UK Professor Hopes Modified Bee Genes Can Prevent Colony Collapse Disorder
A UK Professor Hopes His Genetically Modified Worker Bees Can Help Stop The Colony Collapse Disorder That Is Grossly Effecting the UK Economy
Last week 140,000 protesters from the British Beekeepers Association (BBKA) marched on Whitehall demanding $8-million in emergency funding from the Department for Environment to tackle alarming rates of bee decline. The decline has cost the UK economy about $54-million in the past year alone.
But British scientist Francis Ratnieks — and the UK’s only professor of apiculture – is pioneering research that he hopes will assuage the hardship beekeepers have been experiencing with colony collapse disorder.- » See also: MSNBC to Air 2 Hour Special on Animal Conservation: “100 Heartbeats”
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He hopes to reverse the decline of the honeybee by breeding cleaner bees to protect hives from harmful diseases. The cleaner bee is a breed of worker bee that will be genetically programmed to keep hives clean. They will be responsible for removing pupae and larvae from the hives if they are dead or dying.
Currently these cleaner bees only exist in very small numbers. The hygienic bee was first observed in the 1930s, but at most only 10-percent of a hive has bees with this gene.
Basically, if more of these bees can be “created” then they can protect hives from parasites like the varroa mite: last year the mite killed more than 2-billion honeybees and wiped out one in three colonies.
This three project is being privately funded by the leading UK honey brand Rowse Honey. The company has warned Britain that the country could run out of home-produced honey by Christmas.
Aside from just honey, bees pollinate some $165-million worth of crops in the UK annually, as well as flowers and wild plants. The Bee Farmers’ Association is supporting the project by helping to test colonies with hygienic queens in 100 hives across Britain, to see if they are also good at making honey.
Source: guardian.co.uk | Image source: david.nikonvscanon on Flickr under Creative Commons
It’s over. Lord’s coming back soon. Have a quarter of barley for a day’s wages. Bats are dying off, too. No one even knows why. Frogs all over the world depleting… They minimize insect populations that kill crops. That genetic stuff won’t work. It’s over. It’s coming. Mayans knew it. They all knew it. December 21, 2012 and after that immense tribulation. Next Pope is the last. Peter the Roman. Probably the False Prophet.
Hmmm, this sounds promising but I would worry a bit about the “unintended” consequences. Africanized honey bees started arose from the same desires to improve the species.
CCD? Is this like ADD for bees? Weird. Who’s helpin the bees?
Jess
http://www.anolite.echoz.com
About time too!
This report is so badly written and contradictory (was it CCD or varroa that killed 2 billion bees this year; and wouldn’t all but the queens have died of old age anyway?)that it is difficult to glean facts from the sensational supposition. Does Francis intend to produce GM bees or use conventional selection methods? I suspect the latter.
It is good news that some research is happening anyway despite continual cuts back in government funding.
We didn’t learn our lesson about tampering with bees LAST TIME, apparently.
re: cchiovitti
Seriously, how much does this sound like one of those B-movies from the 60’s. Alfred Hitchcock would have been all over an idea like this!
Awesome. Not to be overly selfish, but a world without honey is a sad sad world. Of course, the lack of crop pollinization also greatly sucks.
Wow.genetically cleaner bees…whats next a poopless human.
re: Wolf
Not a terrible idea! Maybe a poopless cat, I hate emptying the litter box.