Bees are disappearing!, page 1
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Topic started on 26-2-2007 @ 06:11 PM by centurion1211
In what could turn out to be a disaster for agriculture in the U.S. and the rest of the world, bees are mysteriously disappearing.

Where's the buzz?

Bromenshenk is leading a team of bee researchers looking for a cause. He's even listening to hives for signs of distress. Beekeepers in 22 states have reported bees dying in huge numbers.

Jeff Pettis of the U.S. Department of Agriculture says parasites and disease have killed bees in the past, but never anything like this.

"We went through multiple hives and we couldn't find anything that I would even call a beehive, so it was depressing," Pettis says.

Part of the mystery is that colonies can go from active and healthy to dead and gone within days. For beekeepers, that's a loss that stings.

They "just disappeared," says beekeeper Louise Rossberg. "There's nothing there. There's no bees on the ground anywhere. There's just a completely empty hive."


Since the scientists are baffled, I've come up with these possible conspiracy-type explanations:

Bee rapture - it is the end times and God is taking the (righteous) bees first.

Bush is at fault - The bees are being drafted to fight in the iraq war. OK, this is a longer shot than the other idea, but Bush is blamed for everything else that happens, so why not?

Attempts at humor aside, this is truly happening and as the article say, will cause huge problems for agriculture.

[edit on 2/26/2007 by centurion1211]


reply posted on 15-3-2007 @ 10:59 AM by frayed1
After reading this thread, I got to thinking about stories my Grandmother told about bees/beekeeping. In her day, more people kept bees especially if they farmed. The following site mentioned the superstitions that I was familiar with, plus a few more.....I've bolded the ones that caught my attention the most.

Folklore page


Bees have often been regarded as wise and even holy insects, having foreknowledge as well as knowledge of many secret matters. In antiquity they were sometimes divine messengers, and their constant humming was believed to be a hymn of praise.

There is believed to be a very strong link between bees and their keepers; bees cannot prosper in an atmosphere of anger or hatred, and will either pine away and die, or fly away. There is still a common belief that bees should be told about deaths that occur in the beekeeper's family; in past times this was extended to include every birth, marriage or other notable event in the life of the family. It was especially important to inform the bees of the death of their owner; traditionally this was done by the eldest son or widow of the owner, who would strike each hive three times with the door key and say 'The master is dead!'. If the procedure was not followed, the bees would die or fly away. In many districts the hives were put into mourning by having black crepe draped around them, and at the funeral feast sugar or small amounts of the food eaten by the mourners were brought out for the bees.


Now these are just superstitions, but folklore and old wives tales often hold a grain of truth.....after all these did originate in a time when beekeeping was more widely practiced, and people were closer to the land and perhaps more in tune with nature. Makes me a bit uneasy....
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