Thursday, October 7, 2010

Culprits identified in worldwide honeybee die-off

By Brett Michael Dykes

Thu Oct 7, 12:21 pm ET

Over the past few years, there's been some panic over a dramatic decrease in the world's honeybee population, an occurrence that has left many experts scratching their heads. Now it appears as though part of the bee die-off mystery has been solved.

As reported by Kirk Johnson of the New York Times, a somewhat odd pairing of entomologists and military scientists has pinpointed likely culprits: a fungus and a virus, both of which flourish in cool, wet environments. While scientists aren't certain, they believe the fungus and virus work together to hamper the insect's digestive system. Each is relatively harmless on its own, Johnson says, but their combination is deadly.

READ MORE:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_upshot/20101007/od_yblog_upshot/culprit-identified-in-massive-worldwide-honeybee-die-off

1 comment:

The White Rose Resistance said...

Honeybee researcher who blames virus for CCD has financial ties to pesticide manufacturer BAYER!!
http://www.naturalnews.com/030027_colony_collapse_disorder_Bayer.html
The New York Times recently published a story on a new report that claims to have discovered one of the primary causes of colony collapse disorder (CCD), a condition in which entire colonies of bees mysteriously die. BUT...... the report, which pins a fungus and virus combination as the culprit, was headed by a researcher with financial ties to Bayer Crop Science, the creator of pesticide products that are also linked to CCD. (I called that one!! I knew something stunk to high heaven about that report...and as usual, the truth comes out.)Get this too!! Prior to receiving grant money, Bromenshenk had planned to testify against Bayer. Interestingly, Bromenshenk had been after Bayer's pesticides prior to receiving the grant money, and had even agreed to be a key witness in a class-action lawsuit by a group of North Dakota Beekeepers against Bayer. The plaintiffs all believed strongly that Bayer's pesticides were largely responsible for the mass die-off of their bees, and Bromenshenk seemed to be in agreement as well. But shortly after receiving the research grant from Bayer, Dr. Bromenshenk mysteriously switched sides and began to pursue other research options instead.