To Bee Or Not To Bee Trivia Quiz

Answer: Duck and cover -- they're trying to scare off an incoming giant wasp.

Honest: they scare away giant hornets and other wasps by doing "the wave" like fans at sports stadium but, um, upside down.

The various giant honey bees of India and Nepal are big -- some about an inch long -- and very aggressive, but the hornets and other wasps that hunt them as prey can be many times their size. Because the hives of these bees are open to the air (unlike those of western honey bees, who build their hives inside enclosed spaces), the bees working on the surface of the hive should be easy pickings for hungry hornets. But this trick of waiving their hindquarters in the air in a ripple effect, known as "shimmering," apparently is extremely effective at scaring off would-be marauding hornets. Gerald Kastberger from the University of Graz in Austria and his team spent 15 years observing giant bees and has videotaped the shimmering defense in two different hives in Nepal. When the "wave" starts, attacking wasps often veer off their target, and when the wave ripples over a big enough area, wasps turn tail and flee altogether. Kastberger's paper on the subject at Plosone.org includes fascinating video.

Answer: Yes

Assuming the bee died quite recently and with its stinger still attached, you can still get a very painful sting from stepping on a dead honey bee, even beyond the the basic matter of having the stinger penetrate your skin. That's because the venom sac that is attached to the bee's stinger continues to function whether the stinger is still attached to the bee or not, whether the bee is alive or dead, until it dries out. The stinger will continue to pulsate and pump venom into the wound even after its owner has reached a state of non-beeing.

Incidentally, while Merriam-Webster's spells it "honeybee," entomologists and apiarists (beekeepers) are generally adamant that "honey" describes a subspecies of bee (like "carpenter" and "mason") and that it is therefore properly written as two words: honey bee. "Honeybee," they say, makes about as much sense scientifically as "colliedog."

Answer: It's only true of worker honey bees.

Only worker honey bees die after stinging. The stinger of a honey bee is barbed, unlike that of other bees such as carpenter and bumble bees which have smooth needle-like stingers, as does the queen honey bee. This means that once a worker honey bee stings something with skin or membrane thick enough for the barbs to catch hold on, the bee can't just retract the stinger and go on to sting again. Other bees can but, with the exception of a queen dealing with her rivals, they generally didn't want to sting anything in the first place and rarely take advantage of this option.

You might think, then, that the barbed stinger of the honey bee would be easily detachable, but sadly it isn't. When the stinger catches and the bee pulls away, not only the stinger and venom sac pull free of the bee, but part of its abdomen and, usually, intestines go with them as well. Death follows pretty quickly, so stinging is understandably a last resort for honey bees and they are extremely unlikely to sting without provocation or in defense of a nearby hive.

Answer: The hive has fallen victim to Colony Collapse Disorder.

This combination of occurrences is symptomatic of the mysterious phenomenon known as Colony Collapse Disorder, or CCD, which has been seriously damaging bee cultivation in the beginning of the 21st century. Combined with other, better understood phenomena affecting honey bees, it is devastating to the population of managed western honey bees, one of the ecosystem's most important pollinators.

Swarming, on the other hand, is a natural activity of bees when the hive gets too crowded, too hot, or the queen is getting old. When a hive is about to swarm the brood cells for the unborn queen eggs/grubs are indeed capped in their cells, but when the hive swarms an essential element is that the queen goes with them. The worker bees spend time preparing the queen for her unaccustomed flight, and usually the colony will clump on trees or other surfaces fairly close by in the first couple of days while the queen gets used to flying. The fact that the queen is in the hive and there isn't any sign of a swarm clumped in the area suggests that something very unusual, and very destructive to the colony, has happened. Even if the worker bees (the females) were all off in the fields gathering nectar and honey, the males (drones) do not join them, as their only function is to mate with the queen. So there should be drones (males) either in the hive or in the nearby mating collection area: absent a swarm, drones generally are in only those two places (or dead on the ground in the mating area, poor guys). The fact that the drones are gone but the queen is there is again indicative that something is wrong, and that whatever happened it wasn't a normal swarm.

