G
Gandalf Grey
Guest
The Bee Sting
By Stephen Fleischman
Created Mar 4 2007 - 10:51am
Don't mess with nature!
It may not be a nuclear war or global warming that brings us down, but the
mysterious disappearance of the honey bee. We've been messing with nature
since Adam plucked the first piece of fruit off the apple tree.
The New York Times, on Feb 23rd, reported on a beekeeper named David
Bradshaw in Visalia, California who got the shock of his life when he opened
his boxes one morning and found half of his 100 million bees missing. His
bees had been pollinating the almond crop in the Central Valley, the world's
largest almond producing area.
The honey bee, apis mellifera, is the most commonly domesticated species in
the United States and is used not only for producing honey, but more
importantly for pollinating crops. Hence, the consternation when it was
discovered recently that bees in 24 states across the country were
mysteriously disappearing. The bees leave their hives to seek pollen and
nectar and in the process pollinate the blossoms of the crop. But these bees
never return to the hive and the colony becomes defunct. The phenomenon has
been given the name, "Colony Collapse Disorder". The scientists are
scratching their heads. They don't understand what's happening here. At
least, not yet.
Apis mellifera provides pollination for more than 90 commercial crops grown
throughout the United States. Tens of billions of bees are involved in
"migratory" pollination, going from crop to crop. The value of the
agricultural output of these bee pollinated crops is estimated at more than
14 billion dollars annually. They include everything from oranges in Florida
to apples in Pennsylvania to blueberries in Maine and cranberries in
Massachusetts, to name a few.
Why are the bees ditching their hives and going astray? Are they on strike
for a bigger piece of the honey pie?
"We are extremely alarmed," said Diana Cox-Foster, the professor of
Entomology at Penn State University and one of the leading members of a
specially convened colony-collapse disorder working group. "It is one of the
most alarming insect diseases ever to hit the US and it has the potential to
devastate the US beekeeping industry."
Too bad for the beekeeping industry, but what are we going to eat if our
fruits and vegetables don't get pollinated? No seeds, no plants, no food.
US Department of Agriculture: don't just sit there. Do something! The
delicate filaments of the web of life are being torn. We know that all life
is inter-connected. We learned that when we studied Ecology in first grade.
("...and the thigh bone's connected to the hip bone...")
Maybe these honey bees don't like the idea of having their hives put in
boxes, stacking the boxes up on flat-bed trucks and "shleping" them around
the country, pollinating strange fruit, doing "the man's" work who then goes
and steals their honey. It may do something to their psyche.
Investigators of "Colony Collapse Disorder" found a new set of symptoms. The
few bees left inside the hive were carrying "a tremendous number of
pathogens"--every known bee virus as well as fungal infections. Even "robber
bees", the wax moth and the hive beetle are afraid to enter the hives to
steal the honey.
What we have here may be another example of capitalist exploitation gone
awry. The big commercial beekeeping operations care more about production
and making money than they do about the welfare of the bees. Corporate
operators are trying to extract too much of the surplus value created by the
bees. It seems they are able to do that with people but not with bees.
To save our food supply--and our lives, the corporate bee exploiters better
go back to the drawing board and bone up on economics. The "invisible hand"
(laissez faire) is not going to make it in these circumstances.
There are two roads they can take. Go back to small commodity production or
advanced technology. If they can devise a new technology for pollinating
crops, like giant fans that can blow pollen around and get it to land on the
billions of blossoms, that might do the trick. Then the bees can go back to
doing what they do best--providing honey for us.
The other alternative might be better. Break up these giant corporations
that have assumed the status of people and get away with murder (literally).
They are more interested in arms production and provoking wars, which are
much more profitable than pollinating crops. Corporations are chartered by
the states. If they don't do the job they are chartered to do, their
charters can be revoked. That's how they were originally set up and that's
the law. The state giveth and the state can taketh away. But have you ever
heard of one charter being revoked? Not lately. They have grown too powerful
to be messed with. However, it can be done.
We can go back to small commodity production. Mom and Pop operations, as we
used to have. The bees will go back to work for us as they always did. The
Queen just has to say the word.
_______
SEFleischman
--
NOTICE: This post contains copyrighted material the use of which has not
always been authorized by the copyright owner. I am making such material
available to advance understanding of
political, human rights, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues. I
believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material as
provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright
Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107
"A little patience and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their
spells dissolve, and the people recovering their true sight, restore their
government to its true principles. It is true that in the meantime we are
suffering deeply in spirit,
and incurring the horrors of a war and long oppressions of enormous public
debt. But if the game runs sometimes against us at home we must have
patience till luck turns, and then we shall have an opportunity of winning
back the principles we have lost, for this is a game where principles are at
stake."
