In message <[log in to unmask]>, [log in to unmask]
writes
>I have been curious since first hearing about the outbreak in England:  What
>potential role, if any, might honey bees have in spreading foot and mouth?
>I'd especially like to hear from our English or Irish subscribers.  Has there
>been any such discussion over there?
There was a tiny bit - the idea was dismissed. No-one can come up with a
likely mechanism. Thank goodness. I hope no-one comes up with some
crackpot idea, like they lick the sweat off their faces and could take
it to another animal and infect it, that someone says is plausible so
we'll have to kill all the bees as well, just to be safe. It's a far cry
from the first cases of BSE when a government minister was proud to
offer his daughter a burger! Even so the response was just too slow by a
couple of days.

The main problem is access to farmland with a ban on public entry.
Beekeepers have either moved their hives off land with the relevant
animals before any possible ban might be made or go through the
disinfection process on entry and exit. This includes all tools and
objects brought on to the farm (and off) so gloves are disinfected too
if I remember right.

I have one apiary in a field used by cows last year (a clover meadow
next to field beans). Fortunately the farmer's father was a beekeeper,
so I can discuss with him how to close up the hives to set them up to
move. They are on two pallets so they can move them to the field
entrance for me to load into my van to take to another site. They won't
be doing the field beans this year. I will have to do some climbing over
a water trough to gain entry into another field as I cannot drive my van
up the track to get into the field. Every other apiary has easy entry.

There are two cases confirmed in my county - at the eastern end near the
first outbreak in Devon and was connected with it. At my end (the west),
a local farm manager and friend had a stop order put on him after a
wagon dropped off some feed. Its previous call was to a farm in Devon
which had the disease confirmed a couple of days later. So he is waiting
to see what happens and dare not go on holiday as he want to be there if
the worst happens.

The outbreak is devastating to farmers caught up in the epidemic. Every
other farmer is waiting, expecting to either catch it or have a
neighbour get it and be involved in a preventative cull. The tourists
and other visitors are staying away in such high numbers that hotels and
"bed-and-breakfast" places are losing money even when staff are laid
off. All National Trust properties are closed (the biggest landowner in
the country - I think). This includes beaches where deer come down to
the sand on the heather. All trade dependent on visitors is hit
terribly, even where there is no F & M (you call it hoof and mouth). The
Eden project has had its expected number of visitors - mostly locals -
but this may not last. 1/3 of the income in my county is from tourism.
Few farms can sell their animals and get their usual income from sales.
So the scale of suffering is enormous. And the waiting ...
--
James Kilty