The bee population in North American and Europe is crashing at an alarming rate. Bees pollinate plants, without them, there will be no crops. Causes for the population crash, which is up to 70% on the east coast of the US, appear to be the usual culprits; monoculture, pesticides, and GM crops.
This is genuinely scary stuff. Celsias has a series of in-depth articles that explain what’s happening.
Bees dying by the millions
Bee colony collapse disorder, where is it heading
European bees taking a nosedive
Predictably, governments are asleep at the wheel, and little research money is available. Can’t be having a little thing like a collapsing bee population interfere with agricultural companies making money.
Is there any relation between this development and the much-touted “Africanization” of bees from a couple of years ago?
I had the same question. I kept hearing about the arrival of aggressive bees or killer bees. Perhaps there was a misguided attempt to control that bee population, that wiped out the honey bees. We make so many environmental mistakes, it will be quite difficult to pinpoint the culprit
They’re declining because of disease and mites
such as the varroa mite,
a bloodsucking parasite that attacks young and adult honeybees.