Thursday, March 15, 2007

Is EM radiation to blame for the ongoing bee dieback?

(Thanks: Reality Carnival.)
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1 comment:

Justin said...

The article/blog entry you link to seems pretty close to TI/tinfoil hat territory. His incredulous reader who doesn't believe that bees get tired, stressed out, disoriented or die from exposure seems to be a little ignorant.

My webcomics partner happens to be a beekeeper by trade and he confirms that bees actually are plagued by these mundane problems, amongst many others.

Check out MAAREC's FAQ on CCD http://maarec.cas.psu.edu/FAQ/FAQCCD.pdf for the various possible causes they're investigating.

One to note is 'Nutritional fitness of the adult bees'. I'm under the impression the recent fall had drought conditions, and that basically means threat of starvation for the bees. But I really should get my comics partner to comment as I'm not a beekeeper and don't want to spread bad information (though, coincidentally, Pasieka is Ukrainian for beekeeper).

As for EM radiation...

As far as I can tell the Ground Wave Emergency Network is being, or has been phased out, and replaced by satellites. It seems a few sites are still in use for other purposes, but why would GWEN be fingered as a suspect only after it lost funding? Why weren't bees dying while it was fully functional? I guess for the hardcore conspiracy theorist official confirmation that GWEN has shut down is actually evidence that it's now being used for nefarious mind control purposes. And somehow bees are getting wasted in the crossfire... an insect that just happens to be a vital link in the human food chain. That's one royal f-up if true!

Here's one for the paranoids, though: the Mid-Atlantic Apiculture Research and Extension Consortium's FAQ on CCD points out two causes they're currently NOT investigating: GMO crops and cell towers. To quote the FAQ:

Radiation transmitted by cell towers: The distribution of both affected and non-affected CCD apiaries does not make this a likely cause. Also cell phone service is not available in some areas where affected commercial apiaries are located in the west. For this reason, it is currently not a top priority.

4:04 PM

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