Monsanto recently held a Honey Bee Health Summit to address colony collapse disorder. The bee population has decreased drastically around the globe in recent years. The biotech giant acquired Beeologics from an Israeli company in 2011. Monsanto is attempting to convince beekeepers that the GMO seed and pesticide manufacturer wants to be proactive in the fight to save the bees.
.” Colony collapse disorder (CCD) first presented in 2006. Millions of beehives around the world lost more than one-third of their colonies, 37 million bees were recently found dead in Canada. Approximately 25,000 bees were found dead late last month in Oregon. Scientists and researchers have surmised that insecticides, herbicides, parasitic mites, and viruses have all played a role in the bee population decreases.
Many reports on the internet claimed that Monsanto was working on a GMO Bee but their researchers denied claims that the biotech giant was planning to create genetically modified bees.
Illinois beekeeper Terry Ingram’s story about having a Roundup Ready queen bee confiscated from his property along other necessary equipment, honey, and bees went viral. Ingram, like many other beekeepers, grew concerned about the impact of pesticides on declining colonies and had spent 15 years researching the issue.
Ingram planned to raise the Roundup Ready resistant queen bee’s offspring to find out if the bee had somehow developed a resistance to the popular Monsanto product. The bee population has been declining since 1997. In 2005, a significant colony reduction prompted alarm among both beekeepers and environmentalists. In 2007, apiaries noted losses which totaled between 30 to 70 percent of the colonies.
Pesticides were labeled the primary suspect nearly immediately. A recent finding found that fungicides Fungicides were killing bees.. It is thought that agricultural chemicals are affecting the bees immune system.
Harvard University has developed a Robot Bee that is capable to pollinate plants.It took engineers more than 10 years to construct RoboBee. It is about the size of a Quater.They think it's the smallest flying robot ever made. it was inspired by the biology of a bee and the insect’s hive behavior. They aim to push advances in miniature robotics and the design of compact high-energy power sources; spur innovations in ultra-low-power computing and electronic “smart” sensors; and refine coordination manage multiple, independent machines.
I myself prefer finding a way to keep the old fashion bees.
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