Dwv

[GRIZZLY]

The news this morning has it that Dwarf Wing Virus is the world-wide silent killer of bees,spread by Varroa.There is no known treatment and infected hives would be located and dealt with ???.

[Neils]

Dealt with?

Nearly 30% of colonies inspected have DWV present From what I heard. Not seen that in writing mind

[Bumble]

The Mail carries an article about it, and, for a change, it looks as if they got the words right.

[Jon]

Guardian as well.

Usual selection of inane comments about Monsanto and Bayer below, many from gutted anti neonicotinoid campaigners!

One guy claims that it has been 'proven' that neonicotinoid pesticides cause CCD. He forgot to post his link to the proof though!

Mind you given the track record of Damian and Alison Benjamin in the Guardian it is hard to take their bee coverage seriously.

This study is very interesting as it does show the mechanism whereby the varroa mite enables a destructive virus to dominate over others and reach lethal levels.

[Neils]

And the BBC

I don't think it will make much difference to the anti-pesticide campaign. As one biologist opined about creationists "The problem with finding The Missing link is that it just means we have to find two more"

[Jimbo]

I had a quick read of the abstract which was published in the latest edition of Science. The bit I found amusing was the scientists did their research in Hawaii as they had to compare non varroa infected colonies with recent varroa infected colonies. If you were a scientist from Sheffield would you chose to go to Hawaii or the West Coast and Islands of Scotland where there are also varroa free colonies. What would you chose?
It also highlights to me these varroa free areas / native bee areas in Scotland should be protected as they are an important resource for scientists and future research and that the SBA should be in discussion with the Scottish goverment to put some legislation in place to protect the areas

[Jon]

To be fair Jimbo, the key factor was that Varroa only arrived in Hawaii 5 years ago and they studied 2 islands with bees with recently arrived mites and two others which were still mite free - so they had a perfect was to compare bee colonies recently exposed to mites with a very similar population never exposed to mites. They found that a particular strain of DWV seemed to replace most of the other viruses. But yes you cannot rule out the tanning factor entirely.

[Neils]

15 years longer exposure in the uk compared to Hawaii perhaps? You've got areas of Hawaii unpopulated by varroa and areas where the exposure is at most a couple of years old, I'd have thought that would make a much more useful comparison I terms of uninfected and newly infected rather than a general population of bees that have been kicking around with varroa and associated viruses for 20 years.

[The Drone Ranger]

Sadly it's as a result of scaremongering by beekeepers initially that started the press interest in bees.

Anyone who keeps chickens were dragged into a government led scaremongering madness a few years ago and had to make provision to bring all their birds indoors.
Oh no bird flu got boring lets write about bee Armageddon
Least its not killer bees -- that went on for a few years

[The Drone Ranger]

If you were a scientist from Sheffield would you chose to go to Hawaii or the West Coast and Islands of Scotland where there are also varroa free colonies. What would you chose?

I choose Hawaii