CCD is caused by pesticides weakening the immune system of bees. This makes other problems like mites and fungus hurt them more. This is known.

lol Hank Green makes yet another video to tell us he doesn't know about *insert topic* I'm starting to think it's his way of telling himself he doesn't have to do anything to help.

We know exactly why CCD happens https://youtu.be/lKKVznGTni0?t=35

TL:DW

Commericalized bee operations (to sell honey/bees wax etc) ends up affecting pollinating species of bees in the wild. As per usual, industrialized animal farming screws up the environment.

Even local bee farming displaces and infects the wild populations, so all honey is bad.


Leave the honey to Winnie the Pooh, and swap your honey out for maple syrup or agave nectar or rice syrup etc, and this whole thing stops.

Or make your own date paste. Bit of water, bit of dates, blend the crap out of it. It's delicious on anything. Particularly with peanut butter.

Lol..no.
CCD is barely studied in wild hives because it's not been seen in the wild in statistically meaningful numbers, and it's much more of a problem for commercial hives because they move, making them more prone to weakness and diseases, they are kept together, making them more prone to parasites like nosema and Varroa mites and disease spreading problems like the Israeli virus, and they are constantly in contact with crops sprayed with various pesticides weakening and confusing them. Wild hives don't have these extra deleterious factors, so are far less effected by CCD if at all, and are not noticeably effected by most if not all commercial or hobby beekeeping that targets human agriculture, not native flowers. I kept a hive of bees for years to pollinate my orchard, so I checked on this stuff before jumping in.

Commericalized bee operations (commercial pollinators who's byproducts are honey/bees wax/pollen/royal jelly/bee venom/and bees themselves) don't displace natives. If there were native bees pollinating the crops they are hired to come pollinate, there wouldn't be a commercial bee industry. Honey is mostly a byproduct of the pollination industry, without which America at least would starve. Native bees simply can't pollinate at the industrial scale and timetables required for your vegetables, so without commercial beekeepers we'll all have to eat more meat.

Any sources for these claims of single identified cause? And I don't mean youtube videos of some guy saying that it has been solved. Oh, and preferably not studies funded by agribusiness with vested interest either.

I ask because over the years there have been plenty of "revelations" claiming to have solved the mystery for good that never quite panned out, so, you know, I am a little skeptical.

My favorite is the study that claimed definitive proof it was cell phone signals causing CCD.

And yet the bee expert in the video says the opposite of what you just ranted.