Comment by baxtr
3 months ago
Not that I want to curb your enthusiasm for bees, but…
I recently read that honey bees in particular get the most attention from humans lately, so they are kept in high numbers.
This has some adversarial effect on other pollinators, which hurts ecosystems more than it helps.
There’s something like four thousand species of bees native to North America [1], so while there are lots of reasons to be unenthusiastic about honey bees [2], that still leaves lots of room for bee related enthusiasm :)
[1] https://www.usgs.gov/faqs/what-role-native-bees-united-state...
[2] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-problem-with-...
I‘d give it a chance. After all it can’t be any worse than Seinfeld for Bees https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bee_Movie
Why would what you said curb my enthusiasm for bees though?
Can you provide me more specifics on this by the way?
> This has some adversarial effect on other pollinators, which hurts ecosystems more than it helps.
What are those adversarial effects, what other pollinators, and how does it hurt the ecosystem more than it helps?
I do not mind bees having kept in higher numbers, and beekeepers can do it anywhere without affecting the ecosystem, I believe.
European honeybees do not behave the same way as their native solitary counterparts. They gather honey by visiting every flower on a plant, then moving to the next plant. Native bees OTOH visit only one or two flowers per plant. So if imported honeybees outcompete natives (and studies show they do), it very much affects the viability of monoecious plants, which experience a drop in genetic diversity. I don't want to find out the long-term results of that experiment.
I don't think that's a reason to eradicate honeybees in the US or anything like that, but it does point to a misplaced focus on "just" solving colony collapse disorder while ignoring the plight of the native pollinators.
If you don't keep bees, or if you do but have a large enough property, you could put up a bee hotel. They can be bought or constructed pretty easily, and you'll get to see a wide variety of who's around your area!
https://bugguide.net/node/view/475348
I am no expert at all in this topic! So please take this with a grain of salt. I just have the feeling (maybe wrongly) that the love and focus for bees is having detrimental/ unwanted effects on the ecosystem.
Here some more articles / discussions:
* https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35668879
My love for bees is more about their behavior (similar to how I find ants fascinating), and their "products" that is honey, propolis, beeswax, and so on. I am simply fascinated by their behaviors, and propolis is very healthy!
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Why won’t you let „the ecosystem“ decide that on its own ? It’s much older than you and you are not its lega guardian. If the ecosystem (of which we are a part) decides it wants more honey bees than that’s what it shall get.
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