Pests and Disease

A colony can be strong in spring and gone by the next. This chapter lists what the source names as threats: diseases, parasites and pests, predators, and the unexplained losses called colony collapse disorder. It is a naming chapter. The source says what each threat is but, in the passage I read, gives almost nothing about treatment, so this chapter does not tell you how to treat anything. For that you would need a local beekeeping association or a proper beekeeping manual (check).

Disease in Adult Bees

Wikipedia's Beekeeping article says the common agents of disease in adult honey bees include fungi, bacteria, protozoa, viruses, parasites and poisons. It adds that the gross symptoms in affected adults are very similar whatever the cause, so working out the cause is difficult without microscopic identification of microorganisms or chemical analysis of poisons.

Parasites and Pests the Source Names

Links back to the hive

Beekeeping Fundamentals 1 quoted the same article saying that, since mite pests arrived in the twentieth century, hive floors are often replaced, temporarily or permanently, by wire mesh with a removable tray. This section names the mites behind that change. The article does not explain how the mesh floor helps, and I have not explained it either (check). The wax moth sentence also matters for stored equipment: the article says stored frames can be decimated, which is a reason to think about how spare frames are kept (my inference; the article gives no storage advice).

That listing is the output of a short Python script that holds the six threats in a dictionary and prints them in alphabetical order. The count of six is mine, from counting the article's entries; the article's own wording groups wax moths under two species, so someone counting species would get seven (check).

Colony Collapse Disorder

The article says that since 2006, losses from colony collapse disorder (CCD) have been increasing across the world, "although the causes of the syndrome are unknown". In the U.S., commercial beekeepers have been increasing hive numbers to deal with higher rates of attrition. The article elsewhere says varroa is blamed by many researchers as a leading cause. Those two statements sit uneasily: the causes are "unknown", yet varroa is "blamed by many". I take it to mean there is a leading suspect but no settled explanation, though the article does not say so itself (check).

Predators

The article says most predators avoid honey bees because of the sting. Common predators include large animals such as skunks and bears, which seek the honey and brood as well as the adult bees. Some birds eat bees, such as bee-eaters, as do some robber flies, one of which the article calls a pest of beekeeping in South America because it eats workers while they forage in meadows. Beekeeping Fundamentals 3 noted a traditional reason for pale beekeeping clothing was the idea that dark clothing resembles those dark predators.

Are Bees Living Shorter Lives?

The article reports a 2022 study by researchers at the University of Maryland, College Park, which found that the lifespan of caged worker bees is half as long as that observed 50 years ago. The researchers hypothesised that shorter worker lifespans should correlate with lower honey production. Subtracting, the earlier observation would be from about 1972 (2022 − 50, checked in Python), though the article gives no earlier year, so that is my arithmetic from "50 years ago".

Not Yet Verified, and Sources

• Source. Everything attributed to "the article" comes from the plain-text version of Wikipedia's Beekeeping article (about 42,500 characters). This chapter uses its Pests and diseases section (Diseases, Parasites, Predators, Decreasing lifespan), which I read in full. The Recent developments section, which follows it, was also read, but I use it in a later chapter.
• Not in the passage. Treatment, monitoring, prevention, how the mesh floor helps, how the small hive beetle harms a hive, and the study's methods. None are stated here as fact (check).
• Conflicts. None direct. The "causes unknown" versus "leading suspect" tension is noted above.
• Code. A short Python script printed the threat list shown in the code block and checked the two year subtractions (1972 and 20). The outputs match the page.

Exercises