Did you know that the chemicals that we use in our gardens seriously harm the honeybees and can even kill them? This can be a real problem since we need these bees for pollination.
Research into the effects of toxic chemicals in our environment has revealed that the honeybee can suffer serious effects upon contact with the toxins. The results are that they actually become intoxicated in a very similar manner to humans who are drunk with alcohol. The danger is that they produce honey that is poisonous, and people who have eaten the honey have become extremely ill.
These chemicals include insecticides and fertilizers, and ethanol that is the result of fermented nectar, ripe fruits and manmade and natural chemicals in the environment.
The bees become imbalanced and have difficulty walking and flying coherently. Some will lie on their back and wiggle their legs and just wait for the effects to wear off. However, many become too inebriated and can't find their way back to the hive and will eventually die in their efforts of trying.
The normally passive honeybees that inherently collected pollen as their function, can become more aggressive and even addicted, deliberately setting out to find the alcohol substance in fermented foods.
According to the American Heritage Dictionary, the word “intoxicate” means "to stupefy or excite by the action of a chemical substance such as alcohol; to stimulate or excite; or to poison."
When bees are exposed to certain chemical substances such as ethanol, pesticides or defensive toxic bio-chemicals produced by certain plants, they can display abnormal or unusual behaviour and disorientation. If the bees suffer great exposure, they can become poisoned and die.
The evidence of bee intoxication has been long realized by researchers, including John Cumming who described the effects of alcohol on bees in his 1864 publication of “Beekeeping”.
Research has also revealed that a large variety of flowering plants can also produce the same intoxication effects in bees. For example, honey produced from the nectar of Andromeda flowers contains grayanotoxins, which can paralyse the limbs, and eventually the diaphragm, resulting in death.
It is also noted that honey collected from Kalmia latifolia, the calico bush, mountain laurel or spoon-wood of the northern United States, as well as allied species such as sheep laurel (Kalmia angustifolia), can produce sickness or even death.
What is being done to protect the honeybees and to ensure their honey is safe to eat?
Universities globally are studying the cause of intoxication in bees caused from toxic chemicals, ethanol and natural flowering plants. For example, Abramson's research at the Oklahoma State University has revealed that there is a significant correlation between the reactions of bees and other vertebrates to ethanol exposure.
As well, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has published standards for testing chemicals for bee intoxication.
Conclusion
Through their efforts to understand the effects of toxic chemicals and ethanol in bees, it has brought about an awareness that extends beyond the tiny bee and into the reality of the human world.
Julie Mustard, a researcher at Ohio State reports, “On the molecular level, the brains of honey bees and humans work the same. Knowing how chronic alcohol use affects genes and proteins in the honey bee brain may help us eventually understand how alcoholism affects memory and behaviour in humans, as well as the molecular basis of addiction.”
Bee intoxication is far more common in our environment than most of us are aware of, and yet, it's because of the extensive research in bees that extended researches are now underway to help understand alcohol addiction in humans.
