The Many Potential Causes Of Domesticated Bee Colony Collapse Syndrome

Beekeepers have always suffered losses of their bees but in the old times those losses were gradual and the beekeeper was always able to find the cause, usually a bacteria, mite or some other germ and take pertinent action. Not so with colony collapse disorder, (sometimes called colony collapse syndrome or colony collapse disease). With colony collapse disease more domesticated bees are dying faster with no perceptible reason and because only the queen and a few worker bees are left alive the colony dies.

The vanishing honey bees is still a mystery. As yet there has been no firm evidence to point to any one cause for their end of life. This has led to the presumption that there is more than one cause to colony collapse disorder (CCD). Viable causes are:

Genetically modified crops

An experiment carried out by a beekeeper, John McDonald, seems to suggest that genetically modified crops could be the cause of colony collapse syndrome. He placed eight domesticated bee colonies in an area where the honey bees would have no contact with genetically modified crops and an equivalent number of honey bee hives on farms that grew GMO's. At the end of the season in October the results of the honey collecting of both sets of honeybees was examined. The results between the two sets of bee colonies were very distinctive.

The 8 non-GMO bee colonies produced 150 pounds of honey, per hive, in the over-wintering brood supers. Plus, between them, the eight colonies produced 200 pounds of extra honey. The farm bees, on the other hand, had produced no extra honey and had not even packed the over-wintering brood supers. These farm honey bees will require feeding in order to ride out the winter.

Pesticides

The pesticide believed to be the main culprit in causing colony collapse disorder is nicotine-based Clothianidin, an insecticide in the neonicotinoid family. In Germany investigators found that 99 percent of zapped bees had high levels of Clothianidin in their bodies. As a result the seven pesticides in the neonicotinoid family have been provisionally forbidden.

In the US imidacloprid seems to be the pesticide causing the most colony collapse disorder. For example in North Dakota one third of colonies died after imidacloprid was applied on oil seed rape.

Mobile phones

Is the electromagnetic radiation given off by mobile phobes interfering with the bee's navigating system thus preventing the bees from finding-out their way back to the hive. Some detective work carried out by Dr Jochen Kuhn shows that honeybees do not like going back to their hives when a mobile phone is positioned near the bee hive. If honeybees are trying to avoid mobile phone radiation then this could make plain why they are getting lost and unable to find their way home.

Foodstuff

Honey bees normally use natural material like pollen, sap, nectar, or other botanical materials, for modification into honey. When beekeepers take away this honey, which the bees would normally partake of over winter, and replace it with High Fructose Corn Syrup a natural raw food is being replaced with a highly processed dead foodstuff. HFCS is lacking in the many minerals and vitamins found in honey so the bees are forced to eat inferior food which results in their poor health and incapacitated immune systems.

So what is the cause of bee colony collapse disorder. Probably a combination of all of the above though GMOs, and the neonicotinoid pesticides, seem to be the main factors which has caused the dramatic increase in bees disappearing.

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