Who cares about honeybees, anyway?

Guest Rant by Xris, the Flatbush Gardener

Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) has been making the news rounds for a few years now. It's old, if still current, news. Dire outcomes from the loss of honeybees have been proffered. For example, PBS recently introduced an online "ask the expert" feature with this:

Since the winter of 2006, millions of bees have vanished, leaving behind empty hives and a damaged ecosystem. [1]

Really? The ECOSYSTEM?! Did they not notice that honeybees aren't part of the ecosystem?

Honeybees are livestock. They are animals which we manage for our uses. We provide them with housing and maintenance. We even move them from field to field, just as we let cows into different pastures for grazing.

Perhaps, if CCD can neither be prevented nor cured, disaster would come to pass. However, the underlying cause would not be the loss of the honeybees but our dependence on them as a consequence of unsustainable agricultural practices.

The old ways of farming include hedgerows, uncultivated areas between fields. The biodiversity of these patches provide substantial habitat for native pollinators, as well as other beneficial insects. When even these rough “unproductive” patches of land are cleared, we set the stage for the patterns that have come to dominate agriculture: more herbicides, more pesticides, more machinery. All of these also damage the soil food webs that support both soil fertility and agricultural ecosystems. Although  manufactured inputs provide temporary relief, they reduce the ecological functions of the land, requiring more and greater inputs to achieve the same effect. This is the definition of addiction, and it’s a clear sign that this way of doing business is unsustainable.

Why do we need to ship and truck pollinators around? There are plenty of native pollinators to do the job, where we haven't decimated their habitats. There are 4,000 species of bees alone in North America. 226 species are known in New York City. Many of them visit my gardens in Flatbush, Brooklyn; some have even taken up residence [2]. Many native bees are ground-dwellers which need only some open ground in which to dig their nests. When every patch of ground is cultivated, plowed under or paved over, native pollinators disappear. Suddenly, we “need” honeybees for pollination.

I care about the honeybees. I like my honey and beeswax candles. I support efforts to legalize beekeeping in New York City. But not at the expense of the biodiversity that is all around us, even in the city, if only we care enough to look for it, value it, and nurture it.

Dig Deeper

The Great Pollinator Project

North American Pollinator Protection Campaign

Saving [Honey] Bees: What We Know Now [About CCD], [http://roomfordebate.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/09/02/saving-bees-what-we-know-now/], NY Times, 2009-09-02

Notes

[1] Ask “Silence of the Bees” Expert Dr. Diana Cox-Foster. [http://www.pbs.org/engage/blog/ask-%E2%80%9Csilence-bees%E2%80%9D-expert-dr-diana-cox-foster], PBS Blog

[2] “Cellophane Bees Return”, [http://flatbushgardener.blogspot.com/2009/05/cellophane-bees-return.html], Flatbush Gardener, 2009-05-02

Photo of Jade Bee by Xris.

Comments

[Donna the Dragon Lady]

Three summers ago we had a late frost in Oklahoma - we lost all the flowers off the beautiful wysteria but I didn't see bumblies and enough wasps that summer - how things got pollinated was a mystery with such a lack of bugs. I was bugging my husband to get me a bee hive from the guys he works with - when a keeper finally called asking if I knew of a farm that needed bees - ME!

Since then I've applied for a grant for 10 hives - on two acres surrounded by country homes and woods. I know the value of the pollinators - butterflies, bees, wasps, native and non- and I'll take all I can get. For years I have a husband who consciously mows around Queen Anne's Lace and native yarrow. Clumps of landing pads for parasitic wasps and lady bugs and lace wings abound.

I understand to a point the idea of not using such huge ag methods to rely on transport of bees - but honey itself has it own's important ag use - please buy local and buy often - we need your support.

[vicki]

Excellent discussion.
There's at least one good thing about all the (accurate) press the honey bees got/get: it helps to raise the awareness of and educate those who are "clueless" about the importance of pollinators.

[kris at Blithewold]

The very crux of the matter seems to be that monocultures - of anything - aren't sustainable. When we stop supporting those (buy local!) the healthier our ecosystem (honeybees included) will inevitably be.

[Chris, Toronto]

Too bad most of the hedgerow shrubs in my part of the world are just as non-native as honey bees (buckthorn, introduced from Europe and extremely prolific).

[Janette]

Facinating. At last a blog thats speaks and makes sense.

Yes there are other pollinators and yes they are important. Everything in nature has a "place" and we must stop messing with it or we will find ourselves in deep trouble!

We must do everything in our power to keep our "little friends" from extinction if for no other reason than the health benefits of honey!

