This winter’s losses of honey bee colonies were the worst since records began six years ago, according to a survey carried out by the British Beekeepers Association.
It says more than a third of hives did not survive the cold, wet conditions.
BBC News – Honey bee losses double in a year due to poor winter
Disrupting the Borg is expensive and time consuming!
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So: global warming causes cold weather which kills bees.
Now, come on! Everybody knows it’s not CAGW’s induced cold weather which causes the death of the bees, but several insecticides made by the evil capitalistic enterprise Monsanto, like the Gaucho, the Regent, etc. Capitalism : that’s the enemy.
Sorry this is not allowable news, all cold related deaths can only be attributed to global warming. So therefore these are heat related deaths.
I work at a golf club north if Toronto and we have 8 hives that have peaked member interest in that bees can servive even on a golf course. Honey output has ranged from a low of 80 lbs/hive/year during last years hot and dry conditions to over 200lbs/hive/ two years ago when conditions were wetter and just warm.
This winter we lost all 8 hives and attribute it not to the cold–it wasn’t but the fluctuation in temps. At the end of Jan we had +C temps as high as 12 degrees which included the night time lows. Last day of the month it was 12C at 2am and 12 hours later it was -12C…bees died right there we figure….high losses common in our area..
I’m all for better chemicals but the year that most every aviary had great production no one complained about imidacloprid (Merit insecticide also used to treat fleas on dogs) but when production is low they start. Colony collapse cam be caused by mites and other reasons —chemicals?–world wide movement of bees?–pollenating hives being weak from many travel miles?–breeding?
We requeened, bought some nucs(small base hives) and are underway but at a fairly high expense…
I watched my dad and nephew get attacked by a swarm of wasps when they stepped on a nest last summer, luckily they were too small to sting through their clothing, the queen must have began to lay her eggs far too late because it had been too cold, they were both covered in tiny wasps when they ran to where I was, my dad got stung only once.
Oh my word. I have been involved with beekeeping for over 50 years. I can tell those bloody third floor walkup, cold water flat, British beekeeping ignoramus that 30% mortality is good, even today down here in the warm, dry, and sunny Colonial South.