But not on a commercial scale that is required right now.
I’m calling your bluff on this one, since it’s still too darn cold here in Cleveland for bees, or wasps, and snow is probably still covering that rotting heap, and nobody is mowing right now!
And don’t cut down your fruit trees! I need apples for applesauce…all my trees have died…so call me and I’ll come pick! But the pears you can keep…my pear tree is still producing way more than it needs to.
The apiculture link does refer to the phenomenon as a disease. I do not trust Wiki as the sole source for any factual material, but I usually include a Wiki link because the articles there are usually in layman’s terms and Dopers seem so fond of the site.
According to the article in my local paper, the Virginia Department of Agriculture has requested $250,000 to promote beekeeping in VA. The Ag website refers to the missing bees as a “dilemma”.
People around here are quite concerned about the bees. The mites were bad enough, and now this. We had an article in the paper last week about new research into a different kind of bee which pollinates more quickly but does not produce lots of honey; they are hoping to introduce it into orchards for agricultural work in a few years.
I noticed bees were missing in Michigan about 5 years ago. I was walking my dogs through a field of dandelions and didn’t see any at all. After that I was on the look out and found practically none.
A few weeks later I met a guy who was a beekeeper. he said a mite had wiped out every one of them. I believe the whole state was wiped out. The beekeeper said he was going to buy bees from out of state hoping for crossbreeding. Michigan bees are very good honey producers.
They have not come back any way near what they were once.
Aren’t bees towards the r-selection end of the spectrum? Hence they can easily restore their
former numbers, over the long term. Short term of course this is serious.
Weird.
Was the word “Croatoan” inscribed in a nearby tree, perchance?
You win the thread.
Neither; they’d both get eaten by a bat.
Yeah. I mean, joking aside, it’s pretty damned ominous.
Bees?
What about the widespread decline in amphibian populations that’s been noted for over two decades?
The lily pond’s almost half full, folks.
I just want to make it clear that I have nothing to do with the missing bees. Nothing what-so-damn-ever. I mean, yes, I have been working on a bee-control device in my spare time, but only for the intellectual exercise, and, anyway, to build a working prototype I’d need hundreds of millions of US dollars, such as that which disappeared from Iraq last year while I was there, and I had nothing to do with that either. Anyway–anybody who claims that I am amassing of army of killer bees with which to conquer the Earth is a lying sack of crap, and if there is any justice will shortly be stung to death by a swarm of the bees in question. Said swarm, incidentally, is not in my basement, because I have nothing to do with the missing bees.
It’s cold in the Chicago area too, but I am sporting a genuine mosquito bite, acquired just today, on my right shoulder. 
I’m no fan of stinging/biting critters, but this does sound a bit ominous. Do seagulls eat bees, by any chance? We’ve had what seems to be an enormous surge in gulls around here in the last few years. I know correlation does not equal causation, but there’ve been big animal losses at the local zoos and there’s a definite decline in the chipmunk population around here, both of which coincided with the population explosion of gulls.
Won’t somebody think of the larvae?
Now did you actually see the mosquito? And how was your shoulder exposed when it’s so darned cold out? I’m only saying, because I’ve had some itchy bites recently in areas covered by my shirt, and my best guess is spiders, since I checked and the cats have no fleas. I usually aquired the bites during the night when I’m not wearing a shirt.
I first heard about the drastic drop in the bees population a few years ago and I’m still surprised there hasn’t been more concern in the news media, who are usually quick to jump on a story about a slight breeze picking up from the west and recommend that we all stock up on emergency supplies. It’s a quite serious situation, and nary a mention in passing. I personally haven’t seen a bee while mowing or gardening in several years, though the yellow jackets and the wasps seem fine. But no bodies? That is bizarre.
When my offspring was 2 he said to me, “I had 10 ideas but the bees took them.” Then he wandered off. Now I’m wondering…
Weeeeelllllll… no, I didn’t see the mosquito, but this is much more like a mosquito bite than it is a spider bite.
Wild-ass theory #2: I, too, have noticed an upswing in the wasps and yellowjackets, and have read assorted newsy bits that they are an introduced species, sting multiple times, are omnivores (which is why they flock to trash cans at fast food places) and are aggressive (of that I have personal experience), none of which applies to honeybees. Is it possible that the wasps/yellowjackets have crowded out the honeybees, like grey squirrels have crowded out the red ones?
As far as I can tell bumble bees have been doing all the pollination on our raspberry bushes the past several years. I haven’t seen a honey bee around here in a long time.
Hmm, aquick Google search on “bee decline” turns up numerous news items from the past several years, in fairly major outlets. Seems it’s not the media that has been unobservant…
Is anyone else reminded of Pelligrino’s Dust?
In that book, the ecological collapse started small, with fungus gnats, and propagated upward, to dust mites, bees, bats…
We’re so screwed.