|
|
Extreme Veteran
Posts: 319
| I didn't manage to see the film, but we have been very alarmed at the lack of bees recently. We have 2 types of bumble bees usually: The larger ones we are used to in England and a smaller, yellower one. This year started OK but recently we have seen very few bees and none of the smaller ones meanwhile I found 2 dead ones inside and another so exhausted it could only crawl. There have also been fewer butterflies.
After 5 years planting and nurturing our fruit trees we have quite a lot of blossom this year but the chances of a reasonable crop look poor.
We suspect the surrounding fields have been sprayed, although they are currently pasture so its surely not necessary.
Has anyone else noticed reduced bees this year?
What can we do about it? | |
| | |
Veteran
Posts: 214
| If anything I think I've seen more bees and butterflies here this April than I'd expect but I put that down to the weather. Only noticed one or two dead bees.
Coincidentally I saved a handful of good links a couple of days ago about bees and neonicotinoids....
Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neonicotinoid
UK Govt position:
http://www.pesticides.gov.uk/environment.asp?id=2989
Buglife report of 2009 (PDF):
http://www.pesticides.gov.uk/uploadedfiles/Web_Assets/PSD/ACP_Paper...
BeeBase (looks a possibly useful bee site) page on neonicotinoids with responsesto UK govt position etc:
https://secure.fera.defra.gov.uk/beebase/index.cfm?pageId=296
COLOSS (Prevention of COlony LOSSes) website - not researched this yet:
http://coloss.org/
...their links page is probably worth checking out:
http://coloss.org/links
The Co-op have some useful stuff, maybe an action could be to lobby other supermarkets to do likewise? Would probably have faster results than trying to influence the govt:
http://www.co-operative.coop/corporate/ethicsinaction/takeaction/pl...
http://www.co-operative.coop/planbee
BBC's "Who Killed the Honey Bee?":
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00jzjys
...is no longer available online from the BBC but I found a place where you can watch and download it:
http://stagevu.com/video/vhiqepbemugg#
There's probably loads of relevent clips on Youtube, here's one starting point:
http://www.youtube.com/user/DorsetBokashi
There was a BBC radio 4 afternoon play about a year ago set in a future when bees had vanished and itinerant workers were employed to hand pollenate crops. The play focused on the conflicts and side effects when a company devised mechanical bees to replace the workers. Too much to do to hunt for a link to it ATM.
Have we a 'bee person' here who might thoroughly research this and report back? I think it's potentially a very important issue and one we could incorporate into some of the things TBI does.
| |
| | |
Veteran
Posts: 214
| Looks like your poll got posted twice, I deleted the duplicate but that included your vote (I guess) so you should probably vote in the remaining 'Vanishing bees' thread. | |
| | |
New user
Posts: 3
| Beekeepers are also to blame. Some more links at:
www.suttonjoinery.co.uk/CCD/selected links.htm
I have a hive in my orchard populated by a swarm 5 years ago. I don't like bees, and have left them alone to pollinate. The Bee Inspector last autumn said that they were completely disease- and parasite-free. Moral: don't factory-farm bees! | |
| | |
Veteran
Posts: 275
| Things are a bit more complicated. Honey bees, like most domesticated animals, can no longer survive in the wild, since the introduction of the parasitic varroa mite. The bees in your orchard will eventually be affected by the mite, which will wipe out the colony. The process may take years, but it will happen. So the honey bees need bee-keepers to control varroa.
On the other hand, it is undoubtedly true that the introduction and spread of varroa was 100% due to beekeepers moving affected ueens and hives around, so arguably the reason honey bees are now reliant on beekeepers is because of the incompetence of the beekeepers in the first place.
And of course, most beekeepers are pretty much blame-free in the whole varroa saga, they have just had to react to the mite and start using chemicals (some naturally occurring) to control it. | |
| | |
New user
Posts: 3
| It's perfectly possible to breed and select for resistance to varroa (resistance which exists in bee populations in some places in the world). See some of my links.
Ask yourself why the commercial bee industry isn't doing this? | |
| | |
Veteran
Posts: 275
| My understanding is that the varroa mite lives quite happily with a wild bee in Southeast Asia. However, its effect on the honey bee is much more serious (because the mite breeds in the sealed cells of the hive, along with the bee larvae, and the gestation period of the honey bee suits the varroa mite better than that of the wild bee, so the mite population grows more rapidly until the bee colony is wiped out). So once honey bees were introduced into areas where this particular strain of wild bee (and its parasitic mites) lived, the honey bee was in trouble. Some years ago there seemed to be a commonly-held view among bee-keepers that, left to their own devices, feral bees would develop a resistance to varroa - although I find it difficult to see how that would work, given the essential incompatibility of bee and mite. More recently the view seems to have been that feral colonies can't develop resistance, and they are doomed. However, I see from some of the above links that some folk are still pursuing the goal of breeding for varroa resistance, so maybe there's a chance it will work.
I imagine the reason the majority of beekeepers, commercial or otherwise, aren't doing this is that it's relatively easy to treat for varroa, and if they waited until a resistant strain had been bred, they'd be out of business! | |
| | |
New user
Posts: 3
| You are right in all you say! Though there is thought to be a way ahead in breeding bees making smaller cells - less room on larvae for varroa.
Of course there would be no "commercial" future in waiting for a natural way out, while refraining from using commercial, pharmaceutical, high-return-for-corporations, oil-derived drugs. What is Transition for, if not to expose this sort of fudge that compromises the natural world and leads down a no-way-out route? (Well, ok, there are other Transition goals.)
By the way I am Chairman of my local Transition Food Group - so have plenty of axes to grind. | |
| | |
Veteran
Posts: 275
| The commercial... oil-derived drugs bit is worth a bit of thought. Most beekeepers use drugs to control varroa, but some use organic acids (I think formic acid, although as I type that, I'm wondering if it's right). The organic acids are cheap, don't need much in the way of oil, or produce any great return for corporations. But they're quite hassley, the dosage needs working out carefully to avoid killing bees as well as mites, you need to use protective clothing as you're making up the right concentration, and generally it's easier to fork out and get the proprietory treatment. As a beekeeper and transition-er, I'm with the majority - I use chemicals, but keep an eye on developments. If the proprietory treatment wasn't available any more, I'd like to think I'd carry on but use organic acids. (And another control mechanism involving encouraging the bees to produce drone brood, which attracts the mites, and then cutting out the brood before the mites emerge). I suppose that's a fudge, but to my mind it's better to have honey produced locally with some compromises than not at all.
And I buy some of my food from Tesco, shop on-line from time to time, drive a car, etc. etc. All of our lives are a fudge when you think about it. | |
| |
|
Vanishing bees