-Thomas Jefferson
By Stephen Fleischman
Created Mar 4 2007 - 10:51am
Don't mess with nature!
It may not be a nuclear war or global warming that brings us down, but the
mysterious disappearance of the honey bee. We've been messing with nature
since Adam plucked the first piece of fruit off the apple tree.
The New York Times, on Feb 23rd, reported on a beekeeper named David
Bradshaw in Visalia, California who got the shock of his life when he opened
his boxes one morning and found half of his 100 million bees missing. His
bees had been pollinating the almond crop in the Central Valley, the world's
largest almond producing area.
The honey bee, apis mellifera, is the most commonly domesticated species in
the United States and is used not only for producing honey, but more
importantly for pollinating crops. Hence, the consternation when it was
discovered recently that bees in 24 states across the country were
mysteriously disappearing. The bees leave their hives to seek pollen and
nectar and in the process pollinate the blossoms of the crop. But these bees
never return to the hive and the colony becomes defunct. The phenomenon has
been given the name, "Colony Collapse Disorder". The scientists are
scratching their heads. They don't understand what's happening here. At
least, not yet.
Apis mellifera provides pollination for more than 90 commercial crops grown
throughout the United States. Tens of billions of bees are involved in
"migratory" pollination, going from crop to crop. The value of the
agricultural output of these bee pollinated crops is estimated at more than
14 billion dollars annually. They include everything from oranges in Florida
to apples in Pennsylvania to blueberries in Maine and cranberries in
Massachusetts, to name a few.
Why are the bees ditching their hives and going astray? Are they on strike
for a bigger piece of the honey pie?
"We are extremely alarmed," said Diana Cox-Foster, the professor of
Entomology at Penn State University and one of the leading members of a
specially convened colony-collapse disorder working group. "It is one of the
most alarming insect diseases ever to hit the US and it has the potential to
devastate the US beekeeping industry."
Too bad for the beekeeping industry, but what are we going to eat if our
fruits and vegetables don't get pollinated? No seeds, no plants, no food.
US Department of Agriculture: don't just sit there. Do something! The
delicate filaments of the web of life are being torn. We know that all life
is inter-connected. We learned that when we studied Ecology in first grade.
("...and the thigh bone's connected to the hip bone...")
Maybe these honey bees don't like the idea of having their hives put in
boxes, stacking the boxes up on flat-bed trucks and "shleping" them around
the country, pollinating strange fruit, doing "the man's" work who then goes
and steals their honey. It may do something to their psyche.
Investigators of "Colony Collapse Disorder" found a new set of symptoms. The
few bees left inside the hive were carrying "a tremendous number of
pathogens"--every known bee virus as well as fungal infections. Even "robber
bees", the wax moth and the hive beetle are afraid to enter the hives to
steal the honey.
What we have here may be another example of capitalist exploitation gone
awry. The big commercial beekeeping operations care more about production
and making money than they do about the welfare of the bees. Corporate
operators are trying to extract too much of the surplus value created by the
bees. It seems they are able to do that with people but not with bees.
To save our food supply--and our lives, the corporate bee exploiters better
go back to the drawing board and bone up on economics. The "invisible hand"
(laissez faire) is not going to make it in these circumstances.
There are two roads they can take. Go back to small commodity production or
advanced technology. If they can devise a new technology for pollinating
crops, like giant fans that can blow pollen around and get it to land on the
billions of blossoms, that might do the trick. Then the bees can go back to
doing what they do best--providing honey for us.
The other alternative might be better. Break up these giant corporations
that have assumed the status of people and get away with murder (literally).
They are more interested in arms production and provoking wars, which are
much more profitable than pollinating crops. Corporations are chartered by
the states. If they don't do the job they are chartered to do, their
charters can be revoked. That's how they were originally set up and that's
the law. The state giveth and the state can taketh away. But have you ever
heard of one charter being revoked? Not lately. They have grown too powerful
to be messed with. However, it can be done.
We can go back to small commodity production. Mom and Pop operations, as we
used to have. The bees will go back to work for us as they always did. The
Queen just has to say the word.
_______
SEFleischman
--
NOTICE: This post contains copyrighted material the use of which has not
always been authorized by the copyright owner. I am making such material
available to advance understanding of
political, human rights, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues. I
believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material as
provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright
Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107
"A little patience and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their
spells dissolve, and the people recovering their true sight, restore their
government to its true principles. It is true that in the meantime we are
suffering deeply in spirit,
and incurring the horrors of a war and long oppressions of enormous public
debt. But if the game runs sometimes against us at home we must have
patience till luck turns, and then we shall have an opportunity of winning
back the principles we have lost, for this is a game where principles are at
stake."
-Thomas Jefferson