North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[list@ginda.us]

On Apr 16, 2007, at 10:06 AM, nbeaureg@student.umass.edu wrote:
> it is within the realm o my conception that
> such radiation Might and/or Could cause bees
> to lose there way.
>
> BUT for me the sticky part of this hypothesis is that
> colonies are not then consumed by pests.
>
> ncb


That was exactly my response.  While it's possible that mobile phones  
could cause bees to abandon (or lose) their hives, there are two  
major problems with attributing colony collapse disorder to mobile  
phones.

1)  if the bees just got lost, why would other pests that usually  
attack undefended hives not attack these hives?

2)  CCD seems to have started in the US, and be most serious here.   
We are well behind the rest of the world in our adoption of mobile  
phones.  (probably because we had better land-line service than the  
rest of the world.)  While it's true that a different mobile phone  
technology is most popular here (Verizon and Sprint use a system that  
is mostly used in the US.  Cingular and most of the other carriers  
use the technology that is used in most every other country.)  and it  
might be worse for bees, that technology is still extremely rare or  
nonexistant in other countries.  So if the problem were mobile  
phones, either we should have been the last nation to be hit, or we  
should be the only nation to be hit, depending on exactly what the  
problems are.

I am familiar with the Independent (the quote newspaper) and in  
general it's pretty good.  But even good newspapers have trouble  
covering science, and this article seems to be bad science.

Ginda

> Quoting "William C. Garthright" <billg@inebraska.com>:
>
> > > ARE MOBILE PHONES WIPING OUT OUR BEES?
> > > By Geoffrey Lean and Harriet Shawcross
> > > The Independent
> > > April 15, 2007
> > > http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/wildlife/ 
> > > article2449968.ece
> > > It seems like the plot of a particularly far-fetched horror film.  
> > > But some
> > scientists suggest that our love of the mobile phone could cause  
> > massive food
> > shortages, as the world's harvests fail.
> _______________________________________________