A Common Pesticide Decreases Foraging Success and Survival in Honey Bees
Other studies point to radio signals from cell phone towers.
Whatever the problem is, I hope they get a fix for it soon. Bees are marvelous, fascinating creatures and we depend on them a lot, yet most people have no idea.
This might bee of interest to you.
Neonicotinoid Insecticides used with seed treatment (systemic)
http://www.ipm.iastate.edu/ipm/icm/2004/5-3-2004/neonic.html
Trade names:
Poncho (clothianidin)
Gaucho (imidacloprid)
Cruiser (thiamethozam)
I am sure there are other simliar insecticides. These are relatively new insecticides.
i lost my one backyard hive last year when it got robbed by other bees. pretty amazing to watch, couldn’t stop it. i think i have a really strong wild hive nearby that has learned how to rob. second year in a row.
There are nearly 20,000 known species of bees in seven to nine recognized families, and probably many more not yet identified.
European honey bees, the type we are most familiar with, are not the only kind that makes honey and certainly just one of many that could be used for pollination of crops. It is also rather prone to disease and deadly mites.
And effort to breed a hardier bee resulted in the “killer bee”, that despite its reputation *is* more resistant *and* produces delicious honey. If its aggression can just be turned down, it could fill much of the gap of the honey bee.
But even more important, one of the reasons that bee diseases and mite infections are so bad is because honey bees are not used just for honey, but are transported around to pollinate, which exposes them to these problems.
Thus a good solution is to limit honey bees to just producing honey, hopefully a crossbred variety that is more resistant. Then use a different bee, that is as good, or better, for pollination. Hopefully one that does not interact much with honey bees.
Could have sworn that they difinitively determined hive disorders were being caused by parasites.
Another possibility is that genetically modified crops can produce their own pesticides.
Would they tell us if they determine this is true?
This is why we put NO pesticides, or grass enhancers, or any other chemical on our yard. The bees (sort of owned a few streets over) loved our hyssop last year. Bought some honey from the neighbor and could actually taste the hyssop. Nothing like local honey! Hope they get this problem solved.
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sfl
Years ago I bought an ant bait (little blocks) that had some pretty intense warnings on it.
After that, it became unavailable, afaik.
It contained one of nicotinic poisons called “fipronil” and said one ant could carry enough of the stuff to kill like 500 honeybees.
I usually ignore the leftist greenies rants abot pesticides, especially when they are killing some particularly useless creature. But this bears investigating, and remedy if found to be true.
No, this is a lie. Pesticides are only GOOD and only kill the things we want it to kill. It doesn’t kill birds or lizards or fish or make our pets sick... or have any effect on people. The bird people and some people in this forum say so! So stop spreding lies. /S