Posts Tagged: colony collapse disorder
Be kind to honey bees
A national roundup of honey bee happenings on the website Tonic.com touched on the UC Davis Honey Bee Haven, a bee-friendly garden set to open to the public Sept. 11.
Tonic reports on good things that happen, dwelling on stories that "inspire, bring hope or simply put a smile on your face." And what could be more inspirational than a lovely flowering garden made possible by a generous donor that daily brings delight and joy to the world, Häagen Dazs ice cream?The Honey Bee Haven is designed to encourage public awareness of the modern-day plight of the honey bee, which Tonic reporter Liz Corcoran described even though it is perplexing and sad. In recent years, bees have been subject to a mysterious decline called Colony Collapse Disorder. Factors that scientists suspect cause CCD include pests, pesticides, malnutrition and stress from transport.
Häagen Dazs - recognizing that fruit, nut and honey ice cream ingredients are dependent on bees - launched the Häagen Dazs Loves Honeybees campaign and donated half a million dollars to Penn State and UC Davis for honeybee research and awareness programs.
Here are some ways to be kind to bees shared in the Tonic story:
- Adopt a beehive, offered by the British Beekeeping Association for about $50 a year
- Support reinstatement of the Boy Scout beekeeping merit badge, which was discontinued in 1995
- Plant sunflowers, hollyhocks, foxgloves and flowering herbs, and if you have room, fruit trees, buddleia and hebe
- Forego the use of herbicides and pesticides.
An artist's rendering of the Honey Bee Haven.
Farm advisor hails self-pollinating almond
A self-pollinating almond variety under study at the USDA's research facility in Parlier would relieve farmers of costly annual bee rental to pollinate their trees, according to an article in Saturday's Fresno Bee.
"That is like the Holy Grail," UC Cooperative Extension farm advisor Roger Duncan told Bee reporter Robert Rodriguez.
"You can feel that hairiness with your tongue," the release quoted USDA geneticist Craig Ledbetter. “That can turn off U.S. almond consumers, who are used to the smooth texture of Nonpareils."
Ledbetter used Tuono as the male parent in conventional hybridizations with California almond cultivars and selections. In 2008, he brought eight promising self-pollinating selections to the California Almond Board for evaluation of taste and appearance. Testers rated the nuts comparable to Nonpareils, the USDA release said.
ABC Action News in Fresno also took on the story. It said Ledbetter began his work with self-pollinating almond trees 17 years ago out of fears Africanized bees could kill off local hives.
"It was out of those concerns we really started the program," Ledbetter told reporter Dale Yurong. "It's ironic that a different bee problem (Colony Collapse Disorder) came up."
Bee hives in a California almond orchard.
Plight of the honeybee particularly bad in 2010
After several mild years, colony collapse disorder of honeybees has returned with a vengeance in 2010, according to news articles that ran over the weekend.
Fresno Bee reporter Robert Rodriguez used UC Davis apiculturist Eric Mussen as a source for his story, describing the scientist as "the state's leading bee expert."
"It never went away," Mussen said about the mysterious disappearance of bees from hives, "but this year a substantial number of beekeepers got walloped again. And worse than they had been hit before."
Another concern is this year's unusually cool, wet winter. In Merced County, farmers have already had to apply fungicides to combat such problems as bloom rot.
"There some growers who are applying their third spray, when normally this time of year they may only make two," the article quoted David Doll, a UC Cooperative Extension farm advisor in Merced County.
The Hanford Sentinel ran a story about rising cost of honeybees to farmers, which it blamed on CCD and growing almond acreage. The Woodland Daily Democrat's article contained comments about pollination from UCCE farm advisor Joe Connell of Butte County.
Connell said it appears the majority of Northern California growers had their pollination needs met this year."There is definitely potential for a good harvest, but we won't know for sure until the nuts themselves start to size up," Connell said. "Definite answers probably won't be available until the end of March."
The Democrat story said Mussen and Connell believe cold weather and high rainfall during this year's almond blossom season reduced the amount of time the bees could spend in the fields, and might cause the ripening almonds to drop from the trees before they are fully developed.
"Proper pollination and fertilization will allow the nut to fasten (to the tree) and really hold a big crop," Mussen told reporter James Noonan.
Despite these challenges, Connell was hopeful about the 2010 almond season.
"We have a good number of blossoms right now," Connell was quoted, "if we can get nuts to take hold in about a quarter of them we'll be in pretty good shape."
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A pollen-covered honeybee on an almond blossom. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey.)
Could pesticide be key to solving colony collapse mystery?
An article posted today on Salon.com said the maker of imidacloprid, Bayer CropScience, found the pesticide in the nectar and pollen of flowering trees and shrubs at concentrations high enough to kill a honeybee in minutes. That December 2007 revelation, plus beekeepers' own experiences in fields treated by the pesticide, have scientists taking a new look at imidacloprid's role in sudden, unexplained bee die-offs that have been reported around the world for the past 10 years.
Scientists have pondered whether there is a single cause of Colony Collapse Disorder or whether the phenomena results from a variety of factors, such as the combined effect of disease, pests and pesticides, as was reported in March by the BBC. Salon reporter Julia Scott spoke to UC Davis Cooperative Extension entomologist Eric Mussen about the pesticide implicated in today's article.
He told Scott that he wasn't surprised about Bayer's research conclusions and that he has seen UC studies with similar results, such as one at UC Riverside that found imidacloprid in the nectar of a eucalyptus tree bloom at concentrations of 550 ppb a year after it was applied.
"From some of the data on the trees, it appears as though there are situations where honeybees can get into truly toxic doses of the material," Mussen was quoted in the article. "This (is) the first time that we've had something you put in a tree that could stay there for a long time."
Still, Mussen said, he doesn't believe imidicloprid or a related pesticide clothianidin carry all the blame for CCD.
"Could it be part of the story? I'm sure. I think any of the pesticides the bees bring back to the beehive is hurting the bees," Mussen was quoted.
Photo by Kathy Garvey.
Hope for honeybees
The food and agriculture magazine Edible Sacramento featured honeybees on the cover of its summer edition, and sought comment from UC Davis entomologist Eric Mussen on the hottest issue related to the insects - colony collapse disorder. The value of honey bees, vignettes of beekeepers, and details about hive life and leadership are covered before what writer Mary Moulton called a "disturbing development."
The paraphrased information from Mussen notes that this is not the first time honeybees mysteriously vanished. "In the late 1800s there was a colony collapse and back in the 1960s and early '70s, the condition became known as the 'disappearing disease' within apiary circles," Moulton wrote.
In 2004 and 2005, United States suffered dramatic drops in bee populations. By 2006, the article said, the media began covering the story in earnest.
The article said Mussen recounted the following hurdles bees face: pesticides and other chemicals, loss of habitat and field forage, at least two distinctive mites and several viruses.
Edible Sacramento