MetaFilter posts tagged with Bees

All you're sad or merry in, / You must tell the Bees.

naju — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 11:50:53 -0800

Telling the Bees is a blog devoted to (obsessed with?) bees. Bee lore. Bees in 15th century art. Dogs who look like bees. Bee cakes. Bees and indie rock. Bees and comedy. Bees and Sylvia Plath. Bees and bees and bees. The name of the blog is a reference to a curious folk custom.

Sniffer Bees

contraption — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 14:58:15 -0800

Inscentinel uses trained bees to sniff out drugs, explosives, and spoiled food.

Bees no better off.

paulsc — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 08:06:53 -0800

A new genomic study posits at least a reliable genetic marker for honey bees subject to Colony Collapse Disorder. Reports this past spring from Spain of a possible cure for CCD (previously on MeFi) haven't stemmed U.S. beekeeper losses, and a recent NYT article summarizing the work of U.S. experts working on the problem cites a number of related causes, including mites, viruses and common pesticides, as possible factors in the process of weakening hives that later suffer CCD. Regionally, long periods of wet weather this spring and summer have reduced normal honey production, leading to many hives in New York and New England having insufficient food for over wintering. On top of surveyed losses from 2006, 2007 and 2008 published this spring, 2009 losses will likely further raise the cost and decrease the availability of commercial bee operator's mobile crop pollination services in 2010, leading eventually to higher food costs.

"... The Apiary Inspectors of America (AIA) and USDA-ARS Beltsville Honey Bee Lab conducted a survey between September 2008 and early April 2009 to estimate colony losses across the country. Over 20% of the country’s estimated 2.3 million colonies were surveyed. A total loss of 28.6% of managed honey bee colonies was recorded. This compares to losses of 35.8% and 31.8% recorded respectively in the winters of 2007/2008 and 2006/2007. While a decrease in total losses is encouraging, the rate of loss remains unsustainable as the average operational loss increased from 31% in 2007/2008 to 34.2% in the 2008/2009 winter. ..."

Orchids

netbros — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 10:24:46 -0800

How do you spread your genes around when you're stuck in one place? By tricking animals, including us, into falling in love. Orchids — Love and Lies Orchids are dizzying in their diversity. Over the past 80 million years, some 25,000 wild species have taken root on six continents, in nearly every kind of habitat. Representing a full fourth of the world's flowering plants, there are four times as many orchid species as mammals, and twice as many as birds. Perhaps the most clever deceit of all is offered by those orchids that hold out the promise of sex. And not exactly normal sex. Really weird sex, in fact. I went in search of one of the most ingenious and diabolical of orchids: the Ophrys. (Some botanists call it the "prostitute orchid.") I'd been eager to lay eyes on this orchid and meet its hapless pollinator ever since reading about its reproductive strategy, which involves what my field guide referred to as "sexual deception" and "pseudocopulation." The pollination strategy of the Ophrys is, like that of so many orchids, ingenious, intricate, wily, and seemingly improbable—so much so that proponents of intelligent design sometimes point to orchids as proof that the hand of a higher intelligence must be at work in nature. (And a rather sadistic intelligence at that.) Yet the peculiarities of orchid sex actually offer one of the great case studies of natural selection, as Charles Darwin himself understood. Darwin was fascinated by orchid pollination strategies, and though he was puzzled by the purpose of Ophrys's uncanny resemblance to bees (pseudocopulation wasn't observed until 1916), he taught us much of what we know about these plants in The Various Contrivances by Which Orchids are Fertilised by Insects, the volume he published immediately after The Origin of Species. Outcrossing, or mixing one's genes with distant mates, increases vigor and variation in one's offspring, maximizing fitness. The sexual frustration of a deluded bee turns out to be an essential part of the orchid's reproductive strategy. Determined not to make the same mistake again, the bee travels some distance and, if things work out for the orchid, ends up pseudocopulating (and leaving his package of pollen) with an orchid a ways off. That distant orchid is likely to look and smell ever so slightly different from the first, and some botanists believe these subtle variations from plant to plant are part of the orchid's strategy to prevent bees from learning not to fall for a flower. "Imperfect floral mimicry" [pdf] is the botanical term for this adaptation. There's a video on YouTube, a riveting snippet of interspecies porn, in which you can watch a wasp be utterly bamboozled, and then humiliated, by an Australian tongue orchid. The tongue orchid (Cryptostylis) lures its pollinator by deploying a scent closely resembling the pheromone of the female wasp. "Prurient apparitions," is how Victorian critic John Ruskin described these flowers. Prurient? Is it possible that humans can look at an orchid and, like the deluded orchid bees or male dupe wasps, see an apparition of female anatomy? (Georgia O'Keeffe certainly did.) Could it be that plant sex and animal sex have gotten their wires crossed in human brains just as they have among the bugs? That accident of evolution has proved another happy one for the orchid, for look how much we humans now do for these flowers: the prices paid, the risks to life and limb endured, the pains taken …

