The Hive Detectives: Chronicle of a Honey Bee Catastrophe

By Loree Griffin Burns and Ellen Harasimowicz

“Spotlights a ‘dream team’ of scientists as they work to determine what is threatening bee colonies and (by extension) agriculture . . . fascinating.”—Booklist (starred review)

Without honey bees the world would be a different place. There would be no honey, no beeswax for candles, and—worst of all—barely a fruit, nut, or vegetable to eat. So imagine beekeeper Dave Hackenburg’s horror when he discovered twenty million of his charges had vanished. Those missing bees became the first casualties of a mysterious scourge that continues to plague honey bee populations today.

In The Hive Detectives, Loree Griffin Burns profiles bee wranglers and bee scientists who have been working to understand colony collapse disorder, or CCD. In this dramatic and enlightening story, readers explore the lives of the fuzzy, buzzy insects and learn what might happen to us if they were gone.

“Throughout the presentation, readers learn about the anatomy, development, and social behavior of honey bees, and observe the process of scientific investigation and its vital, real-world application.”—Booklist (starred review)

“An appendix adds varied fascinating facts about bees—again using the format of an illustrated research journal. Harasimowicz’s clear, beautifully reproduced photographs support and extend the text. Readers . . . will be well served by this example of a scientific mystery still unsolved.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“Clear color photographs of beekeepers, scientists, equipment, close-ups of bees, hives, etc., complement the text on every page. Youngsters concerned with the environment will find this meticulously researched title a valuable resource.”—School Library Journal

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: May 3, 2010
• ISBN: 9780547488127

Loree Griffin Burns

LOREE GRIFFIN BURNS, Ph.D., did her doctoral at the University of Massachusetts Medical School. The author of Beetle Busters, Tracking Trash, and The Hive Detectives, she is an award-winning writer whose books for young people have won many accolades, including ALA Notable designations, a Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Book Award, an IRA Children’s Book Award, a Green Earth Book Award and two Science Books & Films (SB&F) Prizes. Loree holds a Ph.D. in biochemistry and her books draw heavily on both her passion for science and nature and her experiences as a working scientist. She lives with her husband and their three kids in a farmhouse in central New England, where she gardens, keeps chickens, and writes about science and scientists. She likes to think that one day she’ll fill the big old barn on their property with horses. Learn more about Loree at loreegriffinburns.com and follow her on Twitter @loreegburns.

Book preview

Text copyright © 2010 by Loree Griffin Burns

Photographs copyright © 2010 by Ellen Harasimowicz, except for the following (numbers refer to pages in the print editon):

Scott Bauer/USDA ARS: pp. 28 (inset), 29, and 58 (right); Loree Griffin Burns: pp. 3 (right), 12 (left), 42, 44 (bottom left), 56 (left), and 57 (left); Scott Camazine: p. 56 (top right); Kathryn de Graaf: p. 58 (top left); Lila de Guzman/USDA ARS: p. 30 (top right); Maryann Frazier/American Bee Journal: p. 46; Andy Hemken/Honey Guy: p. 3 (bottom left); Cara Llewellyn: p. 13 (inset illustration); Jennifer L. G. O’Keefe: pp. 19 (under), 33 (under), 44 (right); Jeff Pettis/USDA ARS: pp. 13 (right) and 21; J. Pettis, R. Ochoa, E. Erbe, and C. Pooley/USDA ARS: p. 30 (middle right); Roger J. Simonds: p. 45 (right); I. Barton Smith, Jr.: p. 14; Dennis vanEngelsdorp: p. 25 (right)

Photo of silhouetted bee throughout by Don Farrall, Getty Images

Drone definition on page 32 copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Adapted and reproduced by permission from The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, fourth edition.

All rights reserved. For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 215 Park Avenue South, New York, New York 10003.

www.hmhco.com

The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:

Burns, Loree Griffin. The hive detectives: chronicle of a honey bee catastrophe /

Loree Griffin Burns; with photographs by Ellen Harasimowicz.

p.cm.— (Scientists in the field)

1. Colony collapse disorder of honeybees—Juvenile literature. 2. Bee culture—Juvenile literature. I. Title. SF538.5.C65B87 2010

638'.13—dc22 2009045249

ISBN 978-0-547-15231-8 hardcover

ISBN 978-0-544-00326-2 paperback

eISBN 978-0-547-48812-7

v1.0215

To my sister, Karin

[Image][Image]

Mary Duane heads out to inspect her backyard beehives.

Put on your veil, grab your hive tool, and light up your smoker . . .

. . . we’re going into a beehive.

Before we begin, remember this: Honey bees are gentle insects.

Gentle? you ask. But don’t they have giant stingers on their rear ends?

