Mobile phones responsible for disappearance of honey bee

[OwlHoot]

From the Telegraph:

Mobile phones responsible for disappearance of honey bee

... They set up a controlled experiment in Punjab earlier this year comparing the behaviour and productivity of bees in two hives – one fitted with two mobile telephones which were powered on for two fifteen minute sessions per day for three months. The other had dummy models installed.

After three months the researchers recorded a dramatic decline in the size of the hive fitted with the mobile phon, a significant reduction in the number of eggs laid by the queen bee. The bees also stopped producing honey. ...

and the first Google ad after the article:

T-Mobile Official Site

Get the gang together with the latest smartphones from T-Mobile

DOH!

[threaded]

From the original paper:

Flight activity
(No. of workers bees leaving the hive entrance/min)
Before exposure 34.1 ± 10 (18–48)
During exposure 22.8 ± 6 (13–34)

Their numbers are so dramatic one would have expected someone keeping bees to have noticed it previously.

[Toastiness]

TWO hives ?

FFS, what kind of sample size it that ?

One for badscience.net surely ?

[HairyArsedBloke]

May Bee the hive with a phone got the call to come home and the message hasn't reached the other one yet?

[gingerjedi]

Further intervention from the mother nature program, we were never meant to reach intelligence level 3.

Bees disappearing is just the start of the devolution process.

[TimberWolf]

TWO hives ?

FFS, what kind of sample size it that ?

One for badscience.net surely ?

whs

[minestrone]

The problem is far worse in the states where the reception saturation is nothing compared to the UK

[OwlHoot]

The problem is far worse in the states where the reception saturation is nothing compared to the UK

True and, as the article points out, bees seem to do comparatively OK in London, where presumably the signal is strong.

OTOH, if beekeepers carry switched on mobiles then the local signal strength might spike while the phone sends signals. Also, in the US bee hives are carted around in trucks almost non-stop so the bees can pollinate lots of different areas, and some people reckon that stresses them. It also means they spend longer in close proximity to the driver's mobile phone.

It's obviously a virus though. I'm sure we've discussed CCD (Colony Collapse Disorder) here before.

[threaded]

Honey is far cheaper to buy from China.

If your hive dies off you can claim a farm subsidy.

If you just pack in you get nothing.

So if you want to get out of the Bee game, which do you do?

Which is why they can't find a single cause for CCD.

Simples.

[thunderlizard]

TWO hives ?

FFS, what kind of sample size it that ?

It could be about 2 x 40,000 bees.