The Bees are disappearing

[Mermade]

I have a steady stream of honey bees coming to pollinate my plants and I live in Los Angeles. My son and I were watching them come and go just the other day. I wonder where they live? This is simply anecdotal and the point is simply that I find it interesting that with disappearing bee populations, I'm well provided for in about as an urban environment as you can get.

For the ecosystem the loss of bees is of greater concern, but for nostalgia's sake I am saddened by the loss of the fireflies. I've noticed over the years returning to the Midwest that they are almost gone. I remember the air being thick with them as a kid and making lanterns. The last time I went back in the summer I saw one the entire trip.

[captZEEbo]

[ QUOTE ]
This article was released today, the link works for me? but yes, the gist of it is that a lot of our crops, ecosystem, etc rely on bees to pollinate. I think it quoted albert einstien as saying "if the bees are all gone "man would have only four years of life left".

[/ QUOTE ] snopes

Looks like this quote is false and was invented as political propaganda sometime in the past. Other people point out that whoever said it completely overlooked the role other species play in pollination.

[The once and future king]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
This article was released today, the link works for me? but yes, the gist of it is that a lot of our crops, ecosystem, etc rely on bees to pollinate. I think it quoted albert einstien as saying "if the bees are all gone "man would have only four years of life left".

[/ QUOTE ] snopes

Looks like this quote is false and was invented as political propaganda sometime in the past. Other people point out that whoever said it completely overlooked the role other species play in pollination.

[/ QUOTE ]

WTF, I saw a programme on TV yesterday which specifically mentioned the Einstein quote, and then went on to say that it had been tested by scientists, and was found to be wrong. Man would in fact have 9 years.

[Twistofsin]

More bees are dying because more factory farmed bees are being used globally. These bees, like most other globalized food commodities are of poor quality.

They are not acclimated to the enviroments they are shipped to, are not genetically diverse, and have been raised in suboptimal conditions.

[vanwely]

Just paid $295 to remove a horde of bees from above my garage. They are amazing. I put some concrete over the hole they were going through and the next day they went into a triangular hammer formation and slowly cut a hole in the concrete. They really know how to coordinate themselves well.

[morphball]

This site has a lot of info on Colony Collapse Disorder

MAAREC - Colony Collapse Disorder

[Paul B.]

Well, at least Beedogs are still around.

[spider]

This article says BFD about the bees. Dunno anything about the author but she sounds like she knows what she is talking about. Even says something about bee's crappy DNA being the longer term problem.

Slate article

[Marnixvdb]

haha why would Einstein say such a thing, what would he know about bees?

[rutang]

[ QUOTE ]

For the ecosystem the loss of bees is of greater concern, but for nostalgia's sake I am saddened by the loss of the fireflies. I've noticed over the years returning to the Midwest that they are almost gone. I remember the air being thick with them as a kid and making lanterns. The last time I went back in the summer I saw one the entire trip.

[/ QUOTE ]

maybe if you hadn't killed so many making lanterns, there would be some fireflies left. at the rate fireflies multiply, the ones you killed making lanterns as a kid have probably erased millions of implied fireflies.

I'm sure that there is some real research going on as to whether or not fireflies are dissapearing, but I always assumed that it wasn't that they were dissapearing, but that we did't see them anymore because we spend so much less time at night in unlit areas.

I still see them on unlit backroads, and in the occasional late night backwoods walk. My neighborhood as a kid had plenty of fireflies, but about 10 years ago they installed a ton of street lamps, so now when I visit my folks, I just wouldn't see the fireflies as easy.