A New Virus in Wasps Could Threaten Honey Bees
November 9, 2016
From: Seeker
A wasp species in Hawaii has a virus that experts fear could easily spread to our most important crop pollinators.
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Researchers from multiple institutions who collaborated on the discovery, writing in the journal Nature, are concerned that the virus could be particularly threatening to honey bees. The insects are vital to crop pollination worldwide and, by extension, to the global food supply.
As it is, honey bees already face serious threats from colony collapse disorder, in which a bee colony’s worker bees disappear, and Varroa mites, which can bring about the condition called deformed wing virus and render a bee’s wings useless.
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