Mites, diseases, and pesticides are all suspected of contributing to bee colony collapse disorder. The bees are dying at such a fast rate that farmers who rely on bees for pollination are now reserving them five years in advance. NBC’s Anne Thompson

The recent warm dry spell created ideal conditions for a bumper crop, but five to seven per cent of growers may suffer due to the lack of honey bees, said John Gibeau, owner of the Honey Bee Centre in Surrey.

Diagram by Chris Bisson

For local farmer Don Reese of Reese’s Farms in Scottsburg, using bee pollination services has helped tremendously with production of his crops. “We would not be able to raise the vegetable crops we raise without pollination services like we’ve been getting. It’s not enough wild bees or natural pollinators to pollinate so we can have the produce we need to have, so we rely on beehives,” Reese said.

Published on April 25, 2013

This report covers conditions and observations made between Monday, April 15 and Sunday, April 28, 2013.

Instead of $130 to $140 per colony, desperate farmers were paying $245 to $250, he said. Lured by the high prices, many beekeepers who would have divided their hives between California almond groves and the orange groves in Florida opted to send all their colonies to California. While Mattiaccio didn’t truck his bees to California, he was among the few commercial beekeepers who did take bees to Florida. The resulting orange honey crop is smaller this year than normal, and prices are escalating.

La Consejería de Agricultura y Agua, a través del Instituto Murciano de Investigación y Desarrollo Agrario y Alimentario (IMIDA), ha desarrollado durante tres años en el Campo de Cartagena, el Valle del Guadalentín y en colaboración con la localidad de Pulpí, el proyecto 'Operación polinizador' para conservar las poblaciones de abejas silvestres por ser necesarias para polinizar determinados cultivos. Dicho proyecto, financiado por la empresa Syngenta, cuenta con una segunda fase de desarrollo para mejorar la polinización de los cultivos de melón mediante la creación de márgenes para el sustento de abejas. En esta fase, que irá desde el presente año hasta el 2015, también colabora la empresa Procomel.

Anything that needed pollination did particularly badly as the cold and heavy rain stopped bees working and bees are in short supply anyway due to agricultural pesticides, mites and colony collapse. There's nothing we can do about the weather, short of making greater use of cloches, cold frames, greenhouses and polytunnels to protect edible crops, but there are a few things you can do to assist pollination:

Article written by  Tyler Pike