Answer: He reported the first recorded case of "empty hive syndrome" or "colony collapse disorder" worldwide.

Mr. Hackenberg fortunately did not perish, and his highly regarded commercial hives have not, to my knowledge, been infiltrated by Africanized honey bees ("killer bees"). To the best of my knowledge he was never on "America's Funniest Home Videos" and never did anything dopey enough to be a candidate.

He is, however, the commercial beekeeper who found 400 of his Florida honey bee hives inexplicably empty of all adults other than the queens one mid-November morning, and no sign of dead bee bodies.

His hives are generally acknowledged to be the first reported case in the world of what has come to be known as "colony collapse disorder" or "CCD". Since 2006 CCD has now been reported all over the US and in Europe.

Answer: It decreased by approximately 30% nationwide.

Although bee populations have gone through significant drops in the past, by 2013 the managed honey bee population in the US had reached a 50 year low, approximately 30% of the drop occurring only in the preceding four years. Honey bees are subject to a number of deadly parasites, fungi, viruses and environmental stresses that may or may not have any relation to the relatively recent phenomenon of Colony Collapse Disorder, but together with the effects of CCD the losses to managed hives are dramatic.

As bad as the situation is in the US, it is even worse in parts of Europe: Spain lost approximately 80% of its managed bee population in the same period.

Answer: There is no consensus between the studies as to the cause.

The U.S. says it doesn't know, the EU is pretty sure it's attributable to pesticides, and Canada is taking a 'watchful waiting' approach.

According to a joint study published by the United States Department of Agriculture and the United Sates Environmental Protection Agency in the first week of May 2013, the causes of Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) remain unknown. The report points to a number of possible causes or contributing factors--such as a parasitic mite called Varroa destructor; viruses, or a possible interaction between one particular virus and a fungus; European foulbrood, a bacterial disease of bees; and the use of pesticides, including neonicotinoids ("neonides", for short), a family of neuroactive chemicals--but states that substantial further research will be needed to determine whether any of these actually explain the phenomenon of CCD.

Days before the USDA-EPA report was published, however, the European Union voted to ban the use of neonides for a period of two years because of what the EU considers to be convincing evidence that this type of chemical plays a major role in CCD, or at least in honey bee depopulation generally. In Canada, CCD itself has not been a major phenomenon yet, but there were mass bee deaths in 2012 that corresponded with the corn planting season. Canada has declined to follow the EU in banning neonides, but is instead proposing safeguard and monitoring measures.

Interestingly, very little weight is given by either the US or the EU studies to the periodic pop argument that the unusual phenomenon of CCD may be caused by manmade interference with the electromagnetic charges and electromagnetic communication methods of bees. My very own completely-unsubstantiated-by-anything-but-intuition theory had been that the adult bees, including the male drones who normally would not wander far from the hive except in a swarm, are mistaking some outside electromagnetic stimulus as a command from the queen to swarm, that the hive therefor unwittingly swarms without the organizing force of their queen, and accordingly quickly dissipates in confusion without her leadership. However, it doesn't sound like any of the available science so far supports me on that at all. So far, most studies seem to conclude that because the background electromagnetic fields produced by cellular/mobile phones are weaker than the fields generated by the bees themselves, manmade electromagnetic interference is not likely to be a factor. On the surface of it I think I might detect a couple of holes in that formulation that should be filled in, but then what do I know: I was a political science major.

Answer: A male carpenter bee; try to ignore him, or change seats

Carpenter bees look a bit like bumble bees, but are bigger, and their black abdomen is furry on the belly but smooth and shiny on a portion of the back. The females bore holes deep into your nice wood trim to make their nests, while the stingless males buzz around menacingly nearby to protect the busy females. It's all a bluff, though--they can't hurt you. If he really becomes a nuisance, see if you can move to the other side of the porch. (As with other female bees, the usually unseen female carpenter bee DOES have a stinger--stingers are modified egg-laying tubes--but are very unlikely to use them unless you disturb their nest, which in this case is hard to do by accident.)

