Pesticides Kill Oregon Bumblebees...

Jun 23, 2013 by

Pesticides Kill Oregon Bumblebees

This story both deeply saddens me and gives me hope. For those of you who haven't heard, earlier this week a blanket of dead and dying bumblebees were found on a parking lot in Oregon. The estimated loss was around 50,000 bumblebees; other insects, such as honeybees, were killed as well. Customers found the bumblebees at the base of a group of European Linden trees, which had recently been sprayed with a pesticide called Safari--a neonicotinoid pesticide produced by Valent. After the mass die-off, researchers set out to find out if the culprit was the pesticide or the tree itself; apparently linden tree nectar can be toxic in high doses. As of Saturday, the Oregon State Department of Agriculture (ODA) announced that "the bee deaths are directly related to a pesticide application on the...

read more

Our Supermarkets without Bees

Jun 22, 2013 by

Our Supermarkets without Bees

People often ask me what will happen if all the bees die. Whole Foods (as part of their "Share the Buzz" campaign) recently posted a great photo (below) to illustrate this visually, since it's quite hard to really comprehend the role that bees play in our agriculture. I find the photo rather haunting. When people ask about dying bees, they usually mean honeybees. But the truth is, many pollinators are responsible for the fruits in the photos, not just honeybees. And those pollinators are being affected by some of the same causes that are impacting honeybees: mites, pesticides, diseases, and lack of habitat and nutritional variety (i.e. not enough flowers). A recent devastating bumblebee die-off in Oregon (over 25,000 bumblebees were found dead in a mall parking lot) has led to research on pesticides that...

read more

I heart bumblebees! Part Three: How we can help....

Mar 21, 2009 by

I heart bumblebees! Part Three: How we can help.

I watched the documentary King Corn last night and LOVED it. It's about two men who decide to farm an acre of land in Iowa and grow corn to understand just how the crop gets into so much of our food (and bodies). It's poignant, interesting and thoughtful, and I couldn't help but think how similar the issues they're looking at are to the ones that have caused bee decline. Basically, we're both exploring the downward spiral of agriculture, and its effects on our environmental and bodily health. The King Corn website also offers some great ways to address our agricultural system on the "take action" tab in their website, which gave me some good ideas for this post. So let's get on with it, shall we? How can we help out bumblebees (and...

read more

I heart bumblebees! Part Two: Why the bumblebee is in decline....

Mar 14, 2009 by

I heart bumblebees! Part Two: Why the bumblebee is in decline.

So, why have the bumblebees been in decline? Many of the articles I found concerned the U.K., which doesn't mean that the decline isn't happening in the U.S., it's just that the U.K. has been a hotbed of recent bee research. An article titled "Decline of Bumblebees (Bombus) in the North American Midwest" states: "The nature and extent of bumble bee decline in North America is poorly understood due mainly to a lack of baseline and long term data." Clearly, there are reports of bee decline in the U.S. as well, and I think that the two phenomenons are closely related. So let's return to David Goulson's analysis. In the last blog, I wrote about bumblebee's unique characteristics, but let's point out some of the main ones that are contributing to their decline. Bumblebees...

read more

I heart bumblebees! Part One: Cool facts about Bumblebees....

Mar 11, 2009 by

I heart bumblebees! Part One: Cool facts about Bumblebees.

So, I was speaking with a colleague the other day who just happens to have a family history in beekeeping. Her father (if I'm correct) is a third generation beekeeper and also an etymologist. Anyway, we were talking about her family's bee business when she mentioned that over 5 species of bumblebees had disappeared in the U.K. recently. 5 species? That surprised me, so of course--since I teach research writing and I'm into bees--I had to go and research the fact. I found two articles that talked about this phenomenon. One was titled "To Be or Not to Bee..." by Marianna H. Horn and Peter G. Kevan and another (not so subtly named) was called "The Demise of the Bumblebee in Britain," by David Goulson. Both articles had some enlightening things to say about...

read more