5 ms·

> Though honey bees are not, contrary to popular mythology, declining in numbers around the world, Varroa mites do thus cause serious trouble for apiarists, par

> Though honey bees are not, contrary to popular mythology, declining in numbers around the world, Varroa mites do thus cause serious trouble for apiarists, particularly in the West. Is this true? First time I'm reading this (as opposed to the opposite, that honeybee populations are collapsing).

tptacek 5y ago
Honey bee populations in America are certainly taking a hit, but honey bees are invasive to North America, and feral honey bees all died out in the 1980s, so any American honey bee you'd be talking about is livestock, not wildlife.
- WaitWaitWha 5y ago
  The wild hives that I see along the Appalachian trail would disagree of their demise.
  - tptacek 5y ago
    Huh, it turns out that there probably are feral colonies in Appalachia (they were thought to be extinct nationwide) --- specifically because those colonies are Varroa-resistant. Super interesting.
    - pedrocr 5y ago
      Great video on those bees and how they've adapted to varroa: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=T7CB8E7jKBc https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=T7CB8E7jKBc They had a ~90% bottleneck when varroa arrived and after adapting are now at full strength again.
      - sswaner 5y ago
        My first thought on clicking that link: “No way I am watching a 1.5 hour video on bees”. 1.5 hours later - absolutely fascinated. Thanks for sharing.
- wayne31r 5y ago
  Honey bees are non-native in North America but definitely not invasive. If they were invasive, then the feral population would not be dying out. Humans, on the other hand, could definitely be considered invasive.
dflock 5y ago
All insect populations are in drastic decline everywhere. Everywhere we have records and have compared them to recent counts, they are in the region of 50% or more down since the 70's. Bee's are slightly more complex because we keep large numbers of certain bee species as livestock, but I haven't seen anything to indicate that wild bee's are somehow exempt from the general collapse of insect life.
- lostlogin 5y ago
  > All insect populations are in drastic decline everywhere. bees are indeed more complex, and in some places the populations are increasing due to high stocking of hives. https://www.airborne.co.nz/pages/bee-keeping-statistics-new-zealand https://www.airborne.co.nz/pages/bee-keeping-statistics-new-...
- drewm1980 5y ago
  Native bee species are indeed in decline, and domesticated bees certainly are not helping. At best they're competition. Ran into that while deciding whether or not to keep eating honey after I went vegan. Biased source: https://plantbasednews.org/lifestyle/food/is-honey-vegan-the-not-so-sweet-truth/ https://plantbasednews.org/lifestyle/food/is-honey-vegan-the... Trace their sources, and you end up on EU publications: https://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/conservation/species/redlist/downloads/European_bees.pdf https://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/conservation/species... And the IUCN red list https://www.iucnredlist.org/ https://www.iucnredlist.org/ About 1/10 of the EU's bee species are red listed.
jonas21 5y ago
Yes, the global honey bee population has been growing steadily for a long time. This is due to increasing demand for honey and pollination services. In the US, it's been pretty stable even after colony collapse disorder appeared here in the mid-2000s. The rate at which individual colonies collapse has increased, but beekeepers have responded by creating more colonies to replace them. https://www.ers.usda.gov/webdocs/publications/88117/err-246.pdf https://www.ers.usda.gov/webdocs/publications/88117/err-246....
lostlogin 5y ago
In New Zealand the numbers are high enough that it is a problem (disease, dealing honey crop etc). https://www.airborne.co.nz/pages/bee-keeping-statistics-new-zealand https://www.airborne.co.nz/pages/bee-keeping-statistics-new-...

tptacek 5y ago

Honey bee populations in America are certainly taking a hit, but honey bees are invasive to North America, and feral honey bees all died out in the 1980s, so any American honey bee you'd be talking about is livestock, not wildlife.

WaitWaitWha 5y ago
The wild hives that I see along the Appalachian trail would disagree of their demise.
- tptacek 5y ago
  Huh, it turns out that there probably are feral colonies in Appalachia (they were thought to be extinct nationwide) --- specifically because those colonies are Varroa-resistant. Super interesting.
  - pedrocr 5y ago
    Great video on those bees and how they've adapted to varroa: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=T7CB8E7jKBc https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=T7CB8E7jKBc They had a ~90% bottleneck when varroa arrived and after adapting are now at full strength again.
    - sswaner 5y ago
      My first thought on clicking that link: “No way I am watching a 1.5 hour video on bees”. 1.5 hours later - absolutely fascinated. Thanks for sharing.
wayne31r 5y ago
Honey bees are non-native in North America but definitely not invasive. If they were invasive, then the feral population would not be dying out. Humans, on the other hand, could definitely be considered invasive.

dflock 5y ago

All insect populations are in drastic decline everywhere. Everywhere we have records and have compared them to recent counts, they are in the region of 50% or more down since the 70's. Bee's are slightly more complex because we keep large numbers of certain bee species as livestock, but I haven't seen anything to indicate that wild bee's are somehow exempt from the general collapse of insect life.

lostlogin 5y ago
> All insect populations are in drastic decline everywhere. bees are indeed more complex, and in some places the populations are increasing due to high stocking of hives. https://www.airborne.co.nz/pages/bee-keeping-statistics-new-zealand https://www.airborne.co.nz/pages/bee-keeping-statistics-new-...
drewm1980 5y ago
Native bee species are indeed in decline, and domesticated bees certainly are not helping. At best they're competition. Ran into that while deciding whether or not to keep eating honey after I went vegan. Biased source: https://plantbasednews.org/lifestyle/food/is-honey-vegan-the-not-so-sweet-truth/ https://plantbasednews.org/lifestyle/food/is-honey-vegan-the... Trace their sources, and you end up on EU publications: https://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/conservation/species/redlist/downloads/European_bees.pdf https://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/conservation/species... And the IUCN red list https://www.iucnredlist.org/ https://www.iucnredlist.org/ About 1/10 of the EU's bee species are red listed.

jonas21 5y ago

Yes, the global honey bee population has been growing steadily for a long time. This is due to increasing demand for honey and pollination services. In the US, it's been pretty stable even after colony collapse disorder appeared here in the mid-2000s. The rate at which individual colonies collapse has increased, but beekeepers have responded by creating more colonies to replace them. https://www.ers.usda.gov/webdocs/publications/88117/err-246.pdf https://www.ers.usda.gov/webdocs/publications/88117/err-246....

lostlogin 5y ago

In New Zealand the numbers are high enough that it is a problem (disease, dealing honey crop etc). https://www.airborne.co.nz/pages/bee-keeping-statistics-new-zealand https://www.airborne.co.nz/pages/bee-keeping-statistics-new-...