About the stories about the bees dying off......

[Gloria]

Was watching Retroplex today and saw a movie made in 1997 called "Ulee's Gold" starring Peter Fonda. He plays a beekeeper. At one point he comments to someone about how the mites, pesticides and drought are killing bees. He actually goes back to the mites and makes a second comment about them....

So, 10 years ago someone knew enough about these problems to put them into a movie! But I guess things have gotten worse now...nothing like letting the years slip by on all this environmental "stuff" that nobody wants to deal with....

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

1. Actually, I think it's been going on ~20 years or so.

I think it's mostly just fear mongering, IMO.

[BeHereNow]

2. I keep finding dead bees all around my house.

In my yard, on my walkway and sidewalk...
a day hasn't gone by this entire summer that I have not
found at least one dead bee.
I'm in Los Angeles-
Anyone else in my area noticing this?
BHN

[Gold Metal Flake]

8. Yup.

Mostly, I have noticed a profound lack of bees. There is a tree next door that is always abuzz with bees. You can hear a drone from all of the bees anytime you are in the yard. But not this year. Tree is healthy, full of little blooms. No bees.

[ret5hd]

3. Pretty good movie though, huh?

Loyalty, desperation, blood ties, the dignity of work. I liked it.

[SmokingJacket]

4. Bees have been disappearing for around 25 years.

Due to varroa mites. However... some people think this Colony Collapse Disorder is different, because bees are simply vanishing from the hives -- not lying dead on the bottoms of the hives. Though others I've read think it's just more of the same problems we've been dealing with.

I'm getting some hives next spring, so I've been reading up...

[morningglory]

7. I went to an apiary where Ulee's G was made in May and asked them about

the colony collapse. They said the folks are just not taking care of their bees. They said bees only live 3 weeks, they work themselves to death. They said people put hundreds of hives on semi trucks and drive all the way across the country, introducing stuff and exposing their bees to stuff and not taking care of problems that pop up. Dunno. That is what they opined. I went to buy my year's supply of honey. Have never seen that many butterflies!

[sarge43]

13. That one is totally off the wall.

First, a honey bee lives for about three months after hatch out. Second, worker bees don't specialize. Each goes through the duty roster of all hive jobs, starting with nursing duty of the eggs and larva, then on to lady in waiting for the queen (keeping her clean and fed), janitor duty around the hive, guard duty and finishing their life cycle as foragers. If the workers were dying by their third week, the hive wouldn't survive a season, probably no more a few months; they'd starve to death, smother in their own filth or be destroyed by another insects, like ants, invading the hive.

Again, the head banger with CCD is there aren't heaps of dead bees; they just gone in great enough numbers that the hive can't continue to function.

In itself transporting them around the country for pollination duty isn't harmful. There could be something to the contact with 'cides at the mega agribusinesses. That is being studied as a possible cause or at least contributing to CCD.

[SpiralHawk]

23. Pesticides, freaky corporate mutant genes, and cell phone radiation and shit

All factors...

[sarge43]

9. CCD isn't caused by varroa mites

As you say, there would a lot of dead bees and mites. Right now the thinking is leaning toward an insidious and long term buildup of 'cides, but that is still very tentative. Affected bees are needed for study.

[Ino]

5. There are tons of honey bees in my garden...

buzzing around the coneflowers. I've also seen many of those huge bees (B-52s, I call them). I'm in St. Louis.

[sarge43]

6. If they're harvesting cone flowers, they aren't honey bees.

HB's tongues aren't long enough to reach through the cone to the nectar and pollen. Maybe a smaller variety of Bumblebees.

[Ino]

14. Isn't this a honeybee?

http://imgred.com/
http://www.wingsinflight.com/beephoto.html

[baby_mouse]

18. Certainly looks like one to me... nt

[sarge43]

22. Unless that's a very small flower

the one on the right looks too big.

I'm not saying HBs won't harvest cones if they can and they certainly check them out, but for the most part they don't bother. They are opportunists. Goldenrod blooms concurrently with Cone flowers and that they can't get enough of. So, easy pickings or hard work ...

[hatrack]

26. My bees love the coneflower patch in the front yard

It's always busy with them.

[Bjornsdotter]

33. I've wondered about that

:hi:

...I always have a ton of bumbles on them but never any honey bees. I have something that resembles a honey bee but they are too big. I do have honey bees by the oregano, unfortunately that also attracts these nasty blue/black wasp/hornet things......:scared:

Cheers

[baby_mouse]

17. B-52s!

I'm copying that! :D

[BrotherBuzz]

10. Two non-native bee mites were introduced to the US in the eighties

The tracheal mite, Acarapis woodi, in 1984; and the varroa mite, Varroa jacobsoni, in 1987. The tracheal mite has been treatable to a large degree, but the varroa mite has proven to be a mean one that has developed resistance to just about everything the beekeepers have thrown at them.

[Vadem]

11. I've been looking for honey bees and all I've seen are baby ...

bumblebees in my flowers! It is pretty scary, actually!

