[Texgreen] Why our bees are dying

[Roger Baker]

[Its likely because we keep moving them around so infections spread  
from stressed colonies. Great piece of reporting at the link below.  
-- Roger]



<<[The varroa mite] caused negligible damage in Europe, where it first
appeared in 1908, because the beekeeping industry is smaller and far
less mobile. In the U.S., however, the mite jumped from hive to hive
with alarming rapidity. "In the U.S., beekeepers are a bunch of
mechanized gypsies, moving from crop to crop all through the year
chasing pollination fees and honey flows," said Frank Eischen, a U.S.
Department of Agriculture research entomologist tasked with searching
for new medicines to keep the invaders at bay. "Because of all this
unnatural movement, some colonies get stressed, and they may be more
susceptible.">>

Hannah Nordhaus. "The Silence of the Bees." High Country News, March
19, 2007.
http://www.hcn.org/servlets/hcn.Article?article_id=16891