SOUTH AFRICA: Bees Endangered
June 29, 2015
Editor’s Note: Translated from the original French via Google Translate. The orginal article, AFRIQUE DU SUD : Les abeilles menacées de disparition, is available here.
From: LeMauricien.com
They were among the last to not see their population decrease. But the South African bees are found now housed in the same boat as their sisters from Europe or the United States. The reason: an epidemic of foulbrood, which could sign their disappearance.
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Nightmare
When Brendan Ashley-Cooper discovered the disease in his hives in 2009, he immediately worried: “We knew we were going to have this massive explosion of foulbrood,” said the beekeeper Cape. “I did not know what to do, I did not know what would be the extent of damage. I worried just for my bees. “Six years later, the nightmare became reality. Hives are extinguished one by one.
American foulbrood attacks the brood (all larvae), preventing the worker reproduction. When a hive is dead bees from other hives often rush them to harvest honey. This is what they bring contaminated honey in their hive, spreading the disease.
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