The Vanishing of Bees

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Of all insect-pollinated crops across the global agricultural community, bees contribute 73% of the pollination success. However, the population of these incredible honey-making insects is shrinking at such a drastic rate. Ecologists forecast a great hit on the agricultural sector as nutritionists worry over a skyrocketing price of honey -the nature's ultimate sweet health hub. 

In the U.S, National Agricultural Statistics show a honey bee decline from about 6 million hives in 1947 to 2,4 million in 2008, a 60 % reduction barely in the last 60 years.

Pest management is such a major issue in the agricultural sector. The pests are estimated to be causing at least some 55% crop losses annually. This is a huge loss to the farmers -the sustainers of humanity. Cases of pest attacks such as the fall armyworm caused up to 100% crop losses among some farmers in Africa's Uganda in 2017.

In many instances, the garden infestation of pests is one of the top upsetting incidences that farmers face in their entire gardening career. The pests attacks often get so overwhelming that the farmers start to view every insect as some bad or dangerous crop devourer evil enough to be killed. And the pesticide has always brought farmers such great relieve. A one time spray often guarantees a week or two of a peaceful mind. The assurance that the crops are pest-free and that the nightmare of economic loss has been paused and eliminated is so rewarding to the mind of a farmer whether subsistence or commercial in practicing.

Unfortunately, during the application of these pesticides, the farmers both voluntarily and ignorantly never recognise that whilst there're numerous of those bad insects flickering around in their garden, but also, there're some absolutely essential ones. The pollinators are these essential insects. A number of our crops rely on these pollinators to form their fruits -that we'll inturn call harvest. Soybean, beans, cabbages, tomatoes, cotton, sunflower, and over 800 other crops depend on these pollinators.

Why pollination is not only a scientific term but is central to the success of your farming 

So what is pollination? Well, this is the process by which male sex cells of a plant fertilizes female sex cells of a plant -it's some sort of sexual intercourse between plants or their flowers occurring without your notice. This human-nutrition-sustaining intercourse, however, requires intermediaries to make it a success. The bees are most crucial of many insects that make pollination possible.

How pollination happens

Crop plants that rely on insects bloom out with beautiful coloured flowers. Just as flowers fascinate humans, so are bees thrilled by them as they fly around.  The vast shades of tempting colours and irresistible sweet scents win the heart of the bee into paying a courtesy visit to the flower. Upon successfully being lured into the flower, the flower goes ahead to reward the bee with sweet nectar. This reward of nectar has sustained the bee-flower relationship since plants emerged on the face of the earth.  After sucking the nectar from the flower, the bee flies back to the hive or their colonies.

Strangely, during the struggle to suck as much, the extra sweet nectar for making honey, the bee will transfer the pollen -a male sex cell we talked about earlier -often seen as a yellowish powdery material in a flower, to the stigma -the part of the flower with female sex cell. When this phenomenal transfer is made, a child called a seed and eventually a fruit is unsurprisingly conceived. The fruit then grows into harvest we pick at the end of the season in tomatoes or soybean.

A poorly pollinated watermelon looks like that on the right and a farmer loses. This happens when the bees were too scarce to pollinate the flowers. Pesticide sprays can scare away the bees from coming to pollinate of crops and the economic impact can be high. Sadly, more farmers are experiencing pollinator scarcity.

The threat

Unfortunately, the bees are vanishing and crop pollination is going down. This is leading to shrinking volume in crop harvest. There is also a great increase in volumes of low-grade grains and unmarketable-sized fruits. The major cause is pesticide use. The pesticides not only kill the pests like fruit flies or aphids destroying our crops but they also kill the bees -our ultimate crop pollinator.

How can we protect the population of bees? Let's reduce and where possible stop synthetic pesticide usage. They kill the bees, the innocent and highly valuable insect for our gardens.

There are great alternatives like use of organic repellants. Leaves of the neem tree, cloves of garlic, oranges, and onions (learn how this works) will keep our crops safe from the pests whilst keeping the population of the bees rising to assure us of better crop yield every season. Ozone Biotech does international sales of organic pesticides -pesticides that never kill bees.

The second way is to plant more flowers around our homes and town areas to keep the bees replenished.

The last and most incredible way is to spare some little space and put beehives. Not only will you be harvesting fresh natural honey every after 3 months but you will be sustaining the population of bees to heighten your crop yields seasonally.

The article is written by Abet Tonny, a Ugandan science writer.
Also, feel free to write to me tonnyabet@gmail.com.