You are probably aware, no matter who you are or how environmentally engaged, that the mantra of "all the bees are dying" and "science does not know why" and "CCD is the modern scourge of Apis mellifera" turns up as a topic by major media and Big Green enviro groups as a constant refrain.
I am a long time donor to EarthJustice, a cabal of attorneys who fight for environmental causes, endangered species, and against the corporatacracy that seeks to appropriate everything on Earth for humans. I get a lot of mail asking for donations to fight the cause of dying honey bees.
Recently, a invitation appeared at my inbox, described this way--
I am a long time donor to EarthJustice, a cabal of attorneys who fight for environmental causes, endangered species, and against the corporatacracy that seeks to appropriate everything on Earth for humans. I get a lot of mail asking for donations to fight the cause of dying honey bees.
Recently, a invitation appeared at my inbox, described this way--
I was intrigued but also skeptical that some of the most important issues would NOT turn up in the presentation. I am finding many of the Big Enviros and the major media prefer to focus their blame for the annual 44% loss of honey bee hives on the chemicals applied to crops. Lack of forage diversity, lack of genetic diversity, trucking long miles in migratory pollination circuits, feeding HFCS and fake pollen are rarely mentioned as contributing to the demise of colonies. But especially galling is the lack of disclosure regarding beekeepers routinely TREATING their bees with chemicals IN THE HIVES. This almost never is articulated. So, I decided to write the presenter, Mr Peter Lehner, to find out exactly what he did or did not know about these issues and the impact on the industrial honey bee. Below is my letter.
Other considerations and impacts driving the loss of honey bees
Inbox
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Jan 20 (10 days ago)
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Hi, Mr Lehner---my hope for your presentation in LA is that it carries a more nuanced message regarding the decline in commercial honey bees. The hybrid population of Apis mellifera ligustica are THE commercial strain kept by not just industrial pollination outfits, but also almost ALL hobbyist beekeepers buying bees from breeders. The discussion of impacts has lacked disclosure of the other major chemically based abuses suffered by these bees. Major media almost never reveals (including the Summer 2014 E J quarterly, "Why Bees Die") ---that in treating for Varroa destructor (the exotic mite related to V. jacobsoni from SE Asia that lives in stasis with its original host, Apis cerana) --- the beekeepers are routinely treating colonies with various acaricides which affect the queen's fertility, affect navigation of forager bees, and affect brood development. These acaricides are lipid soluble, so they concentrate in the wax of combs, and have synergism with other chemicals and so-called "inert ingredients" in chemical formulations-- ( inert sounds benign, eh?) These chemicals are becoming rapidly ineffective as the mites develop resistance to the treatments.
http://journals.plos.org/plo
High Levels of Miticides and Agrochemicals in North American Apiaries: Implications for Honey Bee Health
Fluvalinate has been considered a relatively “safe” material for honey bees by the beekeeping industry; however its history is unclear with potentially significant implications for honey bee health. The original formulation of fluvalinate had an established lethal dose that killed 50% of the tested population (LD50) of 65.85 µg/bee for honey bees, which is considered relatively non-toxic [27]. Surprisingly, EPA in 1995 reported the LD50 of fluvalinate as 0.2 µg/bee, a level that is considered to be highly toxic [70] to honey bees. This is 330-fold more toxic than indicated by the original LD50, a value still quoted in current literature [e.g. 8]. Extraordinary enhancement of toxicity has been found with addition of commercial synergists to fluvalinate, where a topical LD50 of 0.00964 µg/bee, a 980-fold increase to their reported 9.45 µg/bee without the additive, occurred if 100 µg of piperonyl butoxide was applied 1 hr prior to the pyrethroid [71]. Centrally-acting neurotoxicants can sublethally impact a social bee more than the targeted pest due to the complex communication and sensory-based behaviors required to maintain community organization.
Widely-occurring Varroa mite resistance to fluvalinate, coumaphos and now amitraz may have developed rapidly as a result of their constant exposure to miticide-impregnated wax comb. Removal of these residues from wax may extend the usefulness of these or future miticides, by reducing this high selection pressure. It is generally agreed that the mite, Varroa destructorAnderson & Trueman, is playing a key role in the demise of honey bee health, and that intensive use of miticides for their control has led to evolution of wide-spread mite resistance among European strains of honey bees [72]–[75]. Fluvalinate and coumaphos, but not amitraz, are highly persistent in the hive with an estimated half-life in beeswax of 5 years [43]. Fortunately, a broad sampling of U.S. honey showed frequent but very low levels of coumaphos and fluvalinate up to 12 ppb, and only a few detections of lesser amounts of four other pesticides [76].
What is to be done?
