For his part in the nationwide race to appear most well-schooled on colony collapse disorder, Bill Maher perpetuates a falsely attributed (and probably altogether invented) Einstein quotation here. The quote reads:
If the bee disappears from the surface of the earth, man would have no more than four years to live.The comments section provides some interesting points. (Furthermore I wonder if -- assuming the worst-case scenario, that bees vanish altogether -- farmers couldn't just manually pollinate their crops.) Some of the more intelligible comments follow:
It's not all bees, just the Eurpean honey bees. There are still LOTS of other bee species still around. Also the honey bees were brought here 400 years ago to Virignia...
The Indians here prior to that had no problems growing their corn without the honey bees. They just knew better how to use their land, than the current human species do...
Read the article in the most recent National Geographic on this (on Jamestown) for more on the egological changes that the Europeans did to this country.
By: Maliika on April 20, 2007 at 04:50pm
Corn is wind pollinated. The squashes and berries still require bees. In fact, pollination isn't an equal opportunity operation. Pollinators are VERY SPECIFIC to the plants they can and will pollinate. Also, you might find the book 1491 very enightening. It discusses this very topic; at least in part.
By: angrywitwoman on April 21, 2007 at 02:29am
In an article published this week by Der Spiegel, the German magazine debunked well the recent PR campaign to divert the cause discussion of the bee collapse in North America and Europe from GMO and neonicotinoid pesticides to mobile phones. I thought your readers should know this information. The following link will take you to that article so you're not caught up on perpetuating disinformation from petrochemical companies. Der Speigel was amongst the first major publications in the world to cover Colony Collapse Disorder.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,477804,00.html...
Wikipedia is also up on this serious matter.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colony_Collapse_Disorder...
Regards,
RichardG
Farmer
Canberra Australia
By: RichardG on April 21, 2007 at 04:42am
Bees navigate according to the position of the sun. Cell phones have nothing to do with bees but are a pain in the you know what when eating in a restaurant and some idiot at the next table think I should know he loved today's soap.
Pesticides, parasites, diseases kill bees cell phones kill only peace and quiet.
By: Poupic on April 21, 2007 at 10:01am
On the contrary, we do not know what part (or parts) of the sun's electromagnetic spectrum that bees use for navigation. Visible light is just one segment of the sun's radiation. Cell phones might indeed interfere with the ability of bees to navigate, depending on the frequency. The carrier frequencies used by satellites for our own navigation (GPS) is but another possible source of interference.
By: Sisyphuss on April 21, 2007 at 04:44pm
I am a bee keeper and an environmental activist.
I greatly appreciate your comments.
While all hymenoptera are very sensitive to the unseen environment, I do not believe cell phones are the cause of colony collapse.
Regardless of the cause, I do belive your comments on our laziness are accurate and indicative of a really BIG problem.
My educated guess is that there is a naturally occuring disease that has yet to be identified. I conclude this because the colony collapse has occured across the world with a variety of climates and environmental conditions.
I do feel GMOs are soemthing to be very concerned with, and I have always worried about their effect on pollinators and mammals.
Pesticides do not know when to stop killing; WAKE UP people, do your really need that kelly green, glow in the dark lawn?
What do you think those little flags on your lawn mean?
By: hymenoptera on April 23, 2007 at 09:43am
I have checked several beekeeping websites, and there is no mention of "colony collapse syndrome". Our local beekeeping society just had their quarterly meeting, and the subject matter on the roster was preventing swarms (bees swarm when the colony gets too big for the hive). You'd think if colony collapse was real, it would be the subject of intense discussion on beekeeping websites, and for beekeeping clubs, but its not. Just thought I'd let you all know.
By: redpill on April 23, 2007 at 01:17pm
according to a professional beekeeper in Arizona. When the african bees were moving north, the federal government set up thousands of hives across Panama. The thought was that the afican bee would breed with our honey bee and have docile offspring. The exact opposite happened and the offspring had more african genes and were much larger than the honey bee. (No research was done on this before this fiasco) Now bee hives are infected with a parasite that puts larvae in the bees and kills them. This is possible because the bees are large enough to support the larvae. Note: The original honey bee does not have this problem because it's body is too small for the parasite's larvae. Incidentally, the bee hives and the honey are contaminated with pesticide to keep the parasite colony in check. To save the bees, you need to kill off the african/honey bee mutants and raise millions of the original strain of honey bee. I suggest you don't leave the management of this up to the government elite.
By: bigA on April 25, 2007 at 05:09pm
3 comments:
When I read your postings about CCD, I was reminded of the decline in amphibian populations that began way back in the 1980s. Over 20 years later, we humans have somehow managed to survive. I think I'll invent my own quote, which I'll attribute to Kermit the Forg, the smartest amphibian in the world:
"Amphibian populations began declining dramatically in the 1980s, but 20 years later the world still hasn't ended as we know it. True, other small-brained species that are low on the food chain (namely bees) have begun declining. Yes, these events should cause us to pay attention, but they certainly shouldn't cause symptoms such as extreme overreaction that are usually exhibited by another small-brained species: the environmental activist."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_in_amphibian_populations#Natural_population_fluctuations_or_problematic_declines.3F
Of course, by Kermit the Forg, I mean Kermit the Frog.
An invented quote deserves an invented speaker, but Forg, Frog, it works either way.
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