Bumble bees are also furry and bulbous, much bigger and rounder than honey bees, but smaller than carpenter bees and their abdomens will have least some visible yellow mixed with black. Bumble bees are usually ground nesters and are even more peaceable than honey bees. While the buzzing bumble bee you see is likely a female, and therefor does have a stinger, she's not guarding a hive full of honey and nectar and isn't likely to sting unless you hit or step on her. Wasps and hornets are not bees at all, and have long, thin, hairless bodies. While generally more aggressive than bees, they are more interested in your food than in you. As with all stinging insects, the worst thing you can do is yell and flail--that's what's likely to get you stung, especially if you hit the critter in mid-air.

Answer: The writing of a trivia quiz

Bees, including honey bees, carpenter bees, orchard mason bees, and other solitary native bees, are some of the most significant and effective pollinators of food crops, so they are key to the continued existence of these food sources. Sadly, wild honey bee populations have been decimated by the Verroa destructor mite and other parasites and diseases since the mid-20th century, and now managed honey bees are threatened by the same diseases plus the mysterious phenomenon of Colony Collapse Disorder.

While bumble bees and native solitary bees like mason bees are very effective pollinators of many crops -- such as fruit trees and blueberries, among others -- managed honey bees are the only pollinators that can be commercially transported substantial distances to and from fields around the country for planned pollination. Almonds, melons, cucumbers and over a 100 other crops in the U.S. depend exclusively on honey bee pollination for their survival.

Answer: "Take a Bee to Lunch" Day

There doesn't seem to be much that a lay person can do directly to combat the diseases, parasites, and mysterious Colony Collapse Disorder ("CCD") that threaten honey bees and other pollinators, especially since the causes of CCD are still very much in question. So the best things to do seem to be to create as supportive an environment for healthy bees as possible, and to help make research, legislation and remedial action possible with financial or volunteer support.

Believe it or not, buying Häagen-Dazs ice cream does help, even if that particular method is primarily advocated by Häagen-Dazs. Häagen-Dazs was one of the first businesses to institute a public education outreach program regarding the threats to honey bees. A portion of its proceeds now go to fund The Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven next to the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility at UC Davis, as well as the work of the Honey Bee Research Facility itself.

Some ways to have a bee-friendly property are to allow the extremely nutritious early flower of the dandelion weed to survive in your yard for a while, and ditto clover; plant real fruit trees, lindens, tulip poplars, or maples instead of the popular, showy, but nectarless ornamental Bradford pear, and single-flower or deep-cup flowering plants like daisies, asters, and sunflowers or hollyhocks, sweetpeas and larkspur; and avoid using insecticides, pesticides, bug repellents and scent-heavy sprays. You could even become a beekeeper, or offer a local beekeeper hive space on your property.

If you find a swarm on your property DON'T spray it with water or insecticides or have it exterminated: observe the sleepy mass happily and from a safe distance til they move on, or call a local beekeeper and have it collected. Swarming bees are sluggish because they have fed up before leaving the hive, and are even more than usually non-aggressive since they currently have no hive to protect. So unless a swarm has planted itself in a high traffic area where your family or pets can't avoid getting close, you don't have to do anything about a swarm but marvel.

Discourage local anti-beekeeping ordinances, encourage bee-friendly plantings and space planning in your local parks, and support national funding for bee research and protection.

While "Take a Bee to Lunch Day" doesn't exist, and probably would be counterproductive, it is possible to revive an exhausted bumble bee or honey bee by offering it a mixture of sugar and water. Finally, there IS a National Honey Bee Day in the U.S., focused on raising awareness and education about honey bees; check it out.