It has echoes of a murder mystery in polite society. There could hardly be a
more sedate and unruffled world than beekeeping, but the beekeepers of the
United States have suddenly encountered affliction, calamity and death on a
massive scale. And they have not got a clue why it is happening.
Across the country, from the Atlantic coast to the Pacific, honey bee colonies
have started to die off, abruptly and decisively. Millions of bees are
abandoning their hives and flying off to die (they cannot survive as a colony
without the queen, who is always left behind).
Some beekeepers, especially those with big portable apiaries, or bee farms,
which are used for large-scale pollination of fruit and vegetable crops, are
facing commercial ruin - and there is a growing threat that America's
agriculture may be struck a mortal blow by the loss of the pollinators. Yet
scientists investigating the problem have no idea what is causing it.
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