Why are all the bees dying all over the world?

Answer 1

The last several years a mite has been introduced to the domestic bees. The mite is parasitic and weakens the colonies until the colony can not effectively function or gather enough food to survive winter.

Now a parasitic fungus was linked to colony collapse disorder.

This is coupled witht he fact that the european honeybee has relatively little genetic variation since most hives come from a very few companies.

BTW I wonder if the cell phone argument is coming from the same person/people that originally reported cell phones cause Alzheimer's.

Answer 2

Well... there are a number of reasons, and they center around two categories:

1. The evolution and propagation of diseases that the honey bees have no resistance to.

2. Chemicals in their environment, especially the new 3 to 5 year pesticides. While around here it is illegal to spray plants that are currently flowering, because the flowers are then covered with pesticides that kill honey bees, they still do so. Also with the multi-year pesticides any honey bee that harvests nectar from a treated plant will take the poison back to their hive and poison the hive's food supply.

Albert Einstein once said that when the honey bees die off, the human race only has 20 years till its extinction.

Answer 3

Last week, on CSPAN radio (channel 132 if you have XM radio), I heard a US House Subcommittee hearing, where some of the top scientists in this field were giving testimony (sorry, I don't remember which subcommittee). There is no certainty about why colony colapse disorder is occurring, however, the scientists discussed possibilities related to pesticides and parasitic mites. They said beas are very suseptible to pesticides, and that the pesticides might be changing something about the beas cumulatively over several generations to make them suseptible to not reproducing. They did not mention cell phones as a probable cause, and said that genetically modified foods have not been shown to be a cause either. In regard to Africanized beas, they mentioned that some researcher, I think from Texas, had done research in this area and actually found that African beas are less suseptible to colony colapse disorder, and this researcher had thought that Africanizing honey beas might be a key to keeping colonies stronger. Sorry, I wish I could remember the subcommitte's name that took the testimony of the bea experts, but I bet if you are interested in this you could contact CSPAN radio and ask them. I remember the hearing was on in the early part of last week (week of 4/23). The scientists also said that the number of honey beas has been declining since the 1950s, and that there hasn't been a lot of study on the subject previous to now.

Answer 4

I didn't know they were, but if it's bees particularly, more than anything else.. you have to look at all aspects of their life. Their sensitivity to heat, their ways of tracking/moving about, and also what they eat.
Bees collect pollen, it's quite possible that they are taking on poisons in the pollen that come from pollution, or pesticides/insecticides or other sources.
Anything could be affecting them, but if it's only bees and not, say, wasps.. then you have to look at the difference between the two insects and eliminate possible causes until you find the answer. The main difference, obviously, is pollen collection.

Answer 5

One source I read in an e-newsletter stated that it was a possibility that they were dying because of the radiation given off by cell-phones. However, this month's Scientific American magazine states that is is more likely a bee parasite that had previously been eradicated here in the US. I haven't read the article through yet because I am doing Y!A this morning. My money is on the likelihood of a parasite being the culprit.

Answer 6

the straightforward answer isn't any. the area stems from the actual undeniable truth that Colony cave in affliction contains bees disappearing from a particular section, that would want to be brought about by may diverse causes which include insecticides, fungi and viruses. yet another situation is that there is amazingly little files on organic bee hives the global over, in truth no human being knows the well-being of bees that are literally not saved for honey production. it truly is despite the indisputable fact that genuine that in elements affected by CCD organic bee hives have also been affected. That being said, there are elements of the global that would want to benefit by eu bee disappearance. that's because the eu bee is aggressive and may kill and colonies hives of bee species interior of reach to that section, frightening a comfortable insect/plant stability unique to that part of the global. at the same time as it truly is genuine that CCD on eu bee stocks might want to posses a wager to the nutrition reserves of an enormous percentage of worlds inhabitants the global does no longer grow to be a flowering plant desolate tract as grow to be reported contained in the documentary. again there is little or no information both thanks to say that CCD is effecting interior of reach bee populations, yet there is very a lot of information exhibiting that eu bees position a huge rigidity on interior of reach colonies. in short, the reply to CCD isn't uncomplicated to locate and is more beneficial than in all likelihood to be a mixture of aspects putting severe rigidity on the Hive until eventually it cave in. desire this helps.

Answer 7

The latest report is showing that cell phone frequencies are interfereing with the bee's navagational system and they are not able to find their way home. Hence, they die.

They are still doing extensive tests on this but I believe they already have some proof that it's going on.

Check the drudgereport.com and do a search on bee's. You can read all about it.

Answer 8

That's an interesting question that I was also wondering. It reminded me of a documentary I was watching on killer bees and how they take over the European-like bees in their hives. That would be the answer, as far as I can tell.

Answer 9

Nobody knows for sure, but I would say it is closer to the global warming issue. Maybe, because we don't have as cold of winters as we used to that it isn't killing off a natural enemie of the bees like it should.

Answer 10

The cell phones that everyone are using is on the same frequency so the bees get so confused they die because they are unable to function properly