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U.S. honeybee colonies hit a 20-year high

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21–30 of 194 posts

Re: U.S. honeybee colonies hit a 20-year high

#21
post #5

Life finds a way. I think in some ways, CCD has probably "pruned" the bee population in a good way. Beekeeping allowed weaker hives that would have normally died off in the wild to continue to spawn new hives. CCD has reversed that trend, and may have improved the overall strength of the bee population genetics.

You are right and wrong. It's true that introduction of new diseases and parasites were a part of what is called CCD, and to the extent that hives with genetic strategies both of immunity and behavior were the survivors in the usual evolutionary way, then the remaining stock should be more robust (although of course that isn't necessarily "weaker" hives, and who knows what kinds of genetic variation was lost due to a lack of a particular success strategy against varroa for example). However, CCD is rightfully attributed to pesticides, fungicides, and a host of other human created stress factors on bees. Colonies survive these collateral stresses for the most part by luck, and not by any generic advantage. You are right that beekeepers have artificially extended generations of bees whose natural defenses might have failed against new parasites and diseases (that we ourselves imported into their populations), and that some die off was inevitable as result of natural balance being reached, but I'd say there is a good argument to be made that CCD interfered with this process rather than aiding it.

Re: U.S. honeybee colonies hit a 20-year high

#22
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but it doesn't explain where they come from. Sure it does. They come from the Internet, it explicitly stated that. Joking aside, from my understanding, the issue with bees is a combination of multiple factors, such as pesticides, disease, parasites, etc. Those are primarily local issues. So it's perfectly feasible to find some isolated spot in the US, grow a ton of bees, and ship them across the country to wherever…

It's mostly pesticides.

yeah, research is coalescing around neonicotinoids being the primary culprit, as they weaken bee immune systems.

Re: U.S. honeybee colonies hit a 20-year high

#23

Why was this downvoted? Does CCD selection pressure help or hinder bee genetics?

We've detached this subthread from its original parent (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10023994) and marked it off-topic. You're welcome to repost the on-topic part if you want to.

Re: U.S. honeybee colonies hit a 20-year high

#24
So was that the solution all along? Just breed more bees to replace the ones that die?

If that's the case, it seems like a mountain was made out of a mole hill in the media. I read multiple times that I may never eat a pollinated fruit or vegetable again.

Re: U.S. honeybee colonies hit a 20-year high

#25
post #4
post #2

So the solution is to... buy more bees of the internet? Thank god we solved CCD

CCD is an economic problem. The varroa mite wiped out feral North American honey bees --- which are not native to North America --- a long time ago. Supposedly, any honey bee you've seen in the wild for the past decade has been part of a proprietary hive. So, ordering more honey bee queens off the Internet seems to be a pretty reasonable response to the problem of a 10-20% increase in overwintering hive failures.

I might be missing something, but surely that's not a sustainable solution?

Re: U.S. honeybee colonies hit a 20-year high

#26

So was that the solution all along? Just breed more bees to replace the ones that die? If that's the case, it seems like a mountain was made out of a mole hill in the media. I read multiple times that I may never eat a pollinated fruit or vegetable again.

It really was. Colony collapse disorder was bad for the colonies and breeders that experienced it, yes. But the honeybee industry has been going strong, contradicting all the apocalyptic warnings.

Re: U.S. honeybee colonies hit a 20-year high

#27
post #25
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CCD is an economic problem. The varroa mite wiped out feral North American honey bees --- which are not native to North America --- a long time ago. Supposedly, any honey bee you've seen in the wild for the past decade has been part of a proprietary hive. So, ordering more honey bee queens off the Internet seems to be a pretty reasonable response to the problem of a 10-20% increase in overwintering hive failures.

I might be missing something, but surely that's not a sustainable solution?

If honey bees in the wild are an invasive species decimated by another invasive species, and pollinating honey bees in practice are all proprietary, than discussions of honey bee populations in the US aren't much different from discussions of dairy cow populations.

So, no, I don't see how this is unsustainable.

Re: U.S. honeybee colonies hit a 20-year high

#28

So was that the solution all along? Just breed more bees to replace the ones that die? If that's the case, it seems like a mountain was made out of a mole hill in the media. I read multiple times that I may never eat a pollinated fruit or vegetable again.

It really was. Colony collapse disorder was bad for the colonies and breeders that experienced it, yes. But the honeybee industry has been going strong, contradicting all the apocalyptic warnings.

Doom sells. You will never sell any newspapers saying all flights landed safely.

Re: U.S. honeybee colonies hit a 20-year high

#30
Buying more and more bees is a very expensive solution. Perhaps I'm just a poor beekeeper (maybe true?) but I would have to sell my honey at untenable prices if I was looking to make money on my beekeeping.

For example, I've spent $1600 on bees and equipment, I've harvested 3 gallons of honey. I would have to sell that honey at $44/Pound to break even. Now hopefully over the long term this goes down a lot as the upfront capital investments spread out over the years.

My bee losses have been huge though. The first year I had 3 hives, lost 2. The second year I had 5 hives and lost 3, last year I had 5 hives and lost 4. Buying bees at $130/hive isn't sustainable (except through my charity) if I wanted to actually make any money at this, especially on a small scale.

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