Uncle's Day

eye of newt — Sun, 21 Jun 2009 00:54:22 -0800

An alternative look at Fatherhood: a study with bees shows that females mating with random males actually have more genes in common with their sisters than they do with their own daughters. And that makes them more likely to put the good of their colony sisters over their own reproductive legacy. Would that work with humans? Well, there's a society in China where kids don't have Fathers.

Let me show you a world of bats and bees, ants and trees, morning glories and a few beached whales

filthy light thief — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 16:49:39 -0800

The Graduate University for Advanced Studies, casually referred to as Sōkendai (a contraction of Sōgō kenkyū daigakuin daigaku), was founded in 1988 as the 96th national university in Japan. Amongst other things, it is home to the Soken Taxa Web Server which in turn hosts the first online Japanese Ant Color Image Database that currently lists 273 species of ant, the Illustrated Guide of Marine Mammals and the Marine Mammals Stranding DataBase, the Mammalian Crania Photographic Archive that currently includes 704 specimens, the Morning Glories Database that covers the many mutants of Ipomoea nil, closely related species and interspecific hybrids, the Makino Herbarium Database, which is named after the pioneering Japanese botanist, Tomitaro Makino, and the Japanese Bees Image Database.

Southern California is for suckers

will wait 4 tanjents — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 19:55:07 -0800

Tree of Bees? Hills that move? A reflective humorous post about living in Southern California via mockable.org

Robots ruined the Economy

twoleftfeet — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 03:44:30 -0800

Robots ruined the economy. But even robots are affected by bad financial times. Nonetheless, robots help relieve the stress of financial worries. There are worse things than a financial crisis.

Close-ups of insects

Kattullus — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 22:31:55 -0800

The Insect Close-ups Flickr Pool is full of fascinating pictures. There are all kinds of wonderful images to be found, of spiders, ladybugs, hornets, aphids, grasshoppers, worms, water striders and those superstars of the insect world, bees and butterflies. You can also search a map for pictures by location. If you want to take your own bug photographer Mark Plonsky has written a short how-to guide. He has taken some pretty great photographs of insects himself.

NYC Rooftop Beekeeper

jim in austin — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 07:28:29 -0800

NYC Rooftop Beekeeper - At 6:30 in the morning I met David Graves of Berkshire Berries outside a lower Manhattan building whose rooftop plays host to one of the 15 beehives he keeps on roofs around New York City... At Zina Saunder's blog filled with her portrait work. [previously]

BBQ Bees

sidartha — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 12:00:29 -0800

Man attempts to kill some bees that have invaded his BBQ, ends up annihilating entire colony of honey bees.

Where my bees at?

Hands of Manos — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 19:04:13 -0800

Häagen-Dazs wants you to know they are concerned about the disappearance of honeybees through a nice little flashed website. But we all know that the real reason our bees are disappearing is because of that damned hip hop music.