[tnlefty]

12. My screed from my neck of the woods:

There aren't nearly as many honeybees as there were 10, 5, 3 yrs. ago and I make a point of planting plants that they enjoy to come up in early spring, through the summer and into the fall. We put a pool in last summer and the bees are back to a degree, not in the numbers that I'm accustomed to, but they're back and I try to pamper them!

TN is in a severe drought condition and whenever I turn a faucet on I'm amazed at the numbers of different critters who flock to it. I checked on bee ponds for the honeybees and we may put one in as I don't think that the honeybees and other critters that we find in the pool (snakes, frogs, lizards, turtles, etc.) benefit from being in chemically treated water. I quit just spraying pesticides over a decade ago. If I feel like I have to use them I spray them directly on the critter that I'm trying to get rid of. We've composted for over a decade so I don't use commercial fertilizers either, although many others do.

I am truly beginning to believe that a combination of factors are effecting honeybees along with many other critters.

Just my .02 as a casual observer who's trying to figure out what is going on and what I can try to do to help.

[sarge43]

24. You're doing more than most to help our friends, tnlefty.

If you feel like planting some goodies for the gang, here's some flowering plants HBs especially love:

Asters, Sunflowers, Salvia, Bee balm (Monarda), Hyssop, Mint, Cleome/Spider plant, Rugosa roses, Thyme, Poppy.

[onethatcares]

30. throw in some peppers/tomatos/eggplants and before you know it

you got a regular livestock thing going on. We feed the birds, plant butterfly attracting plants, bee attractors, and edibles. It changes the shape of the lawn landscape for sure. We've also been in a 5 yr drought in West Central Florida, St Petersburg area. We're collecting rain water, composting and trying to stave off the inevitable water rationing, while others water the grass until it rots. Something is wery, wery wrong here.

[sarge43]

32. Yup. There's a reason why so many cultures place Paradise

in a garden. It sooths the soul. And lawns are a near sterile environment; they support very little life in themselves.

[MagickMuffin]

15. Last year I had to have the Bee Charmer come and remove my Honeybees

They were living under my building out back, and when we had a fence installed for my goats the hive was disturbed and the bees were swarming way to much. We had the fence installed the previous summer, back the bees never settle down. The bee charmer came and removed them and took them with her to her home in the country. She has several hives at her home.

She told me bees will travel up to 10 miles looking for food.

I did notice a bee buzzing about yesterday when I was feeding my goats...

[radfringe]

16. I remember reading an article

years ago about the honey-bee problem. At that time it was attributed to mites

one woman mentioned in the article said she had planted several rows of lavendar around her property and found her bees were doing really well. She had told a few of her fellow beekeepers about this. They also gave planting lavendar a try and found their hives were much healthier

[sarge43]

20. HBs adore flowering herbs.

Ours goes nuts when the thyme and mint bloom.

Well, lavender has mild antiseptic qualities; why it's been used since Day One in wash water and soap. So maybe the chemicals in it are discouraging the mites.

[HornBuckler]

19. If there is any truth to this...

We are totally fucked - Bees are essential to life on this planet for humans. If they die, we die - simple.

[sendero]

21. It's human nature...

... to not be willing to confront a difficult problem until the evidence that it IS a problem is overwhelming.

See it every day.

[Beelzebud]

25. My father in law raises bees for honey. It's been his most plentiful year so far...

*shrug*

I think the bee scare is just that. One more thing to keep people scared.

[sarge43]

29. Our hives are doing well, also.

CCD hasn't seemed to hit the hobbyist/backyard beekeepers as hard. The commercial apiaries have been savaged. One in Michigan lost 12K hives out of 13K, destroyed the business. It's one of the reasons long term pesticide build up is being looked at because commercial apiaries deal primarily with the agribusinesses which do hose the corps with 'cides.

(typo)

[Zywiec]

27. This may be a dumb question

but if pollination can only occur with bees, why do I always see pollen all over my car in the spring and fall? It's obviously blowing all over the place otherwise no one would have pollen allergies.

Of course, I'm sure some bee-ologist can set me straight.

[sarge43]

28. No such thing as a dumb question

There are dumb answers. I hope this doesn't qualify.

1. Bees aren't the only pollinators. Other animals do as does the wind. In fact some plants, like pines, pollinate only by wind and produce enormous amounts of pollen. Bees are among the most efficient which why many plants evolved bee friendly flowers and why we humans transport honey bee hives to crops that can benefit from bee pollination.

2. Bees don't strip a bloom of its pollen and flowers do produce more. It would be self defeating for both bee and plant if bees took all the pollen at one shot and headed home. For the record the adult bees don't use pollen; it's fed to the larvae.

3. Not all blooms are bee friendly. As noted above some can't be harvested by honey bees or for some reason or other from indigestible to difficult to harvest they aren't interested.

4. Or simply there may be not be many bees in your area.

[JacquesMolay]

31. I finally saw a bee in one of my squash plant flowers the other day...

... I've only had one fruit off of it the whole summer.

That's just anecdotal, but I've read up on this and it's serious shit.