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  • From: "TradingPostPaul" <tradingpost@riseup.net>
  • To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Livingontheland] Honey, who shrunk the bee population?
  • Date: Thu, 01 Mar 2007 21:02:15 -0700


1 March 2007 16:40
Species under threat: Honey, who shrunk the bee population?

Across America, millions of honey bees are abandoning their hives and
flying off to die, leaving beekeepers facing ruin and US agriculture
under threat. And to date, no one knows why. Michael McCarthy reports

It has echoes of a murder mystery in polite society. There could
hardly be a more sedate and unruffled world than beekeeping, but the
beekeepers of the United States have suddenly encountered affliction,
calamity and death on a massive scale. And they have not got a clue
why it is happening.

Across the country, from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific, honey bee
colonies have started to die off, abruptly and decisively. Millions
of bees are abandoning their hives and flying off to die (they cannot
survive as a colony without the queen, who is always left behind).

Some beekeepers, especially those with big portable apiaries, or bee
farms, which are used for large-scale pollination of fruit and
vegetable crops, are facing commercial ruin - and there is a growing
threat that America's agriculture may be struck a mortal blow by the
loss of the pollinators. Yet scientists investigating the problem
have no idea what is causing it.

entire article at
http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/wildlife/article2314202.ece







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