ABlog

My father, who died last week, was a beekeeper. A real twentieth century do-it-yourselfer, he studied up on beekeeping and may have kept a hive or two as a young man, though not after I reached the age of memory. (I vaguely remember the punch line from a story my mother used to tell about his encountering an overly talkative beekeeper on some country jaunt: “But I wanted to tell her about my bees!”) After retirement, on acreage alongside the White Salmon River in Washington State, he kept a few hives for a number of years. I felt sad when he finally gave it up. Did he say it was too much work? I seem to remember that some of the hives were wiped out, maybe by mites or disease, and that setback helped prod the decision.

I was fortunate to grow up in what was still the era of amateur beekeeping. I remember, from childhood, the mystique of “comb honey,” displayed at county fairs and purchased at farm stands. I think of Sylvia Plath’s apiary images, and of the regal photograph of Audre Lorde and Gloria Joseph in full protective gear at their home in the Virgin Islands a few years before Audre’s death.

Did you know that a calamity known as “colony collapse disorder” has hit the U.S. “bee industry,” imperiling the pollination of crops worth billions of dollars? Did you know that contemporary beekeepers are “the nomads of the agricultural world,” driving around the country in 18-wheelers packed with bee hives, stopping to rent out their bees to farmers desirous of having their crops pollinated? Did you know that bee “breeders” are working to produce bees that will focus more on pollinating and less on making honey? Did you know that a queen bee costs about $15, “up from $10 three years ago”?

All of this information comes from an article that starts on page A1 of today’s New York Times, “Gone with the Wind, Bees Leave Keepers and Crops in Peril” by Alexei Barrionuevo (2/27/07). The article details efforts to figure out what might be going wrong: “Investigators are exploring a range of theories, including viruses, a fungus and poor bee nutrition. They are also studying a group of pesticides that were banned in some European countries to see if they are somehow affecting bees’ innate ability to find their way back home. It could just be that the bees are stressed out….Researchers are also concerned that the willingness of beekeepers to truck their colonies from coast to coast could be adding to bees’ stress, helping to spread viruses and mites….”

Imagine living in a country, in an era, that would respond to this sinister situation--which, like the collapse of many species in the wild, is obviously a symptom of larger perils to our survival—with a campaign to mobilize the public’s imagination so that young men and young women would once again aspire to keep bees in the back yard. Much as the government promoted Victory Gardens in World War II (which, come to think of it, may have played a role in my city-bred father’s enthusiasm for amateur farming), such an effort could have an impact beyond its immediate practical value, helping people understand basic life processes.

We do not live in such a country or such an era. We live in a place and time where the only respectable solutions to the problems caused by rampant unconsidered technological innovation, the profit motive, and the consequent industrial management of biological processes are thought to be…you guessed it: technical, capitalist, and industrial in nature.

I’m no biologist, but it seems plain to me what the bees’ problem is. They’re like Bartleby the copy clerk in Herman Melville’s story. When it comes to supping on “protein supplements and a liquid mix of sucrose and corn syrup carried in tanker-sized trucks costing $12,000 per load,” having a “shorter offseason, to be ready to pollinate once the almond bloom begins in February,” and getting threatened with exclusion from zones surrounding large California citrus groves where growers want to keep seedless Mandarin oranges pollen-free, the bees Prefer Not To.

The real question is, why are we such busy bees? Why do we go along with this crazy program?

Remind me, please: why do we live this way?