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Thread: Bees Added To U.S. Endangered Species List For 1st Time

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    Captain Obvious's Avatar Senior Member
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    Bees Added To U.S. Endangered Species List For 1st Time

    http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-w...t-for-1st-time

    The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has given endangered status to seven species of yellow-faced bees native to the islands. These are "the first bees in the country to be protected under the Endangered Species Act," according to the Xerces Society, which advocated for the new designation.
    my junk is ugly

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    That's really sad, not just for the bees, but for everyone. If bee populations drop too much, we will be facing food shortages.
    In quoting my post, you affirm and agree that you have not been goaded, provoked, emotionally manipulated or otherwise coerced into responding.



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    Well them are special bees.I bet they don't even sting people.
    I actually mean that and am not being facetious.
    My bees never stung me.
    Wait,no..There was that time i walked out barefooted and one was half-dead in the grass and stung my foot.
    He never flew anymore.Grr.
    It's not the whole hive's fault, though.
    They're nice bees.
    I even got lit up by about 50 Africanized bees @ work then came home and stuck head in my bees' hole.
    They're still nice bees.
    I don't even think it's the same colony now.
    One moved out,went down to the hardware place;took their outdoor section over.
    Same colony,I think during a hurricane they vacated the tree and clung to a fence.
    Hundreds if not thousands died.
    Next thing I know there's somebody new here.
    Last edited by PeoplePower; 10-03-2016 at 09:57 PM.

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    Luckily bees can breed fast. Maryland banned the neonicotinoids pesticides, a possible cause of the colony collapse problem.
    ΜOΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ


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    How'd bees even get to Hawaii in the first place?

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    Quote Originally Posted by Peter1469 View Post
    Luckily bees can breed fast. Maryland banned the neonicotinoids pesticides, a possible cause of the colony collapse problem.
    I believe the real problem is well manicured lawns. Let the weeds grow.

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    Lightbulb

    Shining a light on Colony Collapse Disorder... Scientists See the Light with a Novel Way to Save Bees November 15, 2016 - It can be hard to make sense of what is going on with bees around the world.
    But we do know a few things: neonicotinoids, a class of pesticide used by commercial farmers in the United States, can make bees more susceptible to illness and infestation by parasites like the Varroa mite. We also know that in 2006, beekeepers began reporting a big problem: in some cases, 50 to 90 percent of the bees in their hives were just disappearing. These massive losses got the collective name Colony Collapse Disorder. We also know that bees are big money. They pollinate an estimated 15 billion dollars of U.S. produce a year. That alone was enough to scare the heck out of farmers and grocers everywhere. But, we also know, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, that "reported cases of CCD have declined substantially over the last five years." And domesticated bee hives seem to be on the comeback trail. And just about a year ago, the EPA put out an enormous reseach paper that concluded that neonicotinoids can indeed pose a risk to the health of domesticated honeybees. The report went into great detail on the effects of the most common neonicotinoid, imidacloprid, and found that neonicotinoids don't cause much harm when used on "corn, berries and tobacco," but can be absorbed in great enough amounts to do damage when sprayed on cotton and citrus plants. The U.S. is coming to the game pretty late because Europe banned the use of imidacloprid in 2013. New research sheds light on how the damage is done When you lay out all this information on paper, what becomes clear is that a lot of what's happening in the bee world is still a mystery, especially why exactly domesticated bees are on the comeback trail. But there is no question that neonicotinoids, particularly imidacloprid, can do a lot of damage to bees when enough of it gets into their systems, and their hives and honey. That's the focus of some new research from University College London. VOA spoke with Glen Jeffery, one of the authors of a paper being published today in PLoS One on neonicotinoids and bees. Jeffery's work focused on how neonicotinoids affect the bees on a cellular level, specifically how the pesticides affect mitochondria. "Mitochondria are the batteries in our cells that make the energy they need in the form of ATP," a molecule that transports the energy, he explained. "Mitochondrial decline is a key feature of the action of the insecticide, so ATP goes down when bees are exposed to it." In other words, the pesticide pushes the bee's cells into overdrive and they use up all their energy, and then just simply become immobile, unable to move or feed themselves and they die of starvation. Seeing a solution in light But science is a funny thing. Jeffery and his team were initially doing research on aging, not necessarily bees, so they knew that "...mitochondrial function can be improved with specific wavelengths of light" and light therapy was shown to improve mobility and life span in flies. And here's the great part: Jeffery says the idea of using a similar therapy on bees "occurred to me (a visual scientist) cycling home in the rain after reading about the mode of action of the insecticide and I thought that the light should help." So, he took the idea to the lab. "The researchers used four groups of bees from commercial hives, with more than 400 bees in each colony. Two groups were exposed to a neonicotinoid, Imidacloprid, for ten days, with one group also being treated with light therapy over the same period." Jeffery says he was "surprised by the positive impact." The bees that were poisoned but got light therapy "had significantly better mobility and survival rates, living just as long and functioning just as well as bees that had not been poisoned," while the bees that didn't get light therapy showed less mobility and higher death rates. The team also found that the light therapy -- "15 minutes of near infrared light (670nm) twice daily" -- didn't affect the bees' behavior because they can't see the light. So now Jeffery says he and his team are "working to develop a small device that can be fitted into a commercial hive, which could be an economic solution to a problem with very widespread implications." Talk about seeing the light. VIDEO

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    Exclamation

    Number of observed colonies have plummeted by about 87 percent...

