SUMMARY: If you enjoy a beer on a summer day, you can thank yeast, the microbes that ferment sugar into alcohol and give beer its character. After innumerable generations of using just two types of yeast, a lab in North Carolina has discovered a new yeast that produces a variety of flavors, and it comes from the weirdest source, bees. Science producer Nsikan Akpan reveals what the buzz is all about.
SUMMARY:Neonicotinoids, the popular insecticide used in agriculture, can be harmful to bees, according to new papers. Science correspondent Miles O’Brien joins Hari Sreenivasan to discuss some important findings and analyses on that story, as well as a recent study that looked at the economic consequences of climate change.
SUMMARY: Commercial beekeepers across America have been struggling with great numbers of bee deaths over the past few years. What’s behind their failing health? Some research points to a class of pesticide that’s coated onto a large proportion of corn and soybeans grown in the U.S. Allison Aubrey of NPR reports.
ALLISON AUBREY (NPR): It’s harvest time at Adee Honey Farms in Bruce, South Dakota. Bret Adee’s the third generation to manage the 80,000 hives the Adees have scattered across five Midwestern states. He says beekeeping these days is much harder than it’s ever been.
BRET ADEE, Adee Honey Farms:In 2010, our bees were just destroyed in a couple of weeks. Most of our bees died.
ALLISON AUBREY: Bret says things really haven’t improved much.
BRET ADEE: I would to see about twice to three times as many bees in most of the hives right now. It will be a real challenge to keep them alive through the winter.
ALLISON AUBREY: The Adees are not alone. According to a preliminary survey from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, commercial beekeepers lost 42 percent of their colonies last year. Bees are a critical part of agriculture.
Adee trucks his bees out to pollinate California’s almond groves every year. And it’s not just almonds. Bees pollinate everything from apples to cherries and squash. To figure out what’s plaguing the bees, the Obama administration assembled a task force last year. Scientists at the EPA, USDA and researchers across the country who have been studying the problem are finding there are multiple issues.
Bees have fewer wildflowers to forage on due to a loss of habitat. There’s viruses that pests pass on to the bees. Climate change is thought to play a role too. Another issue is pesticides. Some studies suggest that a class of pesticides known as neonicotinoid, or neonics for short, are harming the bees.
These pesticides are coated onto the seed of about 80 percent of the corn that’s grown in the United States and about half the soybeans too. To get a sense of that scale, imagine a cornfield like this taking up the entire state of California. That’s how much of this re-treated seed is being planted.
DOUGLAS, Ariz. (AP) — Thousands of swarming bees have left one landscaper dead and another critically injured after the men were stung in southern Arizona.
Douglas Fire Department officials say the landscapers were working on a home around 10:30 a.m. Wednesday when they were attacked by the huge swarm of bees. One man later died at a hospital.
The names of the victims weren't immediately released.
A hive was found inside the home's attic and a beekeeper later exterminated it after parts of the roof of the home were torn off.
I am Retired U.S. Navy (22yrs) and a Vietnam Veteran. After my Navy retirement I was in the computer related industry, now retired. In 2000 I was a registered Republican and voted for George W. Bush. Six months of having Bush in the Whitehouse forced me to re-evaluate my political stance. I had always thought of myself as a Moderate Republican, but was a Republican by "default" NOT because of close examination of the GOP. Due to what has happened in America since 2000, I now consider myself a progressive, and registered as a Non-Affiliated voter.
*Anti-First Amendment policies that attempt to turn America into a theocracy by enshrining ANY religious belief as law.
* Any attempt to suppress human or Constitutional rights.
* Any law or policy that supports discrimination based on religion, ethnicity, race/color, gender, sexual orientation, or any law that does NOT support Equal Treatment under the law.
*Any law or policy that attempts to suppress Freedom of the Press or Free Speech.
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