Air pollution jams bees’ radar
May 5, 2008 at 9:48 am by Thomas Wheatley in NewsAir pollution doesn’t just add to our region’s reputation as a smog-laden Mecca. It might even play a role in why honeybees — vital vectors in how we get our food — are dying off at a dizzying rate.
The Washington Post reports on a study that found the scents flowers emit — which are broken down when they come into contact with smog and ground-level ozone — are now traveling shorter distances. Air pollution, the report says, can eliminate 90 percent of a flower’s aroma, and may be contributing to a phenomenon called “colony collapse disorder” that’s become increasingly worse since 2006.
Our sting-happy friends can’t pick up on the scent, lose a food source and their populations subsequently dwindle. That tosses a wrench in the pollination process.
Metro Atlanta, you may recall, recently ranked 6th on the American Lung Association’s list of most-polluted cities.
Send to a friend:
May 6th, 2008 at 7:33 am
Here is one for the Bees:
From Marsha & Darryl at Olive Forge Herb Farm Newsletter May 2008 Haddock, Georgia (Between Milledgeville & Gray)
http://my.georgia.org/net/content/go.aspx?s=22583.0.26.3011
“Seven years ago we were talking about the drastic decline in the wild population of honey bees. This honey bee decline has not turned around. By some estimates almost 90% of our wild populations are gone. This is getting scary. There are lots of theories, none yet proven, but some new pest/disease/environmental factor is decimating the honey bee population and even causing some long-time beekeepers to abandon their business.
(Drumroll) Enter the Mason Bee; less than half the size of a honey bee, this bee lives out its life within 100 yards of its birth place and almost never stings. You’ve probably seen this solitary bee’s nest and didn’t recognize it. In your workshop or garage, any tool that has a hole in the handle or even a deeply recessed screw hole can be a nesting cell for this little bee. The female bee will put her egg in the hole along with a ball of pollen and seal it with mud.
Houses for these little fellows are easy to make. A 4 X 4 piece of non-treated wood or 2 glued-up 2 X 4’s with 5/16 inch holes drilled to about 3 ¼ inches deep is all they need for nesting. We have 3 “Bee Condos†at our place and every hole is occupied.
Without proper pollination most of our garden vegetables will not set fruit. If you enjoy growing blueberries as we do, know that the mason bee will pollinate blueberries much better than honey bees, wasps or any other insect. Don’t confuse the mason bee with the large drilling bumble bee-the Carpenter Bee who is busy as we write, loudly drilling into our cedar siding. This little pollinator, the Mason bee, does not make any holes but will readily take a hole.
We’re pretty sure that re-zoning is not necessary in order to have several bee condos around your yard.”
May 6th, 2008 at 10:27 am
It’s interesting research and certainly sounds like a stress on bee populations, but doesn’t really explain the 2006 colony collapse. As I recall, we were polluting a few years prior to 2006.
Also, if pollution was the lynch pin, wouldn’t you find that collapses occurred more frequently in urban areas than rural?