octopusgardener0
octopusgardener0 t1_iwdnsx0 wrote
Reply to comment by Aartvaark in The lifespans of honey bees living in laboratory environments has dropped about 50% over the last 50 years, hinting at possible causes for the worrisome trends across the beekeeping industry, according to new research by University of Maryland entomologists. by Wagamaga
Normally I'd agree with you, but beekeeping is actually heavily weighted in the bee's favor, they're free to leave if they feel the hive is unsafe or not comfortable (which I've had done), or if they feel it's a poor location for resources, and they've been bred through the millenia to produce more than they need. However, honeybees can actually be considered an invasive species to North America, and I recommend if you want to keep bees in your backyard and want a more naturalistic way of doing it, to look for native bee houses or plant flowers that favor native bees, like nightshades, to bring more around.
Fun fact, native bees actually have a 90% pollination rate to the honeybee's 5% rate, but native bees are more solitary so honeybees match their rate through sheer numbers.
As an aside, my bee houses are foundationless as I believe they know what kind of comb they need better than I do, and I refuse to use artificial treatments for the hive, electing for more natural ones, like formic acid (concentrated venom) pads for mites, and ultimately hope I can reach a level where my bees are healthy enough I can go treatmentless and they can keep themselves so I interrupt them less.
octopusgardener0 t1_iwc1yzq wrote
Reply to comment by Bill_Nihilist in The lifespans of honey bees living in laboratory environments has dropped about 50% over the last 50 years, hinting at possible causes for the worrisome trends across the beekeeping industry, according to new research by University of Maryland entomologists. by Wagamaga
I'm a backyard beekeeper, and we're recommended to replace our whole frames every two years because the wax gets full of toxins to the point it starts affecting the bees at that point. On top of that, all package bees are bred in massive farms scattered around the US (the eastern half all comes from one farm in Georgia, don't know if there's any more out there) which have dubious genetics at the best of times, plus varroa mite infection can cause developmental issues if they get into the brood cells before they cap them.
There's a lot of variables that can affect domesticated bees before adulthood, have they done any documentation regarding the states and histories of the hives they took them from?
octopusgardener0 t1_ixdrlnv wrote
Reply to comment by uuicon in Why do immune reactions take place in the lymph nodes closest to the site of infection? by arlomurfett
The neighborhood watch in parts of your body has people trained to look out for one thing, then when they see it they go down to the nearest police station who sends out officers trained to handle some common problems while beginning training new ones to help the first responders with that one thing