Bees! Tiny little winged providers of both stings and sweet, sweet honey! Also, apparently, tiny little supercomputers in their own right! (no, really!). There’s just one problem with bees. They appear to be dying out. There have been plenty of theories as to why this is so, and the latest comes to what seems like a rather obvious conclusion.
The theories have run from some kind of disgusting fungus/virus hybrid to our mobile phone signals being the cause for their rapid and untimely demise.
Science Daily reports that the rapid decline in bee populations may in fact be down to the use of particular insecticides that infest both the soil when used on crops as well as being released into the air in clouds of talc for up to two years after planting. The idea is that the insecticides are able to float around the crops evenly and stick to the seeds. It’s just that they appear to be sticking to the bees as well. One thing that bees are good at is transporting tiny grains of.. well, anything, although the bees would really rather prefer pollen if given the choice — and this would explain why bee colonies far and wide are dying out. After all, who could predict that chemicals designed to kill insects would kill insects?
[Science Daily via Slashgear]
Image via wherethebeesat