What's the deal with bees?

The study the Independent article is based on was in German, but here's an English summary.

It says they put cordless phone base stations right in the hive itself. Their bee-detectors (to register returning bees) suffered technical failure, so the only data came from daily photographs and weighings of the honeycomb frames. There was also no statistical analysis of the results "because of the explorative nature of this study".

From this they jump to a headline screaming that cell phones might be causing the die off?
 
I heard the bees were shot by redneck hunters with assault rifles. it's a gun control issue.
 
Soapy Sam said:
I heard the bees were shot by redneck hunters with assault rifles. it's a gun control issue.
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It looks like the Israeli Acute Paralysis Virus may be involved in this problem but scientists are remaining cautious in saying so:



http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070907/NEWS34/709070336/-1/NEWS
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Article published September 7, 2007

Virus found in foreign bees may be linked to hive losses
Researchers seek cause of collapse of colonies


A virus found in Australian and Israeli honeybees may play a role in the collapse of honeybee colonies in the United States.

By JENNI LAIDMAN
BLADE SCIENCE WRITER


A virus found in Australian and Israeli honeybees may play a role in the widespread collapse of honeybee colonies in the United States.

A paper published yesterday in the online version of the journal Science says that hives infected with an organism called Israeli acute paralysis virus are likely to collapse, rapidly losing worker bees.

But the discovery that IAPV virus predicts colony collapse disorder in U.S. hives is far from the end of the story, said Diane Cox-Foster, the Pennsylvania State University entomologist who is lead author on the Science paper.

"Whether it is indeed the causal agent, the culprit, or whether it's just a really good marker of colonies that are undergoing collapse - that's the million dollar question," she said.

Italy and Greece. The disorder has wiped out 50 percent to 90 percent of bees in infected colonies.

Bees pollinate scores of fruit and vegetable crops worldwide. A report by the Congressional Research Service estimates that bees in the United States pollinate $15 billion of agricultural products every year.
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I knew it! I knew it all along. It's those crazy Aussies and their attempt to take over the world by repopulating all the hives in the world with Fosters' swigging bees.

Africanized killer bees, my foot. It's the Aussie-ized bees we have to look out for, running around in sheep-shearing gangs and polluting the American way of life by talking about "footy."

Maybe we should shift this to Conspiracy Theories?

I'm just sayin'.

Beanbag
 
Well, not all the bees are dying. I'd love to not have bees, but do you think my bees will die? Oh no. They just keep on living and reproducing and making honey, the wretched little things! :D

I've got a friend who has a LOT of hives (around 100) and they lost 18 this year. The losses have been high, but there are still bees out there. I have not yet heard any conclusive reason for the bees dying, although I have heard a lot of theories, and I know that there are some people working on the cause. Hopefully they will figure it out. In the meantime, at least in my area, there are still a lot of feral bees (escaped domesticated honey bees) that seem to be doing fine. In any event I have plenty of fruit in my orchard.

Now, if the bees *REALLY DID* all die, that would sure be a problem! But that does not seem to be happening. Also I will point out that not all crops require bees for pollination, although most do.
 
Amapola said:
Also I will point out that not all crops require bees for pollination, although most do.
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I think most crops don't need bees.

Major field crops - soybeans, wheat, rice, peas, beans - and vegetables like tomatoes and peppers, plus quite a few fruit like apricot and peaches - are self-pollinating (or at least have self-pollinating varieties). Others like maize and sorghum are wind pollinated.

Some tree fruits and cucurbits (off the top of my head) would be missed, but there are still plenty of food options, I think. A previous post quotes bee pollinated crops on the order of $15 billion, but overall agricultural production runs near $100 billion (see http://www.bea.gov/regional/gsp/ )

Surprisingly, for years, I've had to hand pollinate my zucchini and gourds - never were bees around, I guess. This year, they got pollinated just fine without my help.
 
(link may be slightly NSFW)

Yeah, what's the deal with bees? You annoy them, and they attack with their bum. What's with that?

And what's the deal with Aussies? You annoy them, and they attack with their bum. What's with that?
 
Ok, so follow it here and see if there's something wrong with my logic.

1) Bees catch disease

2) Many bee colonies die... as much as 70-80%

3) Those which are left become resistant to said disease

4) Food is in abundance as there is less competition from other (dead) bees

5) Bee population explodes again

I wouldn't be surprise if this sort of thing happens every couple of hundred years.

Or, it could go...

1) Bees catch disease

2) Many bee colonies die... as much as 70-80%

3) US government steps in and creates super, mutant bee

4) New super bees attack but are wiped out at the last moment when the hero lures the bees into a warehouse and blows it up.
 
