Pasadena, Calif. - In the closing months of 2006, thousands of American bee hives were found to be almost entirely devoid of bees, victims of a mysterious phenomenon now known as colony collapse disorder. A study of 150,000 managed bee colonies in 15 states, commissioned by the Apiary Inspectors of America, found that from September 2006 to March 2007, roughly one-third of the colonies were lost.
Bee keepers have suffered similar unexplained losses in the past, and not all of the hives in the survey were lost to whatever is causing colony collapse. But people are understandably worried that the disorder may threaten all three million managed bee colonies in the United States, a $14.6 billion commercial pollination business. So it is urgent that scientists figure out what is causing the colonies to disappear and how many more colonies stand to vanish.
Many scientists have suggested that some kind of virus or bacterium — or some combination of infectious agents, possibly carried by parasites like mites — is killing the bees. One way to find out if the culprit really is a contagion (as opposed to an environmental threat like pesticides or some other unknown factor), and to gauge its potential strength, is to look closer at the information we have by using a mathematical model, similar to those used to assess human epidemics.
Full Story: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/30/opinion/30farley.html?_r=1&oref=login
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