Shop OBEX P1 Docs P2 Docs Learn Events
Bee decline due to plant virus — Parallax Forums

Bee decline due to plant virus

Too_Many_ToolsToo_Many_Tools Posts: 765
edited 2014-01-29 19:34 in General Discussion
FYI...

http://mbio.asm.org/content/5/1/e00898-13

This is a new one for me...I did not know that viruses could jump from plant to animal.

With the continuing crash of bee populations and with the majority of human food crops dependant on them for pollination, life in the future could get interesting..and hungry.

Comments

  • ElectricAyeElectricAye Posts: 4,561
    edited 2014-01-24 18:33
    robo_bee.jpg
  • Heater.Heater. Posts: 21,230
    edited 2014-01-25 02:25
    How did the worlds avid assembler language programmers let the "asm.org" domain name slip away to a bunch of biologists?
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2014-01-25 04:49
    Hmmm.. viruses jumping from plants to animals. I was having a ponder recently by the fact that viruses amongst animal populations can mutate and jump species boundaries. It just seemed a bit odd and awkward that viruses mutate without having chromosomes.

    And then there are those nasty prions that cause Mad Cow disease.

    In the 1950s, "Silent Spring" expressed deep concern for the bee populations due to excessive spraying of broad-band pesticides of long half-lives. Have we ever really moved on beyond the DDT and other residues in the soils? Could this be imaginary?
  • Mark_TMark_T Posts: 1,981
    edited 2014-01-25 13:49
    Quite a host change, but a virus is just a kit of parts, whenever a cell is invaded by two different
    viruses they can exchange genes and pick up each others tricks... I would imagine a plant virus that
    encounters an already-infected animal cell that it can more easily invade and can replicate and form
    virons containing parts of both viruses, perhaps gaining all the tricks of both... There are a lot of cells
    out there ;)
  • lardomlardom Posts: 1,659
    edited 2014-01-25 23:42
    Interesting. I was wondering if 'colony collapse disorder' was related to chemtrails.
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2014-01-25 23:48
    Mark_T wrote: »
    Quite a host change, but a virus is just a kit of parts, whenever a cell is invaded by two different
    viruses they can exchange genes and pick up each others tricks... I would imagine a plant virus that
    encounters an already-infected animal cell that it can more easily invade and can replicate and form
    virons containing parts of both viruses, perhaps gaining all the tricks of both... There are a lot of cells
    out there ;)

    Okay... so two viruses can exchange genes. But what exactly are virus genes without chromosomes? Just a chemical soup of DNA and RNA?

    Seems like we have a lot of 'loose genes' wandering around.
  • Tracy AllenTracy Allen Posts: 6,664
    edited 2014-01-26 14:25
    This takes The birds and the bees, the flowers and the trees to a darker level.

    Another major concern for honeybees comes from the neonicotinide pesticides that were thought to be safer, and replaced the more deadly ones that were restricted or banned not too long ago. Here is one report that focuses on birds. The pesticide often gets into birds by way of insects, and there seem to be direct effects on honeybees. Not one dose by itself, more like a synergistic effect, like the Joker's cosmetics in Batman.
  • Jack3Jack3 Posts: 55
    edited 2014-01-27 05:15
    Well, I have my doubts. Maybe the mites change it somehow, the mites are a real bother with bees. (I keep a few hives as a hobby). I think the biggest issue with the bees is the that chemical in herbicides. The mites are also a major issue, and bees have a few of their own special bugs. How many of you have sprayed a dandelion flower with herbicide? You probably killed several bees in the process. You can spray other parts of the plant and even better don't spray them when they are flowering.
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2014-01-27 07:27
    Even better, always mow your lawn before the dandelions flower and they will never reseed. You can then pay kids a nickel for each one they remove from your lawn and the problem of dandelions will go away while teach kids how rewarding a work ethic can be.

    No pesticides at all.
  • Steph LindsaySteph Lindsay Posts: 767
    edited 2014-01-27 14:07
    Loopy Byteloose wrote: »
    Even better, always mow your lawn before the dandelions flower and they will never reseed. You can then pay kids a nickel for each one they remove from your lawn and the problem of dandelions will go away while teach kids how rewarding a work ethic can be.

    No pesticides at all.

    Or you can pay the kids to pick the young dandelion leaves for your salad (along with the purslane and miner's lettuce) and perhaps even make the flowers into wine. Many of us in California may be saying goodbye to our lawns entirely this year anyway. Thanks for the link too_many_tools - I'll check that out off the clock.
  • prof_brainoprof_braino Posts: 4,313
    edited 2014-01-27 18:43
    Tracy Allen wrote: »
    Another major concern for honeybees comes from the neonicotinide pesticides

    I thought I saw several article that had fairly significant indication that colony collapse was directly related to neonicotinide pesticides. The poison builds up until it kills the queen, but not is too low to kill the drones.

    Was this study funded by a pesticide manufacturer?

    On the other hand, viri jumping species and kingdom may account for all the increasing zombie virus outbreaks we seem in the movies the last few years.
  • Too_Many_ToolsToo_Many_Tools Posts: 765
    edited 2014-01-28 22:54
    The decline of the bee populations is an ongoing mystery...my post is just another piece of the puzzle.

    And as I said if we don't figure out the mystery and correct the problem we are in a world of hurt in the future.

    The majority of human food stuffs consist of a hand full of plants..all monocultures that if wiped out means wide spread famine...think potatoe blight and the Irish famine on a global scale..
  • Too_Many_ToolsToo_Many_Tools Posts: 765
    edited 2014-01-28 23:00
    Loopy Byteloose wrote: »
    Hmmm.. viruses jumping from plants to animals. I was having a ponder recently by the fact that viruses amongst animal populations can mutate and jump species boundaries. It just seemed a bit odd and awkward that viruses mutate without having chromosomes.

    And then there are those nasty prions that cause Mad Cow disease.

    In the 1950s, "Silent Spring" expressed deep concern for the bee populations due to excessive spraying of broad-band pesticides of long half-lives. Have we ever really moved on beyond the DDT and other residues in the soils? Could this be imaginary?


    If you want to lose sleep, read up on prions...like viruses, once they are out of the box you don't put them back in.
  • Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi) Posts: 23,514
    edited 2014-01-28 23:04
    Loopy Byteloose wrote:
    You can then pay kids a nickel for each one they remove from your lawn and the problem of dandelions will go away ....
    I'd go broke!

    -Phil
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2014-01-28 23:13
    @Phil
    Then there is always 2-4D and forget about the bees.

    Still, cutting lawns before you have all those yellow flowers going to seed will eliminate using more and more chemicals.
  • Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi) Posts: 23,514
    edited 2014-01-28 23:36
    Nope, no chemicals. I just live with 'em. The deer like the dandelions; they just don't eat enough of them.

    -Phil
  • Too_Many_ToolsToo_Many_Tools Posts: 765
    edited 2014-01-29 19:34
    Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi) wrote: »
    Nope, no chemicals. I just live with 'em. The deer like the dandelions; they just don't eat enough of them.

    -Phil

    I would agree..the fewer chemicals the better.

    There was just a recent report that shows a strong positive association between DDT and Alzheimers...a pesticide that has been out of use for many years.

    http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-ddt-alzheimers-link-20140128,0,7442376.story#axzz2rqk8E9aF

    Long term effects of chemicals are almost never known..so one is prudent to avoid any unnessary usage.

    This coming from someone who knows a lot about chemistry.
Sign In or Register to comment.