Blog:Bee colony collapses solved

HoneyBeeAnatomy.png

At long last, the mystery of the sudden colony collapse disorder among bees has been explained. Many theories, including pesticides, stress from being moved around, exposure to genetically modified crops, and others were put forward. The colonies would one day seemingly go crazy, with all the bees flying off in all directions to die.

The answer it seems, is a combination of a certain fungus and a certain virus infecting the colonies. One or the other did not cause the problem, but combined, their affect is fatal. The discovery of the problem is a great step, since they can now attack the problem. Fungicide seems likely to be important in the fight.

Many plants depend on bees for pollination, as well as important food crops depending on it for fruit production. The problem was causing major economic and ecological problems. Now our hardworking little friends can hopefully get back to the business of pollination and honey production... and we can share some of the fruits of their labor.

--Raffi 16:01, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

This is a blog entry on Gardenology.org. To return to the main blogs page, click here.