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At-risk bees highlight threat to food supply

Reviewed by: Phil Veldhuis

Posted: 06/5/2010 1:00 AM | Comments: 0 (including replies)

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(TRIBUNE MEDIA MCT)

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Keeping the Bees

Why All Bees Are at Risk and What We Can Do to Save Them

By Laurence Packer

HarperCollins, 274 pages, $30

It has long been known that the world's bee population has been falling rapidly. But why should you care about the fate of those little stingers?

Well, your food supply depends on bees. No bees means no honey, and no bees means fewer fruits like apples and blueberries.

In this informative volume of popular science, Toronto bee expert Laurence Packer also explains less obvious reasons for you to care about bees:

-- Hamburgers are made from cattle fed hay grown from alfalfa seed pollinated by the leaf-cutting bee.

-- Coffee supplies would decline by 20 per cent without adequate pollination by bee species native to the tropics.

-- Tequila is produced from agave pollinated by bees.

There are more than 19,500 known species of bee, each uniquely adapted to its ecosystem. Packer explains why bees are currently threatened and argues that bees matter for us all.

Many species of bee are highly specialized foragers adapted to pollinate particular plants. Shrinking habitats mean these bees might decline to the point of extinction.

While few of us will ever know these species existed, Packer makes it clear that we will miss them when they are gone.

His central argument is that bees are excellent species to study as indices of environmental health. We can use bees to warn us when ecosystems become dangerously close to collapse.

All bees have a unique sex determination scheme that depends on a single gene rather than on chromosomes like most animals. The result is that many male offspring are not reproductive, reducing the total population of viable adults in the next generation by up to 25 per cent.

Further, as populations shrink, the genetic diversity shrinks faster than in species with a more typical sex determination. Bees will thus start to lose genetic diversity earlier than other species in the same ecosystem.

This gives us an early warning system when ecosystems are losing sustainability. We ignore these warnings at our peril.

Packer misses one reason for using bees as an index species: people have a surprising fascination with the little devils.

We find it compelling that something so small can both hurt and feed us.

A good index species is also one that motivates human behaviour. For example, DDT was banned because it was killing such birds as eagles, which humans also care about.

Packer starts each chapter with a fascinating glimpse into the world of bee research. Scouring Chilean deserts for rare bee species or hand digging bees' nests in the ground outside Calgary, he unearths anecdotes that provide a useful understanding of how scientists study these elusive insects.

Packer does an excellent job of clearly explaining experimental design and how the results support his overall position.

Those hoping for some good news on environmental issues also will appreciate Parker's approach.

Most bees are solitary, harmless and ubiquitous. Unlike white rhinos or Siberian tigers, the animals Packer wants to save are already in your backyard.

Packer has documented more then 100 different species of bee in downtown Toronto. Most of these species nest in the ground or in dead plant growth.

Packer urges modest changes in how we cultivate our own space to help protect bee species. For instance, one local and common species of bee lays the eggs of next summer's generation in the canes of raspberry bushes.

Diligent gardeners who clear away dead stalks of raspberries before the next crop are throwing away the babies with the bathwater. At least in this case, by doing nothing, you can help the bees (and your raspberries).

Packer concludes with six simple steps most of us could take to make sure our grandchildren will enjoy honey, apples, hamburgers, coffee and, perhaps during summer vacation, tequila.

Starbuck resident Phil Veldhuis is a third-generation commercial beekeeper who sells honey at the St. Norbert Farmers' Market. He teaches courses in philosophy and environmental ethics at the University of Manitoba.

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition June 5, 2010 H9

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