Could dying bees mean the end of apples?
Posted by seumasach on November 26, 2008
Emma Clark
25th November, 2008
MILLIONS of bees disappearing from the world every year could mean the end to the fruits and nuts we love, a St Albans bee keeper has warned.
Eileen Remnant met Hertfordshire MEP Richard Hewitt last week to find out more about the virus responsible for killing off honey bees – which are relied on to pollinate a third of our food.
Eileen, who owns four colonies with a population of 40,000 bees in Potters Crouch, said: “People don’t realise how important bees are to our food supply.
“If the disease carries on killing as many bees as it is at the moment then I can see fruits and nuts becoming a real rarity – even fruits like apples and pears.
“It will happen in my lifetime if something isn’t done.”
In Britain, not-for-profit bee keepers are responsible for the pollination of crops but across the world, especially in large countries including America, pollination is a commercial industry with millions of bees transported around the country in trucks.
It is these bees which are prevalent with the virus. Mr Hewitt intends to raise the issue in European Parliament to insist on careful treatment of bees worldwide to help quash the spread of the disease any further.
Mr Hewitt said: “I’m calling for more research into this problem.
“The dissention of the bee population is more damaging to our environment that you might first think.
“I met with Eileen to get an idea of what’s happening on the ground.”
In These New Times 
inthesenewtimes said
The magnitude of this disaster is beginning to dawn on us. Consider the following:
-not only bees but most of the other pollinators are disappearing. We can see this for ourselves: next to no butterflies, moths , beetles, houseflies etc.
-before calling for more research isn’t it worth looking at the research which has already been done. I have personally been in contact with Duncan MacFadyean, chief scientific officer to the Oppenheimer company, who has assured me that their research confirms the lethal effect of human generated EM radiation on insects.
-the German scientist Ulrich Warnke has been studying the effects of EM radiation on bees since the 1970s. You can read his recent report here:
http://inthesenewtim
es.com/2008/09/29/th
e-birds-the-bees-and
-mankind/
He has also addressed the Royal Society and circulated an open letter to beekeepers. All his efforts have been completely ignored by government, media, experts and, for the most part, beekeepers.
-EM radiation has been used commercially for some time to eliminate insects. See:
http://inthesenewtim
es.com/2008/05/15/th
e-disappearing-bees-
ccd-and-electromagne
tic-radiation/
-The Penn State university as well as other investigations have between them ruled out varroa, nosema and other viruses as well as insecticdes as causing CCD and yet they refuse to consider EM radiation despite a substantial and long standing body of scientific work pointing towards it.(see above timeline)
– the British government refuses to recognise the presence of CCD in Britain despite being informed of it by British beekeepers.
We can conclude, therefore, that not only is this just about the most urgent ecological issue that we face, but that it has become highly politicized and that the EM connection has been given the status of a “controversial” or “conspiracy” theory( and contributions outlining this connection to Indymedia have been removed on this basis) . If we are to make any headway at all I suggest that this connection be considered seriously and worthy of objective investigation along with other theories.
Aurelius said
The same thing is happening in Italy too and in others EU countries, the responsible has been identified quite clearly as a new kind of seeds (usually mais seeds, at least in Italy) covered with a thin film made of plastic material and a substance named neonicotinoid. This should protect the seeds from the insects / pests. During the seeding small particles of neonicotinod go into the air and kill almost instantaneously the bees and other insects, especially the bees flying over the fields. I wonder how many tons of neonic. goes into the air in US with your huge corn fields.
inthesenewtimes said
Actually, it’s not quite clear, unless the bees are lying dead around the fields: I haven’t heard that reported. Nor would it explain the demise of wild bees in remote parts of Scotland far from this type of cultivation. Nor would it explain why pesticide poisoning is associated with dead bees found around the hives. Nor why scientists trying to explain CCD by pesticide poisoning go out of their way to speculate that pesticides disorientate bees: why bother with that if the bees are found around the fields using this type of seed? They would just put forward your thesis; but they don’t, presumably because there is no evidence for it.