Jessica's Wanderlust

Why the bees are dying

Posted on November 5, 2014 Updated on December 18, 2014

“If the bee disappeared off the face of the earth, man would only have four years left to live.”
― Maurice Maeterlinck, The Life of the Bee 

I was chatting with someone just the other day about bees and why they are dying and I could barely string a sentence together (embarrassing much!). So as to redeem myself I thought I’d put a brief summary up here.

There are so many different theories on this topic – and lots of finger pointing at various industries but from what I can understand there is a number of contributing factors – and hence a number of different things that need to change so we can save the bees from extinction and ourselves as a result.

• The widespread use of pesticides and insecticides used in the modern farming practices is believed to be killing bees. Granted some of these are meant to be ‘bee friendly’ but the jury is still out on this one.
• Home gardens also use pesticides and insecticides available over the counter. Refraining from using these products as well as planting native plants and flowers will help in encouraging bees in to your garden.
• In the UK the introduction of non-native bees is believed to have compromised the native bee population.
• There are a number of different parasitic mites that can quickly spread disease amongst a hive. In addition wax moths and small hive beetles also pose a threat.
• Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) is a strange phenomenon where the bees seem to just completely disappear. There have been numerous studies on the topic but no strong conclusions have been drawn.

Thanks for reading – I’d love to know what you think about this issue so please leave a comment below or tweet me @jessicaswander.

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