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A 59-year-old man died on Monday after he was stung by a swarm of bees, a Kentucky coroner said. The man, who has not yet been publicly identified, was moving an old bag of potting soil from his porch in Kentucky's Harlan County when the bees came out of the bag, Deputy Coroner John W. Jones said in a social media post. Family members started performing CPR and the man was rushed to an emergency room where he died just before 6:00 p.m. Officials have not said if the man was allergic to bees. "Our heartfelt prayers go out to...

Um, I’m not saying that introducing a genetically modifying vaccine into the human population through the use of the politization process in agriculture via honeybees was a plot line for an X-Files movie, except it actually was. Now this: A biotech company in Georgia has received conditional approval from the U.S. Department of Agriculture for the first vaccine for honeybees, a move scientists say could help pave the way for controlling a range of viruses and pests that have decimated the global population. It is the first vaccine approved for any insect in the United States. The company, Dalan Animal...

People in Mayilattumpara, a village in southwest India, could not sleep at night. Because of habitat loss, wild elephants would enter their village to look for food, destroying crops and farmland. The villagers tried to keep the wild elephants out with electric fences, deep holes and plants believed to keep the animals away. They even tried beating drums. Nothing worked! The repeated destruction of crops led some villagers to stop farming. But the situation turned around last year. That is because residents have finally found what keeps the elephants away: honey bees. Elephants, it turns out, are afraid of loudly...

A bee killer toppled 100 beehives in Prunedale and sprayed hundreds of thousands of honey bees with gasoline over the weekend. The honey bees were being kept on Mike Hickenbottom's Prunedale property along Eacho Valley Road during the winter. The bees are owned by a man who lives in the Central Valley, where it's too cold during winter months, and they like feeding from eucalyptus trees that flower on the Central Coast during this time of year. Advertisement Hickenbottom believes his neighbors were behind the incident, partially because they had complained to him three times. The bees are allowed to...

Bumblebees, a linchpin of the global food supply, are vanishing across huge swaths of North America and Europe as a result of climate change, a new study says. The findings, published Thursday in the journal Science, apparently solve a mystery that's alarmed farmers, experts, policymakers and environmental advocates worldwide, as well as bedeviled researchers. While habitat destruction and potent pesticides known as neonicotinoids have destroyed some bumblebee populations, researchers concluded climate change has played the greatest role in the mass disappearance of bumblebee species, which pollinate plants and crops that are part of the food supply for both animals and...

PARIS — An influential European scientific body said on Wednesday that a group of pesticides believed to contribute to mass deaths of honeybees is probably more damaging to ecosystems than previously thought and questioned whether the substances had a place in sustainable agriculture. The finding could have repercussions on both sides of the Atlantic for the companies that produce the chemicals, which are known as neonicotinoids because of their chemical similarity to nicotine. Global sales of the chemicals reach into the billions of dollars. The European Commission in 2013 banned the use of three neonicotinoids — clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam...

Over 100 scientists worldwide, citing 800 studies, are demanding that the Obama administration follow Europe’s lead and put a moratorium on the use of a new-style pesticide blamed for the deaths of 30 percent of American honeybees every year. In a letter to the EPA and Agriculture Department, the scientists said there is overwhelming evidence from 800 studies that the pesticide family called neonicotinoids are to blame for the substantial declines in honeybees, bumblebees and butterflies, all pollinators needed to help farmers produce billions of dollars worth of food every year. “The 108 signers of this letter therefore urge you...

President Obama on Friday announced plans to save endangered honey bees and other pollinators, for the first time ordering a probe into new types of pesticides that some local governments and 15 European Union nations have restricted or banned. The long-awaited plan creates a “Pollinator Health Task Force” that has 180 days to come up with a plan to save bees, butterflies and other pollinators. The goal is to rid fields of harmful pesticides while planting food for the bugs, even on military bases an along railroad tracks. Virtually every Cabinet department will be included on the task force. A...

The mysterious vanishing of honeybees from hives can be directly linked to insectcide use, according to new research from Harvard University. The scientists showed that exposure to two neonicotinoids, the world's most widely used class of insecticide, lead to half the colonies studied dying, while none of the untreated colonies saw their bees disappear. "We demonstrated that neonicotinoids are highly likely to be responsible for triggering 'colony collapse disorder' in honeybee hives that were healthy prior to the arrival of winter," said Chensheng Lu, an expert on environmental exposure biology at Harvard School of Public Health and who led the...

