[ExI] Bee dieoff cause found?

[Kelly Anderson]

On Wed, Jan 22, 2014 at 10:07 PM, spike <spike66 at att.net> wrote:

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> *>…* *On Behalf Of *Kelly Anderson
> *Subject:* Re: [ExI] Bee dieoff cause found?
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> On Wed, Jan 22, 2014 at 7:37 PM, Adrian Tymes <atymes at gmail.com> wrote:
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> >>…Mainly posting this for Spike, since he has an interest:
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> >>…
> http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/22/us/bee-deaths-may-stem-from-virus-study-says.html?_r=0
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> >…Has anyone else heard of a virus (RNA or otherwise) jumping from a
> plant to an animal? Very cool every time they think they've found something
> contributing to this apparently very complex problem.  –Kelly
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> Kelly consider what we have done with the European honeybee.  We built
> hives for commercial pollination.  We invented methods of taking the bees
> and putting them on trucks, hauling them around to chase whatever crop is
> in bloom.  We brought bees together, offering bee diseases an opportunity
> to spread all over.  Think about it:  the European honeybee has been around
> for millions of years, but only in the past 100 or so have we loaded them
> on trucks and hauled them all over.
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> Bees have specialties.  One job a bee can do is work as a robber.  Robber
> bees go into other hives and devour honey.  This offers yet another vector
> for bee diseases and pathogens when all these hives are collected on a
> truck.
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> Consider the bees that are used as a means of smuggling dope or people.
> These hives are fed with sugar water or corn syrup, but never leave the
> truck.  What happens then?  We provide RNA viruses with a static population
> to completely infect, as well as a means of travelling around to
> agricultural centers, where the smuggled dope and alien workers are
> delivered.
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> We have no justification for believing that a radical change in the way
> bees are used will not result in a change in the balance of bee pathogens
> to bee immune systems.  We can see how the bee’s natural defenses can be
> overwhelmed by all the new opportunities for attack by viruses and
> pathogens.
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Good observations all, but still my question remains. Viruses tend to be
EXTREMELY specialized in what they attack. They can jump between close
relations, such as us and pigs, but to jump from a plant to an animal is
unprecedented in my limited experience.

-Kelly
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