4 ms·
The honeybee is a domesticated species, and there are breeding programs set on making honeybees more resistant to the mite and virus that are often the cause of
by James_Henry 7y ago
The honeybee is a domesticated species, and there are breeding programs set on making honeybees more resistant to the mite and virus that are often the cause of colony collapse. It's a tricky process though.
My guess is that genetic engineering of the bees or their microbiome will end up being the solution.
Or we can just let them all become africanized...
- ptah 7y agogenuinely curious: how will africanization help?
- dangerface 7y agoAfricanized bees are more hearty to mites and disease.
- isoskeles 7y agoAre they also domesticated though?
- James_Henry 7y agoNo, and they can be pretty dangerous.
- lettergram 7y agoResistant to mites, they seem to have improved ability to forage, etc. A lot of beekeepers have hybridized African bee hives. They can be more aggressive, so wear a suit and avoid irritating the hive too much and you’ll be fine.
- penagwin 7y agoAccording to wikipedia, africanized bees are already the bee of choice in Brazil.
- James_Henry 7y agoFrom what I understand, if you took away how dangerous they can be then they dominate the western honeybee in every regard. I found the line in Wikipedia that makes the claim that "The Africanized bee is considered the bee of choice for beekeeping in Brazil" and the source seems to be a 2009 paper from volume 23 of the journal "Brazilian Journal of Agricultural Research" (Pesquisa Agropecuária Brasileira) which doesn't exist as volume 23 was in 1988 (see http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_issues&pid=0100-204X&lng=en&nrm=iso http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_issues&pid=0100-2... ).