I’ll confess, I skipped it, in favor of the TLDR of the Mojo article, which turned out to be an excellent example of bee reporting that is filled with hysteria, yet short on understanding. I’m sure the author has a depth of experience criticizing big-ag, but clearly, his beekeeping knowledge leaves a lot to be desired. But I guess all of that doesn’t matter if one has already positioned themselves as an advocate of the bees - Which surely must be a good thing!
That being said, I’m already famliar with Dr. Lu’s work, and need only to get as far as claims of CCD losses in winter to dismiss his study as a ridiculous attempt to double-down on his failed 2012 study, which also sucked pretty bad.
But, since you’re gracious, I thought I’d read the article anyhow. Unfortunately, I only made it one page before stomach upset kicked in. It appears Dr. Lu doesn’t actually understand what CCD is… he’s conflated it with garden variety hive loss. An understandable mistake if one is an agricultural activist writing for the popular media… But perhaps not so forgivable if one is from Harvard, and ostensibly a bee researcher.
It’s funny how everyone’s eager to weigh in on beekeeping issues, but no one is actually listening to beekeepers - Even the many with doctorates. It seems to be the fearmongers who always get the airtime, however flawed their research.
I’ve seen enough of the article to know it’s probably already had the living shit kicked out of it online by beekeepers with more time on their hands than I. I’m sure the critiques are easily googleable.
But keep the Bee-saving articles coming BB moderators!!!