    Rusty Patched Bumblebee Declared Endangered
    January 10, 2017 — The rusty patched bumblebee has become the first bee species in the continental U.S. to be declared endangered after suffering a dramatic population decline over the past 20 years, federal officials said Tuesday.
    The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service told The Associated Press it was adding the bee to the endangered list, and would develop a recovery plan encouraging people to provide more habitat and reduce pesticide usage. Many of the steps needed to rescue the rusty patched bumblebee might also help other struggling bees and monarch butterflies, which pollinate a wide variety of plants, including cultivated fruits and vegetables, officials said. “Pollinators are small but mighty parts of the natural mechanism that sustains us and our world,” said Tom Melius, the service's Midwest regional director. “Without them, our forests, parks, meadows and shrublands, and the abundant, vibrant life they support, cannot survive, and our crops require laborious, costly pollination by hand.”


    Rusty patched bumblebees alight on a flower in Peoria, Illinois

    The rusty patched bumblebee buzzed across the East Coast and much of the Midwest in high numbers as recently as the 1990s. Today, only scattered populations remain in 13 states — Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia and Wisconsin — and the Canadian province of Ontario. The bee’s historic range and the number of observed colonies have plummeted by about 87 percent since the late 1990s.

    Cause of decline unknown

    The crash happened so quickly that few researchers took notice until the damage was largely done. They're investigating a number of potential causes, including disease, pesticide exposure, habitat loss, climate change and the domino effect of falling populations making it harder for bees to find suitable mates.

    The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, which petitioned the government to list the rusty patched bumblebee as endangered, previously said the bumblebee's decline probably was caused by the spread of bacteria or viruses from bumblebees raised commercially to those in the wild. The group, based in Portland, Oregon, also blamed widespread use of long-lasting insecticides. “The Fish and Wildlife Service has relied upon the best available science and we welcome this decision,” Rich Hatfield, the society's senior conservation biologist, said Tuesday. “Addressing the threats that the rusty patched bumblebee faces will help not only this species, but countless other native pollinators that are so critical to the functioning of natural ecosystems and agriculture.”

    Continent-wide concern

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    Exclamation

    Bees still dyin' in droves...

    1/3 of U.S. Honeybee Colonies Died Last Year
    May 26, 2017 | America's beekeepers watched as a third of the country's honeybee colonies were lost over the last year, part of a decade-long die-off experts said may threaten our food supply.
    The annual survey of roughly 5,000 beekeepers showed the 33% dip from April 2016 to April 2017. The decrease is small compared to the survey's previous 10 years, when the decrease hovered at roughly 40%. From 2012 to 2013, nearly half of the nation's colonies died. "I would stop short of calling this 'good' news," said Dennis vanEngelsdorp, an assistant professor at the University of Maryland. "Colony loss of more than 30% over the entire year is high. It's hard to imagine any other agricultural sector being able to stay in business with such consistently high losses." The research, published Thursday, is the work of the nonprofit Bee Informed Partnership and the Apiary Inspectors of America. The death of a colony doesn't necessarily mean a loss of bees, explains vanEngelsdorp, a project director at the Bee Informed Partnership. A beekeeper can salvage a dead colony, but doing so comes at labor and productivity costs.


    An annual survey shows a third of America's bee colonies were lost over the past year, and over 10 years, the numbers are even more troubling

    That causes beekeepers to charge farmers more for pollinating crops and creates a scarcity of bees available for pollination. It's a trend that threatens beekeepers trying to make a living and could lead to a drop-off in fruits and nuts reliant on pollination, vanEngelsdor said. One in every three bites of food, van Engelsdorp said, is directly or indirectly pollinated by honeybees, who pollinate about $15 billion worth of U.S. crops each year. Almonds, for instance, are completely reliant on honeybee pollination. "Keeping bees healthy is really essential in order to meet that demand," said vanEngelsdorp. He said there are concerns it won't.


    U.S. beekeepers reported they lost 33% of their honey bee colonies over the past year.

    So what's killing the honeybees? Parasites, diseases, poor nutrition, and pesticides among many others. The chief killer is the varroa mite, a "lethal parasite," which researchers said spreads among colonies. "This is a complex problem," said Maryland graduate student Kelly Kulhanek, who assisted with the study. "Lower losses are a great start, but it's important to remember that 33% is still much higher than beekeepers deem acceptable. There is still much work to do."


    This summary chart shows the results of an 11-year annual survey that tracks honey bee colony losses in the United States, spanning 2006-2017.

    vanEngelsdorp said people can do their part to save bee colonies by buying honey from a local beekeeper, becoming a beekeeper, avoiding using pesticides in your yard and making room for pollinators, such as honeybees, in your yard. "Bees are good indicators of the landscape as a whole," said Nathalie Steinhauer, who led data collection on the project. "To keep healthy bees, you need a good environment and you need your neighbors to keep healthy bees. Honeybee health is a community matter."

    https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/...re/348418001/#

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    Quote Originally Posted by waltky View Post
    How'd bees even get to Hawaii in the first place?
    Porous borders.
    I have a big cook.

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