Hi All
 
Enjoyed reading the bits about the pesticide causing so called 'mad
bee disease' in sunflower fields.
 
In south africa we have had a problem over recent years with the cape
honeybee A.m.capenis drifting into the Transvaal Honeybee
A.m.scutellata's hives and then developing into laying workers (tvl
queen cannot suppress worker ovaries) and then the hive becomes
parasitised with cape bees (cape worker can lay worker eggs) and the
hive sort of fizzles out, or is diagnosed Cape laying worker and is
gassed.
 
Now, I recently spoke to a guy from the Orange Free State province in
the centre of the country. His Dad grows sunflowers and he used to
rent hives from a cape keeper as well as keeping a few of his own.
His own hives suddenly got wiped out by the cape bee even although
they had been renting cape bees for a number of years.
 
My question: I wonder if it could have been this chemical that caused
increased drifting of cape bees - the cape bee crash happened about
94 -95 so it would coincide with the launch of this product. (I don't
know if it was used here, but Bayer is a big name in SA)
 
Keep well
 
Garth
 
Garth Cambray           Camdini Apiaries
Grahamstown             Apis mellifera capensis
Eastern Cape Prov.
South Africa
 
Time = Honey
If parents taught kids about the birds and bees, guys would believe they were half the women they used to be!!
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