Honeybees Update

April 18, 2007 at 5:19 pm (EcoTalk)

It looks as thought it’s possible that our desperate need to be in hyperconvenient instantaneous contact with each other every minute of our waking lives might have something to do with the dramatic and devastating collapse of honeybees…

6 Comments

  1. Jonathan Poirot said,

    April 19, 2007 at 1:26 am

    I’m a beekeeper and have placed bees directly under high voltage power lines without any apparent difference. Because of this I think this is unlikely to be the cause of our bee problem. Furthermore, cell phones have been around for long enough that this problem should have surfaced at least in urban areas long before now!

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  2. Aquila ka Hecate said,

    April 19, 2007 at 4:03 am

    This is also what I cannot immediately understand- I would’ve thought that the effect would’ve shown up before now.
    However, it’s possible that the effect could be due to a genetic mutation in the honey bees,perhaps a hypersensitivity of some kind, which has only now started to show up.
    I dunno, I’m theorising on the fly.

    Love,
    Terri in Joburg

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  3. Livia said,

    April 19, 2007 at 4:55 am

    Even though I sympathize for the bees I don’t know if cell phones could really affect them so negatively. What I really wanted to say was “thanks” for linking to Grist, what a great site!

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  4. Cathryn said,

    April 19, 2007 at 6:26 pm

    The reasearch was conducted at Landau university (Germany), and the hypothesis is cursory. It was noted, however, that when cell phones were placed beside a honeybee hive, the bees would refuse to return to the hive. Despite the fact that cell phones have been around for a good while, the growing ubiquity of cell phone usage could have caused the impact point to be triggered, thus catalyzing the noticeable diminishment in numbers. Also, previous impact may have been masked by other factors affecting the population. Most likely it is a combination of factors joining to cause the extreme decline. It is interesting to note that there are not many other hypotheses or theories – plausible or not. I believe the research is on-going, so I am sure there will be a peer-reviewed article published in the near future. Maybe they just think we are assholes and decided to move on to another plane of existence.

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  5. tirjasdyn said,

    May 10, 2007 at 5:54 pm

    Could it be a type of cel phone with a certain technology?

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  6. Tim Capehart said,

    March 1, 2009 at 9:02 pm

    With the original (poor) research using cell phones placed close to the hives, it won’t really apply to most hives. The “inverse square” principal shows that as the distance is doubled, any form of radiation (electromagnetic, magnetic field, microwave radiation, gravity, etc.) is decreased to 1/4 strength. As my bees have no cell phones or cell phone towers within miles, the effect of radiation from that source will be miniscule. And just like Jonathan, I have my bees under power lines with no noticeable effects.

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