Sudden death of 20,000 bees in Toronto

A Toronto museum is investigating the sudden death of thousands of bees in a glass-enclosed beehive exhibit.

Officials at the Royal Ontario Museum said 20,000 bees in a biodiversity exhibit had died within two days last week, though they had appeared healthy.

Scientists have ruled out staff error and starvation, but said poor ventilation, disease or a lack of worker bees could be to blame.

The museum plans to replace the colony in the spring.

"The queen stops laying eggs in early- to mid-October and starts laying again in late February," University of Guelph researcher Janine McGowan told the Toronto Star newspaper.

"If she didn't lay enough winter worker bee eggs to make sure the hive and honey is kept warm during the winter, that could have contributed to the die-off."

www.bbc.co.uk...

This is not good news considering the world's bee population continues to decline. The Colony collapse disorder is well under way.

Wow that is kinda crazy because they are not out in the environment like all the other things that have been mysteriously dying. Maybe they ascended

reply to post by RANDOMguess


LOL @ ascending bees!

It's most likely, I guess that they died from something natural, but it doesn't mean it's not bad. With the bee population deteriorating already, this is the last thing we needed to see happening.

I wonder why type of Bee they have?

since (IMHO) the ones best suited for the colder climates and over wintering are the European Dark/British Black honey bee which is more adapted to long cold winters being larger, with longer hairs that overnit to ensure the hive stays nice and toasty besides being cleaner and less susceptible to the nasty things plaguing the other species of honey bee..

But I guess for a display they are not as pretty as the hybrids or as productive when the weather is on the hybrids side.. methinks with all the problems the hybrids are facing we'll see a come back for the darker honey bees.. which would be nice considering the Nazis tried to wipe them out in favour of the hybrids..

This scary, I just posted a video about strange bird behavior, something is in the air, something just doesn't sit right and the animals know it and their behavior and deaths is our wake up call.

reply to post by Wildeagle


Yeah but why would all of them die from something natural?

Originally posted by RANDOMguess
reply to post by Wildeagle

 

Yeah but why would all of them die from something natural?

I think because they are hybrids based on Mediterranean varieties of bee which tho highly productive in the good times are not adapted to colder climates. So while the hybrids hives are being fed sugar water to survive winter the dark honey bees are happy at work..

reply to post by thoughtsfull


Iv just been schooled.

Originally posted by RANDOMguess
reply to post by Wildeagle

 

Yeah but why would all of them die from something natural?

Well, if we were to believe what we are being fed here

"If she didn't lay enough winter worker bee eggs to make sure the hive and honey is kept warm during the winter, that could have contributed to the die-off."

Notice the If. So it's just speculation.

I'm not taking this reason as being true though, but it's a possibility...among many others.

Originally posted by RANDOMguess
reply to post by thoughtsfull

 

Iv just been schooled.

It is still a great indication of where the world is heading when the hybrid species are dying off while other species like the British black are making a come back..

There are Dark honey bee colonies in North America, most of these are wild, and seem to not be affected by all the issues plaguing the hybrids.. (I think in the US they are called the German Black) and where brought over by the first colonists.. strange how they are unaffected even tho the live in the same environment as the hybrids that are dying.

For me it is one of the clear indications that our environment is changing.. the ones mother nature adapted to the warmth of the Southern Europe are dying while the ones adapted to the cold of Northern Europe are thriving.

To be honest you can't get a clearer signal than that... I have often wondered why they obfuscate that simple fact.

reply to post by Wildeagle


Strangely enough i did a thread a little back that comes up with a possible expanation for this:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Originally posted by TedHodgson
reply to post by Wildeagle

 

Strangely enough i did a thread a little back that comes up with a possible expanation for this:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

Which still does not explain why these things only effect the hybrids!
The British black and European darks honey bees are not affected by the issues plaguing the hybrids. Personally I think it speaks volumes that the dark honey bees are thriving.

this is prob. a precursor for what's going to happen to the human population in the future. at random having 20000 people die off, its ok its normal.



seriously tho, it's odd having birds fall out of the sky, fish floting in rivers, and mass die offs of animals. all with no explanation of what is really going on.

reply to post by thoughtsfull


What the?....

I wasnt trying to explain why these things only happen to hybrids, my thread identifies that a possible neorotoxin in a currently used pesticide could be responsible for making honey bees more suseptable to Disease and ultimately killing them off en mass, I care not for any questions you have, i was providing a thoery which links to this paticular thread.

Also if you had actually taken time to read the article it neither identifies nor talks about which paticular species of bee would be affected by such a thing

reply to post by Wildeagle


Great post. I find this to be one of the most important issues of our time...and yet, it only gets the occasional sound-bite. I guess it's not as "sexy" as invented conspiracies, UFO's, reptilians, "The Awakening", and all that other crap. In fact, the lack of attention being given to this issue, and others of equal importance, clearly reveals that there is no such thing as an awakening, or the evolution of humanity as a species...

Without bees, and spiders, life on earth, as we know it, will be doomed. I have seen, in the South of Europe, various attempts to artificially pollinate plants...they have all either failed, or proven too expensive.

So, thanks so much for reminding us of the truly important things

reply to post by TedHodgson


I generally get the impression from the way write that you are attempting to talk down to me...

You might nor care for questioning these thins, but I have a British black colony in my garden.. I follow the work at Sussex Uni and the Sussex plan very closely, and I find it worth my wile to question why one species of honey bee is susceptible to some of these pesticides and another species in the same vicinity thrive unaffected.

heck you could even draw the conclusion that these pesticides might even be targeted at the hybrids directly, but I guess that again is not worth questioning..

20,000 honeybees in a colony is a rather weak colony. New workers are born late winter/early spring to supplement the hive at which time it will either grow (if it is weak, small) or a portion of them will swarm out (after they raise a new queen) to form another colony. If their numbers were that low during the winter, that means the queen wasn't functioning properly in raising the number of workers.....but.....the hive mentality should have noticed that and they should have started rearing a new queen for themselves and ousted the old one.