First, genetic diversity in the breeding of bees must be recognized as the strategy Nature uses to develop resilience and resistance to pests. This is known as Darwinian concepts of selective pressure. For years, there has been the assertion that "there are no wild bees left---they all died from varroa" And my personal favorite from the conventional folks "you can't keep bees alive without chemicals !!" It is simply NOT true.
I have 28 hives of feral survivor stock bees from the "wilds" of the Los Angeles basin, never treated, not kept on foundations, never fed artificial diets. All over the world and certainly all over the US, there are thousands of us using the bees that survived the Vd invasion, continue to survive and live in all localities from the most tropical to the most severe. For too long, the research and scientific community have had as their goal to microscopically tease apart where on the bee genome the "resistant trait to V.d. resides" and artificially select for that. Why do they look for this trait if none of the bees they work with are resistant? Because the fact is as I wrote above---Apis cerana lives with the pest as a background stressor, and treatment free beeks (like ME) keep bothering them to say they are ignoring basic biological adaptive models. As well, the issue of marked resistance to chemicals in the mites is pushing beekeepers and researchers into a dead end.
Unfortunately, as we know from the example of "puppy mill" dogs (a example most people understand...) when we artificially select for human desired traits, we often saddle the resulting organism with all sorts of undesirable weaknesses---respiratory, joint, teeth, skeletal, and organ maladies which purebred animals are well known for. We see these genetic selection weaknesses in the Cornish Cross chicken and other industrial animal breeds.
Keep in mind, for eons, the relationship of humans to bees was not by purchasing bees from a breeder and shipping them, often from hundreds of miles away, but by using LOCAL SURVIVOR STOCK. The aim to discover the genetic "key" to V.d. is, in my opinion, largely driven by this desire to own the "product" Survivor bees that folks gather from their local environment is anathema to a business selling a product. (for a simple presentation of the concepts of adaptive pressure evolution in Apis mellifera, see this piece from National Geographic, May 2015---pay particular attention to the last 5 paragraphs, quoting Phil Chandler of the UK
The commercial bee world has been slow to accept that they are in a bind with their weak, medication-dependent bees (there are supposedly only some 600 queen lines used in the US) but I am not the only one pushing this idea of allowing more natural selective pressure models to get the weak bees out of the picture. Tom Seeley of Cornell University (eminent researcher of Apis mellifera and writer of many books, most famously, "Honey Bee Democracy")
A short video of his summary presentation at the BeeAudaciousConference in December in California is a good introduction to the principles---
Now, I know I have dumped a lot out of the bucket here, but I tried to be organized in a very technical subject area. My three main concerns are these:
1) the regular use of chemicals IN THE HIVES, by the commercial pollinator companies is a significant, but rarely examined stressor for the migratory bee colonies. MOST hobbyist beekeepers are also using this treatment regimen with their breeder bees. The bulk of the attention is on Ag chemicals applied to crops and the residues encountered by pollinators
2) the lack of genetic diversity, the heavy manipulation (even Artificial Insemination of queens) of the breeder bee stock has resulted in extremely deficient resilience/fitness to the varroa mite and its vectored diseases. This is only getting worse using the typical management practices.
3) Feral survivor stock, such as the bees I catch and keep in Los Angeles and that others are keeping worldwide, represent the best hope for the defeat of scourges that are plaguing Apis mellifera.
I hope I have enlarged your understanding of the issues we are facing in the honey bee "crisis" Certainly, Ag chemicals, loss of diverse habitat, trucking, feeding HFCS and fake pollen, and GMO monocultures are significant insults. But these others are very important too, and rarely articulated.
I would appreciate a response. Susan Rudnicki, Manhattan Beach CA keeper of feral honey bees, rescue bees from structures, teach, sell honey
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Mr Lehner wrote back this response after a few days, CLEARLY not understanding the issues I was trying to point out
Susan,
I’ve now had the chance to rad this a bit more and ask around, including several beekeepers (including my brother in law). The beekeepers I’ve talked to manage hives for honey production, not pollination, and are much smaller than the big California ones.
All agree you make some good points and that genetic diversity, in-hive pesticide use (the ones I talked to never do that), and food source are all important as well as pesticides on the crops that the bees are pollinating. Thank you for increasing my understanding.
Best,
Peter
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So, I attempted to bring the discussion back to the issue of chemical acaricides routinely used in hives by the people growing the food that would be the focus of his presentation address----not his brother-in-law or others he spoke to.
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OK---thank you. But may I point out, the hive loss data and statistics cited by the media and the enviro groups in their campaigns do not refer to the individuals you talked to---those stats don't relate to me either. The presentation at Craft is going to be referring to the big commercial pollinator operations and THEIR losses since the overwhelming majority of crops grown in the US that require pollination are using migratory operations to service the crop. All the insults I described are impacting THOSE bees, but the media and Big Green fail to mention them. There is a lack of disclosure of significant insults.
Just some clarification. Susan
