"We must be careful to not synonymize CCD with all honey bee losses."
Norm Carreck, G. Williams, others - have published on this, and I and my
team would strongly agree. I've been to some countries who think they have
CCD, and whatever is causing their bee declines is NOT what I call CCD.
I'd sure like to have gotten to Spain - that's the only country where the
signs seem similar to what I'd call CCD. Something may also be going on in
France, maybe Italy, possibly Greece.
I don't think the U.K. is seeing the same thing - based on published
reports - but I've also decided, its impossible to tell from written reports.
I'm reasonably sure CCD is not common in most S. American countries nor
Australia and New Zealand - based on my own visits.
"There is a growing consensus that colony mortality is the product of
multiple factors, both known and unknown, acting singly or in combination."
There's one paper that said this, after the authors failed to find a
cause. So, since they couldn't find a specific cause, they fell back on the
'its everything' explanation, and others then piled on. At least one of these
authors is now back pedaling.
I strongly disagree with this claim - that CCD is a result of everything.
If so, why did severe collapses with such distinctive signs, suddenly
appear? I can't think of any group of factors that haven't been with us all
along - migratory stress, pesticides, viruses, mites, weather. So, why now?
The cynic in me says: if you've spent a lot of research money looking for a
cause - its not going to get you more money if you admit you've failed.
Now, I'm not saying we haven't seen CCD before - I'm not sure whether it
goes back to the 1800's (remember, if you find an OLD bee book, disappearing
disease is defined as the disease that disappears before anyone can find
out what caused it - hmm, maybe that's the best definition after all), or if
it did, it was very localized.
I did see some of the wide spread collapses described by Wilson, and I
wish I had bee samples from those pre-mite crashes. Keep in mind, Wilson and
his colleagues showed that long-term exposure to low levels of pesticide
(long before neonics) could cause a slow dwindle, ending up with a queen and
small cluster of bees - but that was over a period of many months, namely
winter.
I suspect that the reason for the cumulative stress notion is not because
there isn't a single causal factor, but rather because we've failed to
identify it. I do think that some external factor may act as a trigger -
weather and associated nutrition are high on my list - but that's my GUESS.
Bits and pieces of correlative information, but not enough to call it a
hypothesis.
Which brings me to a different question - one that seems central to all of
the research and the debates about CCD. What is a hypothesis? I always
thought it was based on sufficient evidence for probable cause.
Its the probable cause issue that bothers me. Where do we cross the line
from opinion to hypothesis to judgement?
Jerry
"The first step in these efforts should be to objectively discriminate
among types of colony mortality occurring worldwide."
Agree with this, but not the HOW, at least not how COLOSS is doing this -
don't expect any answers there.
"This will permit a more informed and appropriate allocation of research
efforts into CCD specifically and other causes of mortality in general."
Personally, NONE of the programs that I am aware of have approached CCD and
other bee loss problems in a systematic way - funding and research
priorities are not being focused as is required to solve an epidemiology problem.
We propose such an approach early on - were told by USDA reviewers that
it wouldn't answer any problems.
I see everyone jumping on a bandwagon of proposing their own pre-conceived
hypothesis, with reviewers doing the same. Most funds have gone to folks
to do more of what they've been doing for all of their careers. Others are
re-inventing the wheel - without doing due diligence to see if they've
discovered anything new, or just something that has been known for a long time.
Failure to acquaint oneself with literature older than a few years should
not be an excuse.
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