Canada’s bees are thriving: public needs facts, not fear
March 21, 2014
From: Orangville.com
Guelph Mercury
By Lee Townsend
News outlets throughout Canada are filled with stories about the imminent decline of honeybees and the calls by some beekeepers to ban the pesticides — called neonicotinoids — which they blame for their problems.
As a commercial beekeeper, I have a couple of points to make that may surprise some readers. First, the Canadian honeybee industry is far from collapsing — in fact, it’s thriving. The numbers don’t lie. Both the total number of honeybee colonies and beekeepers in Canada has risen dramatically since 2008.
My second point is that while the honeybee industry is stressed by many factors, there is one emerging threat that is becoming our biggest challenge. That isn’t the many natural infections that plague bees, ranging from varroa mites to nosema to the emergence of the small hive beetle in Ontario and Quebec. The rising numbers of bee colonies and flourishing honey and pollination industries demonstrate that beekeepers can contend with those problems.
No, the newest and most preventable threat comes from the mistaken alliance some beekeepers are forming with environmental activist groups who would turn farmers into enemies and drive a wedge between the farming and beekeeping communities that depend on each other for their livelihoods.
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