybee decline to diseases spread as a result of mites and other parasites as well as the spraying of crops with pesticides. It may also result from the treatment of forests, rangelands and even suburban areas to control a wide variety of pests.

"There is no question that the extremely irresponsible use of synthetic chemicals in modern farming practices is significantly contributing to this devastating drop in honeybee populations," said Mike Adams. "The more chemicals we spray on the crops, the more poisoned the pollinators become. And the fact that honeybees are now simply disappearing in huge numbers is a strong indicator that a key chemical burden threshold has been crossed. We may have unwittingly unleashed an agricultural Chernobyl."

Source: Mysterious collapse of honeybee populations threatens national food supply

They're destroying our planet... what can we do about it?

Don't forget about GMOs as a possible cause of the demise of honeybees:

www.truthout.org...

Les Firbank, who was in charge of the trials, said: "These weeds are effectively the bottom of the food chain, so the seeds they produce are vital for farmland birds, which are already in decline. There were also fewer bees and butterflies in the GM crops. All the evidence is that it is the herbicide that makes the difference to the wildlife." Mark Avery, of the RSPB, said: "Six years ago, before the farm-scale trials, we were told that GM crops were good for wildlife and good for farmers' profits. Now, against all expectations, we are told they are bad for both. It is bad news for the biotech industry."

see also: www.abovetopsecret.com...

it's pretty much obvious that say, 'Bt' GM crops, which produce an active, contact poison are going to kill insects of all kinds, especially bees which might even ingest the pollen, when a simple breeze of them is enough in most cases. this is only speculation on my part, but in Europe, GMOs are universally loathed and not that widespread, so GM crops might very well be the culprit.

My friend is a migratory beekeeper. He moved his 2900 bee hives from PA to Florida last November. Within a month and a half 2200 of his bee hives disappeared. The bees were just gone. Working with Penn State, he says it's a pesticide made by Monsanto. It's sprayed on crops and seeds. It's systemic and so it gets into the pollen that the bees eat and store in their hives. It doesn't kill the bees, but it effects their nervous system and so when they go out foraging, they can't find their way back and just eventually die out in the field. Hive bees which eventually become field bees in a couple of weeks, and the queen, which never leaves the hive don't die. But 99% of the bees just fly away and can't get back.

Originally posted by mdzialo
My friend is a migratory beekeeper. He moved his 2900 bee hives from PA to Florida last November. Within a month and a half 2200 of his bee hives disappeared. The bees were just gone. Working with Penn State, he says it's a pesticide made by Monsanto. It's sprayed on crops and seeds. It's systemic and so it gets into the pollen that the bees eat and store in their hives. It doesn't kill the bees, but it effects their nervous system and so when they go out foraging, they can't find their way back and just eventually die out in the field. Hive bees which eventually become field bees in a couple of weeks, and the queen, which never leaves the hive don't die. But 99% of the bees just fly away and can't get back.

I think you hit the issue bang on the head.
I would say that this is exactly what is happening.

Do we know how bees navigate??

I wonder if there is a magnetic component to the way bees navigate...

All the best,

NeoN HaZe.

see

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Wouldn't it be interesting if bees are croaking because they've been dealing with genetically modified plants? Jeffrey Smith wrote a couple of good books about GMO's. Check them out.

I'm certainly beginning to wonder if we've gone too far.

i was attacked by stinging, flyign insects once.. bees or hornets.. seemed bees because i hada few dead ones in my hair withoug stingers.. trapped in the strands but i never swatted my head in defence..

so i am qute biased wheni say bee's dying is good..

death to the stinging-me bees! the others i will mourn for.

poor non-stinging-me bees..

-G

as an after thought.. the day after i had an allergic reaction and broke out in hives.. itched as if jesus poured itching powder on my soul. quite evil.

-G

[edit on 31-10-2007 by GlahES]

[edit on 31-10-2007 by GlahES]

Around the time this story first broke, I heard some speculation about how microwaves from cell phone towers might be interfering with the bees' ability to navigate. If they couldn't find their way back to the hive, they would simply die. However this does not explain why their corpses disappear. I wonder how long it takes for them to decompose??

Didn't read the whole thread but they have tracked it down to 5 nicotine containing pesticides. The pesticide basically kills the bee larvae, which in turn causes the colony collapse.

Some of the pesticides now carry warnings. The EPA and other countries similar agencies knew that there were issues with nicotine containing pesticides but still let them go to market.

Idiots. (The Agencies)

I remember hearing of the lack of bees several years ago (I belive I was still in high school at the time) and I heard that it was possibly correlated to cell phone use. I have absolutely no evidance to support this other than the fact that the bees started to vanish when cell phones started appearing, in my memory.

A quick google search of "cell phones bees" brings up a few articles. Here's a link to the first:

www.independent.co.uk...

New film seeks answer to mystery of vanishing bees

LONDON (Reuters) – A new documentary seeks to unravel the mystery of why billions of honey bees have been disappearing from hives across the United States, and concludes that the chief suspect is pesticides.

