"Johnny" wrote in news:1176642808.784690.237520
@n59g2000hsh.googlegroups.com:

Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) occurs when a hive's inhabitants
suddenly disappear, leaving only queens, eggs and a few immature
workers, like so many apian Mary Celestes. The vanished bees are never
found, but thought to die singly far from home. The parasites,
wildlife and other bees that normally raid the honey and pollen left
behind when a colony dies, refuse to go anywhere near the abandoned
hives.

The alarm was first sounded last autumn, but has now hit half of all
American states. The West Coast is thought to have lost 60 per cent of
its commercial bee population, with 70 per cent missing on the East
Coast.



I just asked an entomologist about this. He said that there are a couple
of things that might be happening: mites and/or wasting disease.
Apparently a similar thing happened about thirty years ago which was due to
wasting disease. He said that most of the bees in this country are of
Italian origin and when brought here they displaced the natural pollinators
that we had here. He seems unalarmed that the bees are disappearing and
seems to think that other pollinators will replace the missing bees and/or
we will engineer a better bee from this.