The Bee's Epitaph
The Bee's Epitaph
Not much time left.
Robots can not replace bees.
The last bee's death will shock the world and become breaking news.
Tool late to understand.
In recent years, public attention has been drawn to the plight of honeybee populations, which
have seen losses in the EU and around the world. Behind this highly publicised phenomenon
is a problem of a much larger scale, namely the dramatic decline in the occurrence and
diversity of all kinds of European wild insect pollinators, including wild bees, hoverflies,
butterflies and moths. Numerous pollinator species are extinct or threatened with extinction.
Link: Pesticide Campaign
Link: Bee Life
Link: Pollinis
There are more than 20,000 distinct bee species around
the world, and more than 4,000 in the U.S. alone.
Bees exist in all types of climates around the world, from forests
in Europe to deserts in Africa, even in the Arctic Circle.
Worldwide, bee populations are in decline. Many factors
such as pests, diseases, viruses and monocultures (... and other causes...) each have their own effects, but unfortunately, they often
intensify the effects of each other.
Over the last decade,
multiple reports have indicated that beehives in the U.S.
and Europe have suffered hive losses of at least 30%,
sometimes higher.
Link: Save the Bees
Link: Bee Life
Link: Pollinis
The best known species of bee is the honey bee (Apis mellifera), it is present almost everywhere on our continent. The black bee, which we are particularly interested in France, is a subspecies: it is the Apis mellifera mellifera. This endemic bee is a champion of adaptation and a pillar in the preservation of our biodiversity.
Yet this local bee is in danger, because of human activities (use of pesticides, destruction of habitats, monocultures, etc.), but also because of the dangers caused by the importation of non-endemic species, less adapted and therefore more fragile.
Faced with this observation, it is more than necessary to create legally protected sanctuaries in order to preserve our local subspecies.
Link: Balkan Ecology