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  • From: Marimike6@cs.com
  • To: permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] 60 Minutes blurp on CCD-- Silence of the Bees
  • Date: Mon, 29 Oct 2007 09:30:34 EDT

A much fuller treatment of CCD was shown on Nature last night, titled Silence
of the Bees. Interestingly, it featured the same guests as the Sixty Minutes
piece. Here's the link:

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/bees/impact.html

The gist was that CCD's origins are multifactorial, with pesticide
accumulation probably leading the list. They also pointed out how much the
syndrome was
like human AIDS. The honeybees suffer an immune system breakdown, rendering
them vulnerable to viral and parasitic infestations and other maladies. Then
they follow their instincts, which are to leave the nest so as not to infect
the
others.

But the nests are already infected-- which is why opportunistic creatures
don't immediately come to feast on the unprotected honey being left behind.
There's some kind of poison it it that insects stay away from.

Most sobering, they state that if die-offs continue at their present rate the
honeybee will be extinct by 2035. As will the flowers they pollinate. The
program visits southern Szechwan, where bees and flowering plants are already
extinct, and the local pear crop has to be pollinated by hand (farmers on
ladders
with little chicken-feather pollinating tools).





  • Re: [permaculture] 60 Minutes blurp on CCD-- Silence of the Bees, Marimike6, 10/29/2007

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