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What will happen when bees go extinct? Edit: I don’t understand the vicious pointless downvotes over this question.

by xwdv 6y ago

aardvarkr 6y ago
Not a beekeeper but it’s pretty easy to connect the dots from bee extinction to ecological collapse. No pollinators leads to decreased germination which leads to less food for the lower levels of the food chain and on and on
- sosborn 6y ago
  Bees aren't the only pollinators out there. Yes, they are super important, but others exist. https://www.zmescience.com/ecology/animals-ecology/incredible-pollinating-animals-bees/ https://www.zmescience.com/ecology/animals-ecology/incredibl...
  - whymauri 6y ago
    Aren't the others also at risk?
    - yawz 6y ago
      That's a good point. We are not being bad to honey bees or bees alone. We are killing everything.
- BigBubbleButt 6y ago
  > Not a beekeeper but it’s pretty easy to connect the dots from bee extinction to ecological collapse. How is that an easy connection? Your argument essentially says without bees then nature as we know it falls apart catastrophically - I am incredulous you could interpret this as obvious. Species go extinct all the time and yet Earth is still doing just fine, apart from the damage humans are doing to it. > No pollinators Bees are not the only pollinators > leads to decreased germination A decrease is not the same as elimination > which leads to less food A decrease is not the same as elimination > for the lower levels of the food chain and on and on Your argument is a about knock-on effects, which certainly exist. But you seem to think if any point in the chain breaks, it leads to ecological collapse. Why do you assume nature is so fragile? I am not a biologist and maybe bees are special or there is something I do not understand, but I certainly don't think it's an obvious conclusion.
  - klyrs 6y ago
    You're making a leap from "collapse" to "elimination". Searching for "GDP collapse", the first result I get is referring to a global 4.3% predicted collapse for 2020. People seem to be taking that pretty hard.
    - BigBubbleButt 6y ago
      Fair point. Thank you.
  - licebmi__at__ 6y ago
    Nature might endure what we throw at it, we might not. When people say that humans are ruining the planet, maybe a few people are actually worried about the rock, but most of us are worried about having an ecosystem compatible with our civilization. You might want to investigate about the sparrows in china, quick version; a campaign to exterminate the sparrows to increase grain production ended up with famines.
nix23 6y ago
Peoples with brushes on trees and bushes...and for everything that doesn't make money and is dependent on bees will go extinct too (flowers, trees etc..). And now back to school.
aspaceman 6y ago
We lose another beautiful creature. People quibbling over there being other pollinators are being quite dense.
xyzzyz 6y ago
Honey bees haven’t existed in America before 1600, so I suppose we’ll be without one of the invasive species.
- nix23 6y ago
  Bees overall are dying not just honeybees.
rootusrootus 6y ago
Is that a real risk? I thought it was pretty straightforward to breed more of them. For now. The colony collapse problem is real, but I haven't heard any serious discussion of honeybees going extinct.
- nix23 6y ago
  > but I haven't heard any serious discussion of honeybees going extinct. In Europe it is..in fact it was the main-theme 3 years ago. And not just bees but insects overall...the honeybee was just the friendly looking ambassador for that message.
  - lostlogin 6y ago
    The number of hives in New Zealand has roughly doubled in 5 years - so much so that overstocking is a huge problem. One small data point, but too many and too few are both bad. https://www.airborne.co.nz/pages/bee-keeping-statistics-new-zealand https://www.airborne.co.nz/pages/bee-keeping-statistics-new-...
    - nix23 6y ago
      Again it's NOT about just Honeybees: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_in_insect_populations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_in_insect_populations
yawz 6y ago
I'm pretty sure honey bees are relatively safe as long as there are beekeepers. As I noted above, there are thousands of solitary and/or wild bee species that are in real danger. They pollinate an important part of the plants. Their loss would probably trigger chain reactions that we should avoid.

What will happen when bees go extinct? Edit: I don’t understand the vicious pointless downvotes over this question.

by xwdv 6y ago

What will happen when bees go extinct? Edit: I don’t understand the vicious pointless downvotes over this question.

Not a beekeeper but it’s pretty easy to connect the dots from bee extinction to ecological collapse. No pollinators leads to decreased germination which leads to less food for the lower levels of the food chain and on and on

sosborn 6y ago
Bees aren't the only pollinators out there. Yes, they are super important, but others exist. https://www.zmescience.com/ecology/animals-ecology/incredible-pollinating-animals-bees/ https://www.zmescience.com/ecology/animals-ecology/incredibl...
- whymauri 6y ago
  Aren't the others also at risk?
  - yawz 6y ago
    That's a good point. We are not being bad to honey bees or bees alone. We are killing everything.
BigBubbleButt 6y ago
> Not a beekeeper but it’s pretty easy to connect the dots from bee extinction to ecological collapse. How is that an easy connection? Your argument essentially says without bees then nature as we know it falls apart catastrophically - I am incredulous you could interpret this as obvious. Species go extinct all the time and yet Earth is still doing just fine, apart from the damage humans are doing to it. > No pollinators Bees are not the only pollinators > leads to decreased germination A decrease is not the same as elimination > which leads to less food A decrease is not the same as elimination > for the lower levels of the food chain and on and on Your argument is a about knock-on effects, which certainly exist. But you seem to think if any point in the chain breaks, it leads to ecological collapse. Why do you assume nature is so fragile? I am not a biologist and maybe bees are special or there is something I do not understand, but I certainly don't think it's an obvious conclusion.
- klyrs 6y ago
  You're making a leap from "collapse" to "elimination". Searching for "GDP collapse", the first result I get is referring to a global 4.3% predicted collapse for 2020. People seem to be taking that pretty hard.
  - BigBubbleButt 6y ago
    Fair point. Thank you.
- licebmi__at__ 6y ago
  Nature might endure what we throw at it, we might not. When people say that humans are ruining the planet, maybe a few people are actually worried about the rock, but most of us are worried about having an ecosystem compatible with our civilization. You might want to investigate about the sparrows in china, quick version; a campaign to exterminate the sparrows to increase grain production ended up with famines.

nix23 6y ago

Peoples with brushes on trees and bushes...and for everything that doesn't make money and is dependent on bees will go extinct too (flowers, trees etc..). And now back to school.

aspaceman 6y ago

We lose another beautiful creature. People quibbling over there being other pollinators are being quite dense.

xyzzyz 6y ago

Honey bees haven’t existed in America before 1600, so I suppose we’ll be without one of the invasive species.

nix23 6y ago
Bees overall are dying not just honeybees.

rootusrootus 6y ago

Is that a real risk? I thought it was pretty straightforward to breed more of them. For now. The colony collapse problem is real, but I haven't heard any serious discussion of honeybees going extinct.

nix23 6y ago
> but I haven't heard any serious discussion of honeybees going extinct. In Europe it is..in fact it was the main-theme 3 years ago. And not just bees but insects overall...the honeybee was just the friendly looking ambassador for that message.
- lostlogin 6y ago
  The number of hives in New Zealand has roughly doubled in 5 years - so much so that overstocking is a huge problem. One small data point, but too many and too few are both bad. https://www.airborne.co.nz/pages/bee-keeping-statistics-new-zealand https://www.airborne.co.nz/pages/bee-keeping-statistics-new-...
  - nix23 6y ago
    Again it's NOT about just Honeybees: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_in_insect_populations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_in_insect_populations

yawz 6y ago

I'm pretty sure honey bees are relatively safe as long as there are beekeepers. As I noted above, there are thousands of solitary and/or wild bee species that are in real danger. They pollinate an important part of the plants. Their loss would probably trigger chain reactions that we should avoid.