Colony Collapse Disorder

[watervole]

What is happening to bee colonies?

Colony collapse disorder, or the total abandonment of their hives by bees, is increasingly widespread and could cause a collapse in the production of crops that are dependant on bees for pollination.  There may be a connection with mobile phone usage.

http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/wildlife/article2449968.ece

My only question relating to this theory is that the condition appeared in America before the UK and mobile phone usuage (I believe) is higher over here.  On the other hand, most bee keepers in America move around the country to pollinate different fields, so I'm guessing they may have much higher than average use of mobiles.

However, if you keep bees, it might be advisable to make sure that you never take your handset near the hive.

Comments

[fjm.livejournal.com]

The more I think about this the more it makes little sense. Most rural areas have very poor moible phone coverage.

[johnrw.livejournal.com]

Just scanned the article, technically correct i.e. it's a possible hypothesis -unfortunately there are glaring holes in the idea.

1, Abandoned hives being shunned by other insects suggests a more mundane explanation than mobile phones - unless it's postulated some sort of Feng Shui about the hive's location. disease/ fungal attack leave chemical markers which could be one explanation.

2,>> the Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs insisted: "There is absolutely no evidence of CCD in the UK."<< How would they know? DEFRA canned their Apian research and disease monitoring two years ago - saving a total of £250,000 per annum.

3, No one is precisely sure of the exact mechanism of colony collapse. The evocative vision of a hive's inhabitants suddenly disappearing, like so many apian Mary Celestes is charming but like the Mary Celeste there are explanations which don't involve alien abduction.

If not closely monitored certain strains of bees will - as well as throwing a prime swarm (in which the mature queen departs with about half the mature workforce leaving the colony to a new queen) wll throw casts (young virgin queen leaves with a coterie of drones and a relatively small* support system of mature workers.
(^ compared to a prime swarm - it's still possibly couple of thousand bees}

Throwing repeated casts can weaken the original colony below it's survival threshold.

Casts are usually associated with an environmental stress. what the stress is is open to debate. varroa is extremely stressful, as is European foul brood and other diseases equally the chemical controls used to limit the effect of the varroa mite on the colony are not exactly conducive to a stress free existence.

[watervole.livejournal.com]

Rural areas in the USA are much worse covered than in the UK - the place is just so much bigger - which again makes me wonder why the problem would appear there first if mobile phones were the cause.

It's an interesting theory, but I'm not totally convinced either.

[melodyclark.livejournal.com]

This is a truly frightening story. I've been following the developments. It seems to me unlikely that it's merely the cell phones since cell phones are in use in Australia and NZ, and they have no similar bee problem there. I wonder if it might be an environmental factor tied to the season plus some cell phone implication, or made insecticide (although I know the UK beekeepers are wiser about their choices of agents).