It is truly depressing to see beekeepers struggle with keeping
colonies alive and healthy.  But also sad to see how journalists with
large readership oversimplify stories by picking the most dire
situations, the most eloquent voices and in many cases "copying and
pasting" and repeating past accounts that through repetition tend to
become the truth.  In so doing they misguide the average reader
(general public, politician, policy maker, funder, etc.) into
believing a number of myths.  And then the pressure is on for those
versed in the scientific method (which is designed to isolate factors
so as to extract clarity) to come up with answers to fairly silly
questions, when the bulk of the solutions are known and they are
either economic, regulatory or local and personal choices within the
complex geographic patchwork of beekeeping.  The discourse seems to be
stuck in the same old questions, such as:

Do parasites affect individual bees and colonies?
Do toxicants X, Y, Z kill or weaken colonies?
Does poor nutrition impact colony health?
Do parasites, toxicants and poor nutrition interact?
Does urbanization and land use reduce forage?
Can habitats be restored to be more ecologically friendly?

In a perfect world, were the discourse surrounding beekeeping more
realistic and less strident, at least the scientific community should
have moved on beyond all of this and be investigating much better
questions, more related to the 21st century.

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