Hard Times for Honeybees

  • (Photo by Scott Bauer, courtesy of the USDA)

Beekeepers are continuing to lose their honeybees. About a third of many beekeepers’ colonies have been dying mysteriously each year for the past several years. Rebecca Williams reports researchers think they’re getting closer to an answer:

Transcript

Beekeepers are continuing to lose their honeybees. About a third of many beekeepers’ colonies have been dying mysteriously each year for the past several years. Rebecca Williams reports researchers think they’re getting closer to an answer:

Honeybees have had some bad luck.

Researchers think there are a couple of things hurting the bees all at once.

They think bees’ immune systems are being weakened.

Maybe because of pesticides. And maybe because bees aren’t getting the variety of food sources they need.

Bees normally collect pollen and nectar from many different plants. But when they’re used on farms, they’re just visiting one kind of plant.

And then on top of that, bees appear to be getting hit by a virus.

Maryann Frazier is a honeybee expert at Penn State University.

She says, until researchers can figure out exactly what’s going on, she expects beekeepers to keep losing a lot of their bees.

“I think what we’re at risk of, more so than the bees dying out, is the beekeepers giving up and not continuing to truck their bees all over the country.”

Beekeepers use honeybees to pollinate about a third of our food supply.

For The Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

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Bugs Getting Confused by Asphalt

  • Dragonflies are one of the insects tricked by false light (Photo courtesy of the EPA)

Bugs are getting confused by the
reflections from manmade structures.
Rebecca Williams reports on a new study:

Transcript

Bugs are getting confused by the
reflections from manmade structures.
Rebecca Williams reports on a new study:

If you’ve ever noticed swarms of insects hovering over your car, there’s a
good chance they’re mistaking it for water.


Smooth, dark surfaces like cars and asphalt reflect polarized light. That’s
what bugs see – and that tricks insects such as dragonflies.


Bruce Robertson is an author of the study in the journal Frontiers in Ecology
and the Environment.


“Asphalt actually reflects polarized light more strongly than water and so it
looks more like water than water! And so these organisms are thinking
they’re finding a place to breed and hunt and lay eggs and mate when in fact
they’re finding a place that’s very dangerous.”


Robertson says these bugs swarm over buildings and roads in huge numbers,
and can die of exhaustion.


But he says it might be possible to stop tricking the bugs. Things like
adding white curtains to dark windows or adding a little bit of gravel to
asphalt to make the surfaces reflect less polarized light.


For The Environment Report, I’m Rebecca Williams.

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