Cell Phones Aren't Killing Bees After All

radioweather writes "A couple of weeks ago, there was a nutty idea discussed in The Independent that claimed the electromagnetic radiation from cell phones was causing bees to become disoriented, preventing them from returning to the hive. The flimsy cell phone argument was used to explain Colony Collapse Disorder. Today the LA Times reports that researchers at UC San Francisco have uncovered what they believe to be the real culprit: a parasitic fungus. Other researchers said Wednesday that they too had found the fungus, a single-celled parasite called Nosema ceranae, in affected hives from around the country."

Comments

Re:Why blame everything else?

[Red Flayer]

It's called foulbrood. It's what kills beehives. Any apiculturist (beekeeper) can tell you all about it.

And any beekeeper worth his salt would tell you that foulbrood is bacterial, not fungal, and is treated with tetracycline antibiotics -- Terramycin is what I used when I kept bees.

In addition, foulbrood exists in almost every hive -- it's hives that are weakened for other reasons that are really damaged by it. So, for example, a hive that did not have adequate food supplies (such as if bees didn't return to the hive with pollen) would be more likely to have a huge foulbrood problem.

It's this knee-jerk environmentalism. Everyone was quick to blame cell phones, or some other junk science bullshit, for a problem that didn't exist.

Yes, there was a lot of speculation that was evenutally found to be false. That's science for ya.

/Never mind the fact that several bee parasites are ravaging North American hives due to successive mild winters, which may or may not be due to anthropogenic environmental problems.

Swing that razor one more time.

[pragma_x]

I'm not supporting the "mobile phone" argument one bit, but I'm still skeptical of this as the reason. The fungus plays a role, as it really is the simplest explaination for CCD; it's just the smoking gun. You need to slice with the razor one more time.

Ask yourself: why is this fungus so successful at killing domestic honeybees, why now, and how is it moving from hive to hive so well?

I think the answer comes down to one of a few possibilities:
* The honeybees are stressed (diet, environment, travel, etc) and can't fight the infection
* The plants the bees pollenate are favoring growth of this fungus like never before (GMO's, pesticides, fertilizers, etc)
* Hives are being kept in containers/conditions that favor fungus growth
* The fungus is an invasive species and hence, the bees have no/little natural defense against it

The first one, unfortunately, seems most likely to me. We can *hope* that it's one or more of the others, since they're much more fixable IMO; they pretty much come down to "doing things they way grandpa did" and see if things change.