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Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology

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Informed Discussion of Beekeeping Issues and Bee Biology <[log in to unmask]>
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Tue, 1 Jun 2010 07:54:24 -0400
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This little humorous piece from 2007 was widely published around the world:

*Beekeepers! Beware of Cell Phones!*
(by Marc Hoffman, Silver Spring, Maryland)

Are cell phones killing our bees? I never let my bees use cell phones. They
are social insects, and I have found once I let them have cell phones it is
impossible to control their use. The charges from time overruns can bankrupt
even the most efficient apiary operation. Once they learn to use them, they
become dependent on them: They stop returning to the hive to dance and just
phone in the location of their forage discoveries.

Furthermore, the increased peer-to-peer communication plays havoc with
traditional bee values. "To heck with pheromones!" they say. "Chemical
communication is passe compared with digital." As in many societies, the
young are the early adopters, spending their time text messaging instead of
doing their jobs. In the end we observe a breakdown in hierarchy and,
fatally, anti-royalist sentiment.

This, then, is the cause of CCD -- foolish notions of independence among the
immature, loss of authority of the elders, breakdown of group cohesion, and
collapse of the aristocracy.

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