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Huntsman said:
DangerousBeliefs:

I thought he lured them into the Astrodome and turned on the AC long enough to send em dormant?

Or was that another killer bee movie?

:D
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Wait, wait.. I've got it...

1) Bees catch disease

2) Many bee colonies die... as much as 70-80%

3) US government steps in and creates super, mutant bee

4) Bees get loose on plane with Samual L. Jackson

5) Hero sucks bees out door of plane

Enough is enough! I have had it with these BEEPING bees on this BEEPING plane!
 
Diogenes said:
I can't believe there was no mention of a tie-in to global warming..:confused:
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Now you're just being silly. Bees are alive. Respiration in living things causes heat. If we lose a significant number of bees, the overall temperature of the Earth will decrease and we will be plunged into another ice age, the likes of which have not been seen since that really bad film with an ice age in it. However, bees clearly do not just disappear all by themselves. This is almost certainly a desperate attempt by the world government to counter the heating effect of aliens moving the Moon closer to the Earth. Global warming indeed. Why do you all have to be such sheep?
 
dakotajudo said:
I think most crops don't need bees.

Surprisingly, for years, I've had to hand pollinate my zucchini and gourds - never were bees around, I guess. This year, they got pollinated just fine without my help.
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I've had similar experiences with squash and melons. Last year I had some that were pollinated without my help. This year, I haven't bothered to hand pollinate at all.
 
dakotajudo said:
I think most crops don't need bees.

Major field crops - soybeans, wheat, rice, peas, beans - and vegetables like tomatoes and peppers, plus quite a few fruit like apricot and peaches - are self-pollinating (or at least have self-pollinating varieties). Others like maize and sorghum are wind pollinated.
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Right, most of our staple crops wind pollinate (nut trees, corn) or are capable of self pollination (legumes). But, self pollination can lead to generally lower yields and genetically inferior plants a few generations down the road. Most of the soy bean farmers around here have bee hives along the edges of their fields when the plants are flowering.

There are also many other bugs that pollinate, just not as prolifically as honey bees. So, loss of the honey bee would be a big nuisance, but not the end humanity. I have this odd visual image of armys of migrant workers wading through the soybean fields armed with q-tips to pollinate the flowers.

/did I just equate migrant workers to bugs? Didn't mean it like that.
 
negativ said:
"LUCUS" has become my new favorite poster over at LCF, for nuggets like this:

http://z10.invisionfree.com/Loose_Change_Forum/index.php?showtopic=7319



BUT! This thread isn't really about him. I guess.

I haven't heard a peep about any sort of crisis in the world's bee population, so I did some investigoogling. I can't find anything(!) in the ostensibly non-crazy media that actually addresses the question without the tone of someone running around like their hair is on fire and their ass is catching. So far, I can find 4 major schools of thought:

* OMG the bees are all dying and we're going to starve and it's because of cell phones

* OMG the bees are all dying and we're going to starve and it's because of a particular parasitic mite

* OMG the bees are all dying and we're going to starve and it's because of genetically modified crops

* OMG the bees are all dying and we're going to starve and it's because of the George W. Bush.

So, what's the deal? Have the Zionists finally found a way to do us all in? Muslims seem to think that bees are themselves Muslims because they apparently obey Sharia law (I didn't write it; don't ask me).

Can anyone enlighten me as to the details of my impending doom?
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Some of the claims are amazing, however the decline of bees and the recent emergence of 'colony colapse' are a real phenomena, even discussed on place like NPR. It is a real issue for bee keepers, agriculture and ecologists.

There are many factors involved there are a huge number of bee diseases to begin with, the mite and some insecticides as well. Fortunately there are flys and non european bees that are not as devestated in some areas of the midwest to provide pollination.

It is not caused by some of the more lunatic suggestions (The Flying Spagehhetie Monster) but if you know someone who keeps bee, has an orchard or is into non row crop agriculture it is an issue.

‘colony collapse’

http://www.entomology.cornell.edu/IthacaCampus/Articles/BeeColonyCollapse.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/24/science/24bees.html?ex=1189224000&en=7fac916d7d340e6e&ei=5070
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2007/070713.htm
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mvanishingbees.htm

agricultural pollination

http://apis.ifas.ufl.edu/papers/altpol.htm
http://www.ent.iastate.edu/dept/courses/ent211/node/25
http://www.stanford.edu/class/msande315/docs/unrestricted/model-paper_dissertation_final.pdf
 
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