see also, in Grist: CSI: My Apiary
discuss in Gristmill: Can you hear me now?
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Cell Phones Join Pesticides & GMOs as Possible Cause of Mass Disappearances of Bees
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Buzz Light Year
Could cell phones be the culprit in honeybee disappearance?
Grist Magazine, April 17, 2007
Straight to the Source
Apiarists in the U.S. and Europe have been scratching their heads for
months over rapidly waning honeybee populations. Now some scientists
who have combed through the data are all abuzz with a new theory: cell
phones. In bad news to mobile-attached ears, British researchers are
suggesting that phone radiation could be disrupting bees' navigation
systems. Research has shown that bees act differently around power
lines, and a recent study found that up to 70 percent of the little
stingers failed to return to hives that contained cordless-phone
docking units. The implications, of course, go beyond bee welfare;
Albert Einstein -- if not a bee expert, a relatively smart guy -- once
said that in the absence of the busy crop pollinators, humans "would
have only four years of life left." Ooh, that stings. Other theories
for the bees' departure have included mites, pesticides, global
warming, and genetically modified crops, but so far, none has been
definitively proved.
