Comments on Where Have All the Honeybees Gone?

Good story! This is seriously bad news. I wonder if there's a global warming component to the loss. Even if there isn't here, this is the kind of effects that global warming is going to have -- not just "hey, it's warm, let's grow some Grenache!" but systemic problems with underlying issues people don't often think about or may not even know about yet.

The honeybees can be at least partially replaced by other bees, like mason bees, but they are under many of the same stresses as honeybees. Loss of habitat is real; I've seen houses go up in Marysville in areas that used to have bee stacks.

Mr. Van Wing, they need to hire you.

So they're moving the bees cross-country and totally screwing with their annual cycles and people are puzzled as to why they're all dying?

It would make more sense for growers to maintain their own hives for pollination. Sure it's a whole new thing and expense you have to deal with, but it's not like pollination is optional for food production.

Then we can get back to the old problem of the mites that were killing off all the honeybees 5 years or so ago.

At least some of the environmentalist types in Califoria have been telling almond farmers and other people dependent on bees to keep their own damn hives as it wouldn't really cost anything (sure, it's cheaper to buy South American honey and you won't really make that much money on it, but it'd be healthier for the trees and bees). While the die off of the honeybees is more dramatic than even they thought it'd be, what I've been hearing down at the farmer's market has been a pretty loud "I told you so", especially from the people selling organic honey.

This is from Santa Cruz, California, I should note, I guess, hehe.

There having a similar problem in Europe and especially the UK, except they say the honey bees are being killed by wasps.

Aw, man, wench said what I said before I said it! :)

@4:

That certainly makes sense - in theory. But I wonder, with the evident consolidation of stocks, are there in fact any bees out there "available" to local growers, or, have the corporate beekeepers essentially cornered the market as it were, and locked up the supply?

I mean, even if a California almond grower for example, wanted to develop their own bee stocks, where would they go to get their initial colonies? It sounds like the only place TO go would be the commercial keepers, and they would seem to have a vested interest in restricting access to their own stocks, so as to continue to maintain their effective near-monopolies.

This was being discussed on some talk radio program last nite and I shit you not, someone suggested that Osama Bin Laden could be waging biowarfare against the bees.

There are commercial sources available to purchase queens from, and if you're patient you can try and just catch your own swarm. One came by our farm a couple of years ago and it was pretty cool. We use a local organic beekeeper for our hives when we need them in the spring and summer.

The whole thing will probably mean that local small beekeepers either pick up the slack or that the larger corps will regionalize their bees.

I can always count on SLOG to tap into the local buzz.

For those curious for more, here is the FAQ from the CCD working group.

Africanized honey bees most likely are a factor. Bees are endangered because of over reaction to this bee. Also they have blended into european hives.
Beekeepers do report that. I'm seeing a lot of scientific evidence pointing toward this angle as well.

I'm still scared of bees.

@2 Ms. Van Wing.

but thanks!

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Nice post.

Ms. Van Wing:

I echo the sentiments at the top (Good story! THIS IS SERIOUSLY BAD NEWS.) It seems though, that to have resonance with a large amount of blog readers, you have to BLAME someone. Corporations and Global Warming are likely causes, but unfortunately they are also vague abstracts. You could pick an "evil idiot" like other posters do - Prayer Warrior, Nickels, Bush, Gregoire, Joel Connely, etc.
On the other hand, I really enjoyed the way you conveyed your research. Maybe you're not blood-thirsty ambitious and just want to help out with good science and good reporting.

p.s. My favorite "evil idiot" is Hitler. Did you know his dad was a beekeeper?

I think it was Garrison Keillor.

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Comte,

I know that here in California, at least, there are still wild honeybees that one could develop as alternative lines if one had a need to do so. But it is my understanding that getting a bee starter kit is still pretty easy, and there are -- at least here in the Santa Cruz area -- local, organic beekeepers with healthy stocks.

Before you get all worked up about the plight of the honeybee, consider that THERE ARE NO NATIVE AMERICAN HONEYBEES! It's an invasive species, like the starling or zebra mussel, brought here by Europeans. Try searching Wikipedia and Google for .

While the honeybee is a very useful agricultural commodity, the several thousand native species of bee would be much better off without this massive source of artificial competition. A complete removal of honeybees from North America would be an environmental plus, not a minus, in terms of native biodiversity.

As pollinators, native bees are more effective, per animal, due to their tendency in most species to gather pollen by just letting it stick to their fuzzy bellies, rather than packing it into those tidy pods on their legs. Most species are only active for a few weeks each year, so you have to have diverse populations to get coverage of all flowering periods, or even of one crop since it's flowers might not open during the same bee's activities each year.

Honeybees are just a hell of a lot more convenient, since somebody can bring a truck with 100,000 or so bees on it and drop them in an orchard. But, if the farmers arranged to have a fraction of the land covered in suitable habitat for a few natvie species (even engineered nesting sites) AND avoided insecticides (at least when the desired species are active and vulnerable), adequate pollination should be possible with native bees. When the entire California Central Valley is treated like a gigantic, sterile petri dish scraped clean for almond trees and sprayed like mad, duh, you don't have any natives.

That was supposed to say: search for "native north american bee" but I tried to get too clever and it got trimmed.

Buck is right. This is a problem of conventional agriculture that relies on these non-native and farmed colonies that threatens biodiversity of crops, plants, wildlife, and native pollinators. This is not a problem in native systems where native bees, bats, birds, and other pollinators are abundant because they have enough native, sustainable habitat. It's a shame, but it's also a wake up call that's been noticeable by farmers in many regions for many years. It's just now getting more press.

Thanks you Sage for your contribution and support to this serious issue.

I researched and from what I got the African Honey bee has more pollen production than any native kind. that is why I also read that beekeepers from Brazil intermixed the strain to get those Africanized bees. The research says they are better pollinators and American beekeepers are following suit down south. The only problem being that the Africanized bee strain and those they intermix with do not like the north and colder weather, and may account for besides the mites and other reasons for the decline of seeing bees in northern hemisphere.

Buck et al:

Great point about the native bees! I didn't have room to fit this in the post, but some orchards in Walla Walla use Alkali Bees- the native ground-nesting bees. A few also use native Blue Orchard bees. Neither of these are considered particularly economically viable, but this is largely due to pesticide use (you can't move the ground nests when you want to spray), so there is some hope that the growth of the organic movement will also see increased usage of native bees.

Buck- You make a strong case.
It's interesting to note that your reasoning sounds eerily familiar to another particularly hot issue. I can see a few politicians substituting 'immigrants/illegal immigrants' for 'honeybees' in your 2nd and 4th paragraphs.

I grew up on a farm in Yakima, and we had lots of bees. They are fascinating, and easy to keep, just capture swarms. Fertile queens reproduce like crazy, and raising them is an industry apart from ordinary beekeeping.

Love bees.

Love bees.

I wish we could go back to the era of the Mammoth and Big Tooth Tiger, now that would be a pure/purist era for all the city enviro rather fixated hippies.

Nice post... less rantings about City Hall trivia, yeah.

Or obsessing on child abuse....misfortune as ego boost.

For the past seven years, Chemtrails have become part of our daily existance. It's a combination of powdered aluminum and barium called "military chaff" that is being sprayed world wide by planes that have no markings on them .... supposedly to modify the weather .... a quick fix for global warming. This past January in Western Australia, in excess of three thousand song birds fell out of the air dead not long after a spraying had occurred. Check it out on the web ..... it may give you a new perspective on what's happening to the bees!