The Case Of The Vanishing Bees

The Case Of The Vanishing Bees

Source Link: www.cbsnews.com

(CBS) In spite of all the advances in agriculture, honeybees remain indispensable. By moving pollen from flower to flower, bees are the only efficient way for many crops to pollinate, CBS News correspondent John Blackstone reports.

As growing season begins in California's Central Valley, there is nothing quite as busy as a beekeeper. Farmers pay them to put their hives in their fields and orchards.

"It means the difference between profit and loss for them," says beekeeper Lance Sundberg.

But beekeepers like Sundberg have a mystery in their hives this year. Bees are disappearing at an alarming rate.

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This is pretty alarming and I've not heard of anything like this before. I Perhaps the current climate change cycle has something to do with this...?

i'm scared.... i like bees. anyone heard of any bees going missing anywhere else in the world? (i'm not taking the .. anything here, by the way, although it might sound like i am!)

My memory is a little fuzzy on this but I remember reading somewhere that a disease was running through be hives, but I don't remember what continent it was on . Definitely something not good. Bees really help agriculture.

Originally posted by pavil
My memory is a little fuzzy on this but I remember reading somewhere that a disease was running through be hives, but I don't remember what continent it was on . Definitely something not good. Bees really help agriculture.

I've not heard anything about that but it doesn't seem to far fetched. However, the article does state that the bee's just disappeared. If it was simply a disease I doubt there would be no trace of them. It's like they just flew off somewhere.

I heard the same thing a couple years ago (2-3) at that was in my country
Reports were especially talking about under average honey production.
I guess the weather has drastically changed the bees behaviour and their life expectancy, that's really sad!