Stop and smell the roses. While you still can.

allkindsoftime — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 01:33:55 -0800

Flowers are losing their smell. The discovery could be one of several factors in the "colony collapse disorder" that is wiping out honey bees around the world. Even a brief glance at the titles of the news articles on Wiki reads a bit frighteningly, as do the previous mentions here: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.

Wax or the Discovery of Television Among the Bees

juv3nal — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 16:25:20 -0800

Wax or the Discovery of Television Among the Bees was the first movie on the internet. Also, allegedly the first indie movie edited on a digital non-linear system. Mostly, though it's just awesome because it features a cameo from William S. Burroughs and is just plain weird. spoiler: garden of eden cave = vengeance for the dead

Voice of the Hive

illuminatus — Fri, 04 Jan 2008 11:09:57 -0800

Voice of the Hive is a collection of informative and well-written stories about honeybees. Half of the tales are told from a human beekeeper's perspective, and are filled with valuable knowledge for potential hobbyists. The other half are compelling vignettes of a single bee's life -- widely diverse and compelling, told from each individual bee's perspective. The two elements come together to paint a fascinating picture of this noble insect's existence.

Sustainability

homunculus — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 15:46:13 -0800

Our Decrepit Food Factories. Michael Pollan on what sustainability is really about. [Via Gristmill.]

Ain't superstitious, baby.

found dog one eye — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 11:42:20 -0800

Meet Mojo, a runaway who was finally buried 80 years after his death. Visit with the Orviss family in their spacious mausoleum. Don’t mind the whispers; there’s no reason to be superstitious. It’s just Calvert, Texas.

Evil Bee Animation

jonson — Thu, 08 Nov 2007 10:00:49 -0800

Evil Bee (embedded QT) is a gorgeous & interesting animated short about a worker bee in a factory who rebels; bonus points for awesome soundtrack by menomena.

Bee afraid

nowonmai — Mon, 08 Oct 2007 11:20:48 -0800

Elephants are afraid of the buzzing of bees.

Bee Rapture postponed.

damn dirty ape — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 14:51:35 -0800

CCD caused by IAPV and KBV via AU. CDMA and GSM exonerated.

スズメバチが花にとまった。

voltairemodern — Fri, 17 Aug 2007 08:37:12 -0800

Asian Giant Hornets in action. Asian Giant Hornets on the palm of your hand. Asian Giant Hornet vs Mantis. Asian Giant Hornet vs Asian Giant Hornet.

Flower Vase Made By Bees

jonson — Tue, 24 Apr 2007 22:26:00 -0800

40,000 bees. 7 Days. One Vase.

Are mobile phones wiping out our bees?

stbalbach — Sun, 15 Apr 2007 09:08:47 -0800

Are mobile phones wiping out our bees? Electromagnetic waves from cell phones and other sources may be the cause behind the mysterious bee colony collapses in the US and Europe, a serious problem for food crops.

"First to fall over when the atmosphere is less than perfect..."

rzklkng — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 07:04:39 -0800

Killered Bees. The NYTimes covers the mysterious collapse of commercial honeybee colonies over the last 5-months, covering dozens of states. The disease, Colony Collapse Disorder, does not have a determined cause. The Canary Database indicates that bees can serve as "canaries in a coalmine" for human diseases, as many other animals do. Some of the suspected causative agents (as reported [pdf] by Penn State) include a immunodeficiency, the hive consumption of high-fructose corn syrup, nutritional stress, parasites, infectious diseases, stress due to colony splitting and relocation, insecticides, and antibiotic use. The die-offs are likely to adversely impact both prices and crop yields.

BEES! BEES! OH GOD BEES!

loquacious — Sun, 24 Dec 2006 23:43:30 -0800

OH DEAR LORD! BEES! BEES! BEES!! BEES!!! mmm, honey! HUMANS ARE STUPID!! BEES ARE ANGRY! BEES! BEES!!