Yep, the girl who fell into a yellow-jacket hive one summer wants bees. I've always been fascinated by the social and selflessness of the hive structure. But why now? Earlier this week I attended a showing of Vanishing of the Bees. As you might be able to guess, it was about Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) which has spread across the country. I first learned about this issue in the 2008 book "Fruitless Fall" by Rowan Jacobson. The documentary I watched provided some new theories on why thousands of honeybees are just disappearing and abandoning their hives. One popular theory has to do with pesticides. In case you didn't know, commercial beekeepers don't make their money from honey, they truck their hives cross the country following the crop blooms (almonds in CA, blueberries in ME, and cranberries in MA, to name a few). In the United States, about 100 crop species depend on honeybees for pollination —collectively, these crops make up approximately 1/3 of the U. S. diet, including the majority of high-value crops.
Historically, farmers would spray or dust their crops with a pesticide to keep insects from devouring their plants. Piles of dead bees outside of nearby hives indicated that these beneficial pollinators were also being poisoned. So, chemical companies changed their compounds and delivery method. Now seeds are coated with a systemic (as opposed to a topical) pesticide that stays with the plant throughout its life cycle. Even though the EPA regulates the environmental effects of the pesticides, it is up to the chemical companies to provide the research showing no harm. The company that makes the two kinds of pesticides of most concern has indeed tested the effect the chemical has on adult honeybees. Reports shows that there is no adverse effect. What isn't tested is what happens once that honeybee takes that treated pollen and nectar back to the hive and feeds it to her brood. Some apiologists (those that study bees) and beekeepers believe that the systemic pesticides have an unknown effect on the central nervous system of the larval bees that may present itself in the current or next generation. Maybe the bees fed the pesticide-laced food have weakened immune or nervous systems, causing them to become disoriented and thereby leaving the hive. Maybe the combination of different pesticides has a damaging effect.
Here's another piece of the puzzle. Europe had a similar threatened bee population 10 or 15 years ago called mad bee disease. However, the European regulators take a "better safe than sorry" approach when it came to pesticides. Questionable chemicals were pulled off the market and the honeybee population has rebounded. Hmmmm.....
So that's what I've learned from the movie which got me thinking about starting my own hive in a year or two. And here's a link to the RI Beekeepers Association.
