Honeybee Die-Off Threatens Food Supply
May 3rd, 2007Via: Yahoo / AP:
Unless someone or something stops it soon, the mysterious killer that is wiping out many of the nation’s honeybees could have a devastating effect on America’s dinner plate, perhaps even reducing us to a glorified bread-and-water diet.
Honeybees don’t just make honey; they pollinate more than 90 of the tastiest flowering crops we have. Among them: apples, nuts, avocados, soybeans, asparagus, broccoli, celery, squash and cucumbers. And lots of the really sweet and tart stuff, too, including citrus fruit, peaches, kiwi, cherries, blueberries, cranberries, strawberries, cantaloupe and other melons.
In fact, about one-third of the human diet comes from insect-pollinated plants, and the honeybee is responsible for 80 percent of that pollination, according to the U.S.
Department of Agriculture.
Even cattle, which feed on alfalfa, depend on bees. So if the collapse worsens, we could end up being “stuck with grains and water,” said Kevin Hackett, the national program leader for USDA’s bee and pollination program.
“This is the biggest general threat to our food supply,” Hackett said.
It is a bummer about the bees, no doubt. The idea that we won’t have flowering food crops, tho, is a bit dramatic. Humans can pollinate the blossoms. It will be a bit labor intensive. So what? Its about our food. You know, food? One of the basics of survival.
Imagine pollination days. Days off from school. Schoolchildren walking through the local fields, pollinating the blossoms.
How do you pollinate a blossom? You need the pollen from another blossom. You have to wiggle the blossoms together to get the pollen from one blossom to the other. Honeybees, with their chubby hairy back legs, are perfect for this activity. They carry the pollen from blossom to blossom.
There are also self-pollinating varieties of certain fruits. There’s lots of stuff I don’t know about this, but I know enough to know that we can certainly pollinate plants if we have to. I doubt we could do it to the extent that bees do. I know I’ll be on the front lines to maintain the blackberries!!
Certain fruits and vegetables could become a bit more special. Perhaps that would be more incentive for folks to eat them? Imagine the excitement around the dinner table? We’re having okra tonight. It is very special. Has to be hand pollinated. We savor every bite. Our bodies sing with pleasure at having been fed something wonderful.
Total disaster. This worries me more than the rising seas and peak oil. This is the kind of disaster that isn’t glamerous or flashy and just totally guts you. Bee die off might be the whimper when we’er waiting for the bang.
//MOD Tim, your posts are almost always off topic. Please stop using the comments here as a bulletin board system.
Excellent points. It will become a major hassle, but we won’t starve to death.
Of course, with all the manual labor that will be needed, food will become excessively expensive. Hmm…maybe we could use illegal immigrants to do the work.
The few dead bees found that could be linked to Colony Collapse Disorder had a conucopia of viruses, parasites and fungi, their intestinal tract seemed particularly affected,… as if their immune system had collapsed…Maybe unrelated, maybe not, GMO crops modified to secrete Bacillus Thuringensis toxins have also been shown to depress the immune systems of a number of species. Commercial bees are also bred for size, which may render them unable to feed on a number of small wildflowers which usually provide them with the phytochemicals that protect them from said pathogens…these species of wildflowers are collapsing also due to a variety of factors linked to industrial ag and global warming…It looks so far that no single elements can be singled out but rather a conjunction of them: commercial bees have been under duress for a while, and they might have reached their “tipping point” there are a lot of guesses out there, but it is interesting to notice that africanized bees, and european bees feeding on organic crops, are experiencing nowhere near the rate of collapse as bred commercial bees. Anyway it bothers me: february in coastal central california was abuzz with bees eagerly harvesting any pollen they could find, then NOTHING. An occasionnal wild or africanized bee shows up, a few european survivors, that’s it…I am quite pissed at Monsanto right now (again)Anyways, if this does not come back to “normal” expect a serious increase in food prices later this year and the next…
A question: What’s the probability that this die-off is one of Their projects??
It seems awfully fortuitous–for Those who revel in thoughts of mass human depopulation–that this is occurring just as a massive, criminally-fraudulent-debt induced transfer of resources from:
a. the laboring classes to the Ruling and Upper classes and
b. the West to the East
is about to manifest in the form of world-wide depression and subsequent civil and international war/wars. A lack of food under these conditions will only exacerabate them, and make food a national security priority, which directly benefits Them.
p.s.
The blowback aspect of this mega-problem (They kill the bees, They kill Themselves) makes it seem random, but the timing makes it seem contrived.
p.p.s.