Well to day I ordered 2 3 lb PKGS of (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carniolan_honey_bee). This will be my first go with this type of Honey Bee(in the past I have kept Italian Honey Bees(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_bee). Wish me luck!

If the Environmental Protection Agency moves to restrict neonicotinoid pesticides, often called neonics, because of fears that they are causing bee deaths, it will happen in spite of the mounting empirical evidence rather than because of it. Last December, in response to fevered political pressure, the European Commission banned the use of neonics for two years. The moratorium, guided by the precautionary politics that now dominate science-based regulation in Europe, took effect just as a number of new studies shed increasing doubt on the belief that neonics play a key role in bee health. (snip) The “crisis” prompting this handwringing...

Four pesticides commonly used on crops to kill insects and fungi also kill honeybee larvae within their hives, according to new research. Scientists also found that N-methyl-2-pyrrolidone -- an inert, or inactive, chemical commonly used as a pesticide additive -- is highly toxic to honeybee larvae.

Under pressure from Congress and the honey industry, the EPA is ordering an immediate reduction in the use of widely used pesticides, an admission that bug killers approved by the agency are partly responsible for the disappearance of honey bees. The Environmental Protection Agency is changing the labeling on pesticides to reduce their use in fields when bees are present, the first significant concession provided to the honey industry which has reported bee kills of over 50 percent among some commercial beekeepers. It comes too late for many honey bees that pollinated blueberries, nuts and fruit trees earlier this year,...

Beekeepers in France were confused after their bees produced honey in mysterious shades of blue and green. But now the mystery has been solved as its now believed residue from containers of M&M's candy processed at a nearby biogas plant n northeastern France is the cause. Since August, beekeepers around the town of Ribeauville in the region of Alsace have seen bees returning to their hives carrying unidentified colourful substances that have turned their honey unnatural shades. Determined to solve the mystery the beekeepers embarked on an investigation and discovered that a biogas plant 4 km (2.5 miles) away has...

SEATTLE — The infection is as grim as it sounds: “Zombie bees” have a parasite that causes them to fly at night and lurch around erratically until they die. And experts say the condition has crept into Washington state. “I joke with my kids that the zombie apocalypse is starting at my house,” said Mark Hohn, a novice beekeeper who spotted the infected insects at his suburban Seattle home. Hohn returned from vacation a few weeks ago to find many of his bees either dead or flying in jerky patterns and then flopping on the floor...

New research has linked springtime die-offs of honeybees with insecticides used to coat corn seeds, according to a study in American Chemical Society’s journal Environmental Science & Technology on March 6, 2012. The finding might be a clue to the cause of the mysterious malady afflicting honeybees called colony collapse disorder.

Scientists have been alarmed and puzzled by declines in bee populations in the United States and other parts of the world. They have suspected that pesticides are playing a part, but to date their experiments have yielded conflicting, ambiguous results. In Thursday’s issue of the journal Science, two teams of researchers published studies suggesting that low levels of a common pesticide can have significant effects on bee colonies. One experiment, conducted by French researchers, indicates that the chemicals fog honeybee brains, making it harder for them to find their way home. The other study, by scientists in Britain, suggests that...

What was killing all those honeybees in recent years? New research shows a link between an increase in the death of bees and insecticides, specifically the chemicals used to coat corn seeds. The study, titled "Assessment of the Environmental Exposure of Honeybees to Particulate Matter Containing Neonicotinoid Insecticides Coming from Corn Coated Seeds," was published in the American Chemical Society's Environmental Science & Technology journal, and provides insight into colony collapse disorder.

Almost a third of global farm output depends on animal pollination, largely by honey bees. These foods provide 35pc of our calories, most of our minerals, vitamins, and anti-oxidants, and the foundations of gastronomy. Yet the bees are dying – or being killed – at a disturbing pace. The bee crisis has been treated as a niche concern until now, but as the UN's index of food prices hits an all time-high in real terms (not just nominal) and grain shortages trigger revolutions in the Middle East, it is becoming urgent to know whether the plight of the honey bee...

Beepods are handsome, made-in-Wisconsin wooden beehives designed for optimum bee comfort and user-friendliness. The cost? Under $500. Now show me the honey ... Along with backyard chicken-keeping, urban beekeeping is another exercise in countrified self-sufficiency that’s really picked up steam over the past couple of years and been embraced by city dwellers … the latest “urban agricultural must-have,” as the New York Times put it back in 2009. The whole bees-in-the-city movement reached an unofficial climax back in March when the ban on residential beekeeping was lifted in New York City (although NYC beekeepers had been practicing and celebrating it...