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Bees Are Building Nests With Our Waste Plastic
Daniel_Stuckey writes "In a paper published in the Ecological Society of America's journal Ecosphere, researchers from York University and the University of Guelph in Canada explained that while plastic waste has previously been shown to have devastating impacts on the environment, less attention has been given to the resourcefulness of species in the face of their changing surroundings. "Plastic waste pervades the global landscape," they wrote. "Although adverse impacts on both species and ecosystems have been documented, there are few observations of behavioral flexibility and adaptation in species, especially insects, to increasingly plastic-rich environments.""
"If it’s true that plastic is not degradable, well, the planet will simply incorporate plastic into a new paradigm: the earth plus plastic. The earth doesn’t share our prejudice toward plastic. Plastic came out of the earth. The earth probably sees plastic as just another one of its children. Could be the only reason the earth allowed us to be spawned from it in the first place. It wanted plastic for itself. Didn’t know how to make it. Needed us. Could be the answer to our age-old egocentric philosophical question, “Why are we here?”
Plastic asshole.”
The plastic microparticles will inevitably appear in our honey. The filtration currently performed on honey is mainly for visual appearance,
Do it yourself, because no one else will do it yourself. [beta blockade 10-17 Feb]
The bees aren't alone, I've seen plastic, ribbons, string, mylar, and cigarette butts incorporated into bird nests. Crows in fact seem to deliberately incorporate cigarette butts into their nests to exterminate pests.
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
The plastic microparticles will inevitably appear in our honey.
In order to make plastic "Plastic" many types of chemicals were used. Some of the chemicals make the plastic "elastic", while some others make them tough, or heat resistant, or whatever characteristics the end-product form of plastic is supposed to be.
Some of those chemicals, when enter our bodies, can mimic the effect of Estrogen ( http://www.fastcompany.com/173... ) and mess up our body's hormonal balances.
Those insects might be resourceful, but the same estrogen mimicking chemical could also mess up the bee's biology too.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Bees love decorating their house with plastic garbage too? How long before we get a site dedicated to white-trash bees
Monstar L