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There is hope

PostPosted: Jun 8, 2009 6:44 pm
by tncaver
Today, I walked my dog and observed many honey bees. I have not seen honey bees on my street for several years. Today
there were almost as many as before the bee blight. However, if our government had seen fit to kill all bees off to eliminate
the bee blight OR to eliminate Africanized bees, there might never have been any bees in my neighborhood again.

Maybe killing off all of any species to eliminate a problem is not the answer. Perhaps, "Live and Let Live" is a better
alternative. Maybe our bats should have the same opportunity to recover and build immunity to WNS as the honey bees
have had to build an immunity to whatever has been killing them off.

Re: There is hope

PostPosted: Jun 8, 2009 10:48 pm
by MoonshineR DavE
That's what I've been thinking.

Re: There is hope

PostPosted: Jun 9, 2009 4:24 pm
by Ralph E. Powers
I've mentioned this unpopularist view before myself that perhaps we are dealing with Nature at work and thus actually when you think about it... have no right to interfere. Nature has been around A LOT longer than we have and she knows best... always has and always will.
I don't want to see bats die off either but until we know the grand scheme of things and have proof positive of what is causing WNS we should leave well enough alone.

Re: There is hope

PostPosted: Jun 10, 2009 5:13 am
by caveflower
I really think this is a case of survival of the fittest. The strongest survive. This has been happening since the begining of time. I'm not sure its wise for us to butt in to what mother nature has aready put in action. BUT if us humans have started this with all our advance technoiogy. We have to fix it. How do we know which one it is? :shrug:

Re: There is hope

PostPosted: Jun 10, 2009 6:38 am
by ArCaver
tncaver wrote:Today, I walked my dog and observed many honey bees. I have not seen honey bees on my street for several years. Today
there were almost as many as before the bee blight. However, if our government had seen fit to kill all bees off to eliminate
the bee blight OR to eliminate Africanized bees, there might never have been any bees in my neighborhood again.

Maybe killing off all of any species to eliminate a problem is not the answer. Perhaps, "Live and Let Live" is a better
alternative. Maybe our bats should have the same opportunity to recover and build immunity to WNS as the honey bees
have had to build an immunity to whatever has been killing them off.


It could be that someone has placed some hives close to your neighborhood. I had plenty of bees in my yard until someone stole a couple of hives from about a half mile from here. Despite a yard full of white clover I haven't seen a single honeybee this year. Most people don't seem to realize that honeybees are a naturalized European species and if they were introduced today they would be considered an invasive species. It will be interesting to see if the native bees will increase in numbers to fill in the void left by the die off of the feral populations.

Re: There is hope

PostPosted: Jun 10, 2009 7:43 am
by tncaver
ArCaver wrote:
tncaver wrote:Today, I walked my dog and observed many honey bees. I have not seen honey bees on my street for several years. Today there were almost as many as before the bee blight. However, if our government had seen fit to kill all bees off to eliminate the bee blight OR to eliminate Africanized bees, there might never have been any bees in my neighborhood again.

Maybe killing off all of any species to eliminate a problem is not the answer. Perhaps, "Live and Let Live" is a better
alternative. Maybe our bats should have the same opportunity to recover and build immunity to WNS as the honey bees
have had to build an immunity to whatever has been killing them off.


It could be that someone has placed some hives close to your neighborhood.


I brought this subject up because I read that one government agency may be considering killing off all bats in their area, in
an effort to stop the spread of WNS. Nature is very patient and evolution is a slow process. Man is impatient and known for creating a lot of problems in the natural world. Sometimes I think we might all be better off if man would learn to be patient and allow nature to do it's thing.

BTW, I live in an urban area. If there are any bee hives around here I've never seen any. However, last spring I did see a
huge swarm of bees briefly settle on a neighbor's two pear trees. I could hear their buzzing from a good distance away. Those trees were overloaded with pears that year. Perhaps those bees have found a place to live in this general area. Regardless, I
am glad to see them back, and hovering around the sweet clover and other flowering plants. Maybe my garden will do better
this year.

Re: There is hope

PostPosted: Jun 10, 2009 7:59 am
by graveleye
If only some sort of blight would happen to yellowjackets. I've noticed they've started their nonsense early this year, probably because of all the rain. I'm predicting they're going to be horrendous come September.

Re: There is hope

PostPosted: Jun 10, 2009 8:07 am
by tncaver
graveleye wrote:If only some sort of blight would happen to yellowjackets. I've noticed they've started their nonsense early this year, probably because of all the rain. I'm predicting they're going to be horrendous come September.


I have the same problem with red wasps and moles.

Re: There is hope

PostPosted: Jun 16, 2009 5:50 pm
by mae
There was another thread that proposed killing off infected bats. I'm curious about which agency (and where) proposed this idea.

There are plenty of honeybees that have escaped the farm. Interestingly enough there have been a number of studies that have noted an inverse relationship between honey bee abundance and bumble bee abundance. It has also been noted that certain species of bumble bees are better pollinators than honey bees for certain cash crops.

In conservation biology, it is generally acknowledged that if an extinction is a natural occurrence that humans should not interfere with that. There are several species of bats that are currently endangered due to human activities, and there is plenty of speculation that the fungus was introduced. A major problem with a species going nearly extinct is that they lose genetic diversity, which means they lose their ability to adapt to changing environments. This fungus causes up to 97% mortality. This makes recovery prospects pretty grim (and not to mention how bats have a slow birth rate anyway).

Re: There is hope

PostPosted: Jun 16, 2009 6:06 pm
by tncaver
Interesting that you mentioned the bumble bees, Mae. There were slightly more of them in the same area doing the pollinating,
as there were honey bees. There were also several other insects(non stinging) pollinating the clover, that I could not identify.

As for the bats, I think our big hope is that WNS will stop progressing southward due to climate. Maybe, maybe not. But if
it does, then perhaps the decimated bats will be able to recover eventually. Say, maybe in 50 years or so. :bananabat:

Re: There is hope

PostPosted: Jun 17, 2009 3:08 pm
by Larry E. Matthews
There are bee hives and bee keepers almost everywhere. Even in New York City !!!

There is an association there of bee keepers. Hard to imagine, isn't it?

I don't pretend to be a biologist, but going in and killing off populations of bats just seems insane to me.

Larry E. Matthews
NSS #6792-F