What’s the buzz? Well, bees. What about bees? Do you know that they are dying?
I had read or heard a news story some time back, and something today reminded me about it. Did you know that a large portion of the honey bee population has been disappearing?
I’ve talked about changes that have been happening in the environment, and how normal, expected things in nature, just aren’t happening anymore. Migratory patterns are changing. For instance, the swallows no longer return to Capistrano. The Baltimore Oriole (the bird that the baseball team was named after) no longer lives in Baltimore. Now I am hearing about the decreasing bee population.
It seems that honey bees are dying, and/or disappearing. It has been found that bees are leaving their hives. And it is not just that they are leaving, it is that they are leaving it full of honey. So, if there is food, then why are they gone? Researchers have found up to 4,300 hives abandoned in one area.
Some think that this is because of unusually high amounts of rain. Others think it may be from pesticides. (They started using a new pesticide in France, and found that it messed with the bee’s navigational abilities. Once they’d go out for pollen, they could not find their way back home.) Others think it is because of man made changes in plants. Whatever the reason, they are dying.
Now, for one like me that is terrified of bees (ever since getting stung on the lip at age three), less bees to bother me might be nice. But less bees is not a good thing.
Why is this a concern? Well, without bees, plants don’t get pollinated. Believe it or not (and I didn’t know this until owning a home and buying fruit trees for it) plants are male and female. (We once bought some kiwi plants. They come in a set of three, one male, and two female.) It is the bees that go from flower to flower that make them reproduce. Without bees, we would not have a lot of the fruits and vegetables we do.
I’ve actually seen this. When we moved to Florida, I tried planting vegetable plants like I did in Maryland. The plants would produce flowers, then start to produce, well, produce. But whatever vegetable started to grow, died long before it got too far. I was told that there is some disease around here affecting the bees. Without the bees to pollinate the plants, there are no vegetables.
Part of this could be related to global warming which seems to have an affect on all wildlife and their migratory patterns. Since it is warmer in the northern parts, and the winters don’t get as cold (and I’m not talking Maine of Minnesota), a lot of the insect population is not dying off as it should, and a lot of the animals are not moving south as there is still enough to eat where they are. In fact, everything seems to be moving further north which is why we are seeing wildlife that we wouldn’t expect to see in many areas.
Apparently, American farmers have become so dependent on bee pollination of their plants (specifically honeybee) that they could be hurting soon. They have developed so much of their land that other insects that might help pollination (butterflies, wasps, etc.) have been driven away. Did you know that every third mouthful of food you eat is dependent on bee pollination?
In some situations, some plants are self pollinating. Corn and wheat depend on wind to help pollination. But most flowering plants do not.
This is a scary situation whether you realize it or not. Imagine the world’s food supply cut by one third. In a planet with a growing population, that is not a pleasant thought.
I think the quote was attributed to Albert Einstein (feel free to correct me if I’m wrong). He said that if the bees ever died, man would not be far behind. Is this going on now?
Just some ‘food’ for thought.