Well, I suppose it was only a matter of time. This story from the Vancouver Sun reports that colony collapse disorder has struck here on Vancouver Island, with a loss of perhaps 90% of the local commercial bee colonies. This makes me buzzing mad. The culprit seems to be immune deficiencies brought on by pesticides, which makes the bees prone to parasites, like mites.
If it can happen to the bees, why not us?
March 12, 2010 at 8:28 pm |
So sad.
March 12, 2010 at 10:11 pm |
I listened to an NPR program about CCD a while back. Scary. And probably our fault.
March 13, 2010 at 1:34 pm |
It probably is happening to us. But nature can get along without us. Maybe not without bees.
March 13, 2010 at 2:01 pm |
Uh oh….This does not bode well.
March 13, 2010 at 4:53 pm |
@am and DtV: Sad and scary indeed, and definitely at least partly our fault.
@ricki: Yeah, bees are important. They evolved along with flowering plants (symbiotically, no doubt) about 2-300 million years ago. Nature can get along without them, but not any nature we’re familiar with.
@nursemyra: Not well at all.
What’s so striking to me about this story is that Vancouver Island is a comparatively “healthy” and fairly isolated environment. This happened on a widespread level in Germany a few years ago and was linked to GMOs, and it also seems to be happening in the east, too, where environmental stresses are probably more intense. But, honestly, if it’s occurring around here, the entire global bee population is likely at risk. This isn’t just about honey…Bees are key pollinators of many flowering species. We may be witnessing the breakdown in fundamental natural systems here…
March 14, 2010 at 7:47 pm |
Not to make the situation less dire…The cultivated honey bees that are affected are not indigenous to North America, and there are many other insects that are pollinators. All kind of wasps, flies, various undomesticated species of bees, which probably naturally evolved coping skills to deal with these mites while the domesticated species have been treated with pesticides by apiarists. (Just my conjecture here).
There are ways to encourage native, wile bees and various other pollinators.
http://attra.ncat.org/new_pubs/attra-pub/nativebee.html?id=NewYork
March 15, 2010 at 12:08 pm |
amarilla: You’re right, the commercial bees are not the only pollinators in town. But I guess I see them as a canary in the coalmine. They’re linked to big agribusiness and all its hazards, but if they are dying around here on Vancouver Island, where agriculture is fairly “healthy”, all told, then things are not good. Finding alternatives for the dozens of crops that these bees pollinate would be quite an undertaking.
March 15, 2010 at 4:55 pm |
There was a great NY’r bit about this, too, a while back. I also recall Israeli researchers saying they isolated the bug causing it.
Sorry to hear CCD has made it’s way up north…
March 15, 2010 at 6:58 pm |
@mb: Yeah, that New Yorker article was good. Quirky. And I seem to have tangentially heard about the Israeli research. CCD has been a problem in Ontario for a few years, but its arrival on a remote locale like Vancouver Island is unsettling…
For other readers here’s the link to the NY’r article:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/08/06/070806fa_fact_kolbert
March 15, 2010 at 11:55 pm |
This is one of the few reasons i argue in favour for unkempt back yards. The extraordinary variety of insects that rise and thrive in unmowed grass is refreshing. And the next thing you know, you’ve got an entire menagerie of wildlife, right in the city. Nothing more relaxing than a meadow abuzz.
All said though, I hope the Moss St. Market bee-man is safe.
March 16, 2010 at 5:16 am |
True that, S’Mat. Lawns are horrible for pollinators. But when I’ve let my front plot go, my neighbors stand and shake their heads. Seriously. I suppose I can find a way to pull it off.
March 16, 2010 at 7:46 am |
Here’s Plan Bee to help people encourage bees in their gardens.
http://www.co-operative.coop/ethicsinaction/takeaction/planbee/what-you-can-do-to-help-bees/
March 16, 2010 at 7:55 am |
Or you can give the bees their own custom designed home. Might be the best property investment on Vancouver Island.
http://www.masonbeehomes.com/
March 16, 2010 at 9:44 am |
@S’Mat & Amarilla: Letting lawns go fallow is a good strategy. While grass grows well in this part of the world because of all the moisture, it needs a lot of help (watering, pesticides) in many other places. Which probably isn’t helping anybody.
Also reminds me of the Richard Brautigan story, “Revenge of the Lawn”. You can read some of it here.
@ricki: Thanks for the links. Bee activism. Why not?
March 19, 2010 at 8:19 pm |
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colony_collapse_disorder
What’s next? It is sad.
March 23, 2010 at 3:28 pm |
I’m sad about the bees. But I have to tell you that I look forward to reading your thoughts on such matters. Have you read the book The Weathermakers? (Tim Flannery). Scares the shit out of me what we’re doing to this planet.
March 23, 2010 at 4:45 pm |
Michael: I haven’t read/seen that book. But I’ll look for it. Weather control is indeed another example of technology gone awry. And yet, on another blog, I was shouted down for explicitly linking technology and environmental degradation. Seems some find old critical theory tropes to be an affront…
March 29, 2010 at 9:49 pm |
Many years ago Rudolf Steiner predicted that hyper-industrialization would sooner or later kill off the bees.
And that such would be a prelude to the death of everything.