The news is always full of articles about global warming or pollution caused by oil spills excreta. Governments have conferences and disagreements about what can be done while in the background largely un-noticed a disaster of equal proportions is unfolding.

What am I talking about? The demise of the Honey Bee! (Check out my blog entry on where have all the Honey Bees gone?)

So why should the disappearance of such a humble insect be cause for concern? Well where do you think all the fruit we eat comes from? Figures from the USA are freely available on the net and speak for themselves.

The largest managed pollination event in the world is in California where nearly half (about one million hives) of the US honeybees are trucked to the almond orchards each spring. New York’s apple crop requires about 30,000 hives; Maine’s blueberry crop uses about 50,000 hives each year. Bees are also brought to commercial plantings of cucumbers, squash, melons, strawberries, and many other crops.

In the UK honeybee hives run by mostly amateur beekeepers -contribute around £165m a year to the economy by pollinating many fruits and vegetables.

In short – the disappearance of the bee would cause mass starvation and be an extinction level event for many plants and animals.

What has gone wrong? The bee probably evolved along with flowering plants in the Lower Cretaceous about 120 – 140 million years ago. The earliest evidence for the bee so far found is in 100 million year old amber.

The following is from a 2006 BBC News article.

Scientists have identified the oldest known bee, a 100 million-year-old specimen preserved in amber. The ancient insect, trapped in tree sap, is at least 35-45 million years older than any other known bee fossil.   It appears to share features with both bees and wasps, and supports theories of bee evolution. Experts believe pollen-dependent bees arose from carnivorous wasp ancestors.

They survived the extinction of the dinosaurs, survived continental drift, climate change were around while our earliest ancestors were swinging in trees! How many diseases and parasites evolved to threaten them in that time? Probably many, and they survived them all until now!

So what has changed? The decline started with the invention of the modern hive by Langstroth in 1860. He lived in the Victorian period filled with the expansion of industrialisation. Beekeepers were keen to apply the same industrial methods to beekeeping. They measured their success by ever greater honey yields at a time when nature was something to be controlled. By controlling nature some advantages were gained. However a price is always paid when man pushes the boundary of the natural balance of nature. In beekeeping, much was lost when man-made systems replaced the bee’s natural brood nest.

Bees have lived with and provided us honey and wax for thousands of years. Strange they have suffered since man started to manipulate them on an industrial scale 150 years ago.

Next: What is Wrong With Modern Bee Keeping?

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