Wageningen, The Netherlands
June 10, 2013

By Plant Research International

For years, a mysterious phenomenon has been taking place: hundreds of thousands of honey bees seem to be disappearing from the face of the earth. Many bees always used to die in winter, but the average has risen sharply in recent years. The fates of nature and humans are closely tied to that of bees. Searching for answers and explanations, the media devote attention to the death of bees and scientists put forward various explanations. Biodiversity? The Varroa mite? The Nosema apis? Foulbrood? Neonicotinoids?

Wageningen World, Wageningen UR’s magazine about working on quality of life, focuses on this problem in its most recent issues and asks the views of researchers Tjeerd Blacquière and Coby van Doormalen of research group Bijen@wur. At Bijen@wur, the view is that there is no single cause to be identified, but that the problem may be due to an accumulation of factors.

Read more in Wageningen World 2013, no. 2.

Website: http://www.wur.nl

Published: June 10, 2013