[Tibs]

Donna the Dragon Lady, from whom are you applying for a grant to get 10 hives? I have been involved with a bee project where we supply 2 hives. This has been just a regional project covering about 12 counties. We had such an overwhelming response that we are planning on continuing it, but in an urban setting. I am interested in what other states and agencies are doing.

[mb]

While we agree with the idea of supporting native pollinators, we strongly disagree with the Xiris' shortsighted dismissal of the importance of the honeybee, which seems to be based on the notion that the it is not part of the ecosystem and therefore expendable. Really?! Though not a native species, honeybees have been a part of the ecosystem (which is the relationship of living organisms and the environment), like it or not, since the colonists arrived.

CCD is important not only because it's killing an irreplaceable agricultural asset, but because it's a symptom of a greater problem. Honeybees are essentially the "canary in the coal mine". They are in trouble because they are treated and managed as livestock — fed cheap, non-nutritious HFCs, trucked across the country, worked under extremely stressful conditions, and then dosed with chemical cocktails to eliminate parasites that have taken advantage of their weakened state. This mentality has gotten us into serious trouble with more than honeybees, as a tour of any feedlot will show.

Because of the CCD "alarmists", scientists have discovered that our unsustainable practices, such as chemical pesticide usage and mono-cropping, have led to the die-off of native species as well — a fact that might gone unnoticed until it was too late as it did in an area of China that was so overdosed with pesticides that the local population must HAND POLLINATE crops or starve.

Our use of honeybees as pollinators is not the problem. The problem is how we treat them and the rest of the ecosystem as if it were there only for our benefit. Until we realize that we are a small part of the bigger picture and treat the earth and all its creatures as if they matter and with respect for their needs, we are in danger of killing the very things that keep us alive.

Mary Beth and Barbara
www.beesandchicks.com

[Donna the Dragon Lady]

Donna the Dragon Lady lives in Oklahoma - I live in Oklahoma - and I applied for a farm divisification grant - since I did now own bees of my own - and it is part of ag and makes the farm money - by not only their own production of honey plus - it greatly increases my vegetative and fruit production - the grant was for $5,000 - ultimately the money came from the Fed probably with state funds too.

[Tibs]

Thanks, Donna.

[Xris (Flatbush Gardener)]

Thanks for all the feedback and great comments. And thanks to Garden Rant for the opportunity.

These issues warrant broader and deeper consideration. It wasn't possible (for me, anyway) to do so in 500 words or less. And it's a RANT. Nuance and subtlety are uncalled for in this form.

Of course all species - native, introduced, and even invasive - are part of the ecosystem. The concern raised by CCD has not been for the ecosystem, but for the economic benefits of an introduced organism.

Contrast the response and the resources dedicated to CCD to the negligent reactions to White-Nose Syndrome (WNS). WNS has torn through Northeastern bat populations like a wildfire. It has killed millions of bats, 95% of some colonies, in just three years. The limits of its mortality rate are still unknown. Some species are now threatened with extinction within a decade. Only this year has significant federal funding been allocated: just $2 million. How many tens and hundreds of millions, worldwide, have been devoted to CCD?

The "damage to the ecosystem" has already been done. Western bumblebee species are in decline, caused at least in part by attempts to raise them factory-style for pollination. Bees exported to European reproduction factories returned and were released with novel parasites, which are now escaping into the wild populations.

We are living in the Anthropogenic Era. Like it or not, we are responsible for managing our environments, and all the species with which we cohabit. Without deeper, systemic thinking about which species warrant our attention, it's going to be a long, dark age ahead.

[Jennifer Tidwell]

I have a sweat bee "colony" that nests in my yard on a slight slope that doesn't grow grass very well. They moved in last year and have changed locations twice.

People think I'm crazy when I tell them that sweat bees live in my yard and I like it that way.

Even though honey bees are used for commercial pollination, most native pollinators are much more efficient. The sheer numbers in the honey bee colonies are really the only factor that makes them effective pollinators.

For instance, recommendations for building habitat for orchard mason bees says "a good rule of thumb is 2 to 3 female bees for each mature fruit tree." http://king.wsu.edu/foodandfarms/documents/MasonBee.pdf

I can't find any info on how many honey bees it takes per tree.

[melanie watts]

Thanks for an interesting post that opening my eyes to the other side of the controversy!

[hotels turkei]

Hard Domestic,welcome conference double attitude fear risk television entire emphasis attack finally advise worker enterprise well reveal significance stone tool side choice impossible me original risk living competition general description best transport museum scientist sea experience tool big left appeal individual selection theory judge block trust threaten anything money studio launch teaching part recover opposition cover narrow winner truth reality challenge deputy judge leg be factory link violence common department imagine soldier home in die formal science house tall design desire mass round such carefully question mark metal examination driver birth typical culture become