"Vanishing of the Bees," which has a limited theatrical release in Britain from next week, follows the fate of a group of U.S. beekeepers hit by Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), which first struck in 2004 and made U.S. headlines three years later.


Link

Originally posted by Solarskye

Next will be the fly.

Funny you should mention that because as I read this I thought how I haven't seen very many flies over the last two years. Perhaps three all summer long. I haven't seen any honey bees either and it seems as though there have been fewer bumble bees this year.

Originally posted by Lilitu

Originally posted by Solarskye

Next will be the fly.

Funny you should mention that because as I read this I thought how I haven't seen very many flies over the last two years. Perhaps three all summer long. I haven't seen any honey bees either and it seems as though there have been fewer bumble bees this year.

I noticed less bumblebees this spring/summer as well.

Usually I would see them (and hear them) every time I got near my front door as I have two rhododendron bushes right outside my house. Usually there are a ton of fat fuzzy bumblebees, but not this year. Not a good sign.

I have been familiar with the topic for sometime and it is disturbing to say the least. It must have been about two or three years when the story first broke to me when I was up late one evening listing to Coast to Coast AM. I can't remember the name of the guest, but they said, that with the bees vanishing, it could have catastrophic effects on the world's food chain. Then I remember hearing that it may be a result of pollution, cellphone towers, and perhaps, GMO food.

They have no idea what is behind this mysterious phenomenon, but the scientific community better get a handle on it soon! Colony after colony have been disappearing left and right for sometime now and it is only a matter of time before food production takes a hit. The scientific community is referring to this mystery as (CCD) or colony collapse disorder. Below is a National Geographic article, when the phenomenon was formally reported and it was in 2007.

Pennsylvania beekeeper Dave Hackenberg was the first beekeeper to report to bee researchers what's become known as colony collapse disorder (CCD).

In October Hackenberg had delivered honeybees to a Florida farm to pollinate crops. The bees typically return to their boxed hives when their work is done. But this time was different.

"I came to pick up 400 bee colonies and the bees had just flat-out disappeared," Hackenberg said. "There were no dead bees, no bees on the ground, just empty boxes."

"In almost 50 years as a beekeeper, I've never seen anything like it."

CCD has spread throughout 24 states and ruined hundreds of thousands of bee colonies.

Hackenberg has lost roughly 1,900 of his 2,900 hives. Other operators have lost up to 90 percent of their hives.

Researchers are scrambling to find answers to what is causing the commercially important honeybees to abandon their hives and disappear.

The epidemic could put a strain on fruit growers and other farmers who rely on the insects to pollinate their crops.

An estimated 14 billion U.S. dollars in agricultural crops in the United States are dependent on bee pollination.

news.nationalgeographic.com...

So, if the bee population continues to vanish could we lose certain fruits and vegetables that are contingent on pollination for proper growth and harvest? Then the financial impact will be devastating to the agriculture industry if the problem isn't stemmed before its too late. As the article states "14 billion," is a significant sum money tied to bee pollination. Could there be widespread food shortages and skyrocketing prices as a result?

Here is a little background by the US Department of Agriculture and it has some useful information pertaining to this mystery.

There are three major possibilities that are being looked into by researchers.Bees in hive: Link to video on CCD.

Pesticides may be having unexpected negative effects on honey bees.

A new parasite or pathogen may be attacking honey bees. One possible candidate being looked at is a pathogenic gut microbe called Nosema. Viruses are also suspected.

A perfect storm of existing stresses may have unexpectedly weakened colonies leading to collapse. Stress, in general, compromises the immune system of bees (and other social insects) and may disrupt their social system, making colonies more susceptible to disease.

These stresses could include high levels of infection by the varroa mite (a parasite that feeds on bee blood and transmits bee viruses); poor nutrition due to apiary overcrowding, pollination of crops with low nutritional value, or pollen or nectar scarcity; and exposure to limited or contaminated water supplies. Migratory stress brought about by increased needs for pollination might also be a contributing factor.

www.ars.usda.gov...

As the two sources show, this problem is one that could have potential consequences to the food supply and the greater economy. Hopefully, the a solution can be found to stem this growing epidemic, because the affects on society could catastrophic.

[edit on 19-10-2009 by Jakes51]

allegedly quote of albert einstein: "If the bee disappears from the surface of the earth, man would have no more than four years to live"

I'm in Cape Town, South Africa and strangely enough I had problems with all of them in the last few years (except bees which I don't see as problem, pun not intended). In the last year or so there has been NO insects in and around my house; ants, roaches, flies. I used to have ants right around my house but they're all gone. I can't remember when last I saw a bee. My colleagues have also noticed a difference. One ignorant colleague actually says I should be happy

Did Putin really tell Kerry the bee problem must be taken seriously or he will consider it a just cause for war with the USA? One post claims Putin was so upset he kept SOS Kerry waiting 3 hours before keeping a scheduled meeting. I've watched the world news looking for reports on this with no luck so far.