<font color='black' size='2' face='arial'>Ah <font size="2">the annual Bee update. Ive noticed a decline this year in the UK but havn't seen a rise in dead Bees. What I have also noticed recently and this worried me was when working in the woods clearing a couple of paths there was a very noticable lack of insect life in and under the leaf litter. !!!!!<br>
In one area I raked away about an inch of leaves uncovering the peat/earth from a patch roughly 20 sq ft and then looked for insects. No woodlice, millipedes or even springtails. All I saw was one lonely small spider.<br>
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Now that is truly worrying. Nothing of note has changed in the local environment apart from a really wet year and the Oak trees have dropped more acorns than I have ever seen! <br>
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<div style="font-family:arial,helvetica;font-size:10pt;color:black">-----Original Message-----<br>
From: spike <spike66@att.net><br>
To: 'ExI chat list' <extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org><br>
Sent: Fri, 20 Dec 2013 6:18<br>
Subject: [ExI] confused trees and bees, FW: Season's Greetings from the Federation<br>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><a target="_blank" href="https://twitter.com/GeorgeTakei"><span style="text-decoration:none"><img id="_x0000_i1025" src="cid:part1.04090407.06090403@gmail.com" border="0" height="48" width="48"></span><strong>George Takei</strong><span class="visuallyhidden"><b>Verified account</b></span> <span class="username"><s>@</s><b>GeorgeTakei</b></span> </a></div>
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<div class="js-tweet-text">Well spocken. <img id="bd_nd_B937DB990D1548698380D65CF906E308_0" src="cid:part3.02060209.05070007@gmail.com" border="0" height="16" width="16"><a target="_blank" href="http://t.co/kZmJt6iaeA">pic.twitter.com/kZmJt6iaeA</a></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="color:#1F497D">2013 was a terrible year for bees. Perhaps 2014 will be better. On the first day of this year I saw hundreds of dead and dying bees, apparently having failed to find their hive and perishing from exposure. I saw more dead and dying bees on the sidewalk this year than all six previous years combined, not including that 1 January event. Estimated total about 100.</span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:">Now my observation is the blossoms are coming earlier this year than I recall ever seeing them open, and the bees are here as well. In my back yard I see the vines have blossoms already. The solstice is Saturday afternoon, so this is a case where spring has arrived before the autumn officially ends. I noticed there are more confused trees this year than just my citrus trees in back. I see evidence of early blooming and new growth everywhere. With current indications, there will be a riot of color in January.</span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:">We tend to notice when bees decline, but would we notice if other bugs went missing? My ants are gone without a trace. If some bug virus decimated the ants, how would we know it had happened? Perhaps I could talk the local hardware store out of some information on sales of ant poison and boric acid.</span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11.0pt;font-family:">spike</span></div>
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