In addition to starving a great portion of the world’s population to death, a massive bee and subsequent plant die-off would allow Them to take total control of the world’s remaining food supply, as food becomes not only an issue of national security, but a transnational security issue as well.
http://www.gnn.tv/articles/3063/Please_Lord_not_the_bees
Right JG, we can just replace earth’s pollinated food with genetically engineered (GE) High-Fructose Corn Syrup based products like Coke and Gummy Bears to make up for all those pesky flowering foods. Yummy!
http://www.coopamerica.org/programs/rs/profile.cfm?id=187
Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) proves that everything sugary isn’t sweet. This manufacturer of cocoa and artificial sweeteners has been accused of using child and slave labor; genetically engineering its products; and using political influence to receive special treatment from the federal government. Between 1980 and 1995, ADM cost American taxpayers tens of billions of dollars to maintain subsidies on 43 percent of its goods. Even with this advantage, the company still saw the need to conspire with other producers to fix corn fructose prices. Bottom line: Consumers should take action through the Organic Consumers Association’s Campaign Against GE Corn, and raise awareness with others about ADM and its role in the global food trade.
As with the global dieoff of frogs and other species sensitive to diseases spread by globalization and invasive species, this is merely mother nature’s way of strengthening the genetics of bees: a natural evolutionary process and response to humankind’s tampering with mother nature’s natural balance.
Here in the Siskiyou mountains, in Happy Camp, CA, we have an abundance of orchard bees or mason bees. Orchard bees are wild pollinators that lay their eggs in small holes, such as bamboo poles and even in the grounding hole of three-prong electrical outlets. They hatch in early spring, and pollinate fruit trees naturally, without the need to maintain apiaries. The down side is that one doesn’t get to harvest honey from their nests. Several companies make and sell nests for orchard bees, but you can make one with a simple 4″ thick slab of hardwood such as oak or maple, cut with a chainsaw, and a drill with a 1/4″ drill bit. Drill a bunch of holes into the slab about 1/2″ apart, and hang the wood slab in a shady, dry spot. When you notice the holes plugged with dried mud, dirt, or bits of clay, you now have your own nest of orchard bees to pollinate your garden! More on orchard bees here on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchard_mason_bee
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mason_bee
When Kevin posted one of the first articles on the net re the bee dieoff i thought then, as i do now, that this is one of the most depressing statements of our time.
Maybe it is part of the great plan for the dieoff, but who cares about that plan? I don’t!
Obviously the bees are in distress and need our help.
Here in PA we have been fortunate not to have a freeze killoff in our orchards. I’m going to be out there with a small artist paintbrush this weekend to pollinate blossoms that I can reach. I’m also planting flower seed on the bare ground that was dug up for a bigger sewer line. Next, I’m going to learn about having a hive of my own. After that, I am considering what to do with the ChemLawn truck that frequents my morning commute.
Remember that X-Files movie? I never did exactly understand what they were doing with the bees.
[Cue Weird Theremin Music]
[…] the “glorified bread-and-water diet” quote from the bee dieoff story in mind as you read this […]
http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article2494224.ece
4 May 2007 09:46
Birds and bees are hit by phone waves
By Jonathan Owen
Published: 29 April 2007
First it was bees. Now it is birds and other insects, say reports describing how they are being thrown off-course by “electrosmog”. Some even claim that entire migrating flocks can find themselves off-course when faced with mobile phone masts or pylons.
Tory councillor Debi Jones from Hightown, Southport, said: “It seems strange that these stories are only now coming out and appear to coincide with the proliferation of mobile phone masts.”
This is the latest development in the debate over the reasons bee populations are declining. It was prompted by a recent report in the IoS about new evidence that radiation from mobile phones interferes with bees’ navigation systems, thus preventing them from flying back to their hives.
The revelation that bees do not rely solely on the sun to find their way around – but instead have an internal compass in their stomachs that helps them navigate using the Earth’s electromagnetic fields – means electrosmog could, it is now thought, throw this internal compass off course.
Shhh. Don’t want the bots who read these dialogs to know that we know, right? Anyway, it will take years before any cause is identified, no one will be at fault. Whatever the consequences, killer bees will still be here to flourish where there once was peace. And the government is just a middleman in the consumer/salesman loop; the government agents aren’t to blame for issues, right? As we know, “we have met the enemy, it is us.”
Next thing will be science research on the effects of cell phone microwave transmissions causing failure of bees to navigate. Then the arguments by industry, the demands from consumers: “We need our cell phones!!!”
Rallies to follow, equating cell rights on a par with the second amendment, and “Phones don’t kill honeybees, people kill honeybees!” pedroâ„¢