Well, yes, most bees do have a stinger at the tip of the abdomen. But they only use it in emergencies. If you move slowly and deliberately (no jerks in the bee yard!) and remember not to block the hive entrance (bees hate to find a strange body between them and the entrance to their hive), you can spend an enjoyable afternoon with thousands of honey bees and walk away without a single sting. Mary Duane does it all the time.

[Image]

A honey bee visits an apple blossom

Mary is a hobbyist beekeeper. She keeps a small number of honey bee hives in her backyard for the pleasure of working with the bees and, of course, for the honey. Every week or two, from early spring until fall, Mary opens and inspects each of her hives to be sure the family of bees inside is healthy and safe. If anything is wrong with the colony—and, unfortunately, there are many things that can go wrong—Mary will see signs during the inspection. Her goal as beekeeper is to recognize these signs and take the steps needed to correct them. It’s not an easy hobby, but the rewards, according to Mary, are many.

When you work with bees you have to pay close attention to what you are doing, says Mary. Everything else in your life drops away. The bees are fascinating, they help the environment, and the honey is great, but mostly I love that keeping bees forces me to be mindful.

In nearly ten years of beekeeping, Mary has been stung about twenty times—not bad when you consider she’s handled millions of bees. Most of those stings happened early on, when Mary was new to working with honey bees. Now that she is used to the sights and sounds of an apiary, or bee yard, Mary is more relaxed and stings are rare. She wears a veil, of course, to protect her face, and she keeps sting remedies in her bee box, but she works her bees barehanded.

I started off wearing gloves, but I find that I’m more gentle without them, Mary says. She pats the top of her bee box and adds, If I come across an ornery hive, then I put my gloves on like anybody else.

[Image]

Mary keeps a box of tools, a pair of gloves, and a lit smoker nearby whenever she works her bees.

Mary also keeps a smoker handy. Any worries the bees have about Mary poking through their home—worries they communicate with each other by releasing a smelly chemical called alarm pheromone—will be masked by the smell of smoke. Unable to smell alarm pheromone, the majority of bees in the hive don’t realize anything is amiss and, as a result, remain calm during the inspection.

To prepare the smoker, Mary fills it with dry pine needles, drops in a lit

Reviews for The Hive Detectives

[cassielanzas_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Hive Detectives: Chronicle of a Honey Bee Catastrophe discusses the colony collapse disorder. The author wrote the book to present the colony collapse disorder in an engaging, interesting, informative manner. First, Burns presents the hives collapsing a mystery by explaining many of the ways it is atypical from other bee disorders. Then, she presents a research team to solve the mystery. Next, each member of the research team investigates the disorder and reports back on their findings. Additionally, Burns intermittently injects a page that explains basic science related to bees.The style of the book was clearly laid out as a problem to be solved. The format led to some excitement on the topic. It read like a “Who did it?” for the agricultural world. The occasional page interspersed about bees were informative and not distracting. Additionally, the captions for the photographs were clear. The photographs themselves, while not artistic, were clear and informative.The facts of the book are accurate and current. I have never learned about colony collapse disorder outside of news reports, so I conducted some additional research on the EPA’s website. The theories that the book investigates are consistent with the government reports. The book was published recently, in 2010, and was not yet outdated. The puzzle has not yet been solved. Additionally, there are extensive citations and references.Colony collapse syndrome is essential for everyone, including young adults to learn about. Bees are necessary to pollinate most plants that we eat. This book could be of specific interest to young adults because many young adults are concerned with social justice and environmental issues.Burns also does an excellent job showing multiple sides of the same issue. The idea that there may be disagreements in science and different perspectives could be appealing to developing abstract mind of young adults. Since the book presents competing theories from a variety of scientists, it clearly delineates which parts of the science are theory and which are fact. Young adults are often interested in catastrophic situations, which we would be in if we did not have any more bees to pollinate our plants.Overall, the book was very enjoyable and would make an excellent addition to a library. It would also be a very good non-fiction read aloud.

[sullywriter_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Outstanding!

[abbylibrarian_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

In 2006, beekeepers suddenly noticed some of their hives collapsing. The seemingly healthy and happy bees abandoned their hives for no obvious reason. Enter the hive detectives, a group of beekeepers and scientists with different specialties, coming together to figure out what's going wrong and how to fix it. Is it a new bee virus? A pest? Changes in the environment? The hive detectives are working hard to find out. Another great addition to the Scientists in the Field series, this book has full-color photos and a very readable style. Parts of the book are formatted to look like a field journal, which is a very effective layout for a book that takes you inside the action. Young ecologists and animal lovers will eat this up and I'd also try it on fans of creepy crawly things. Highly recommended.

[prkcs · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Chronicles the scientists, professionals and hobbyist beekeepers who are leading the investigaion into the sudden catasrophic demise of North American honeybee colonies. Includes information about hives, bees and "bee culture."

[salsabrarian · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

After reading this in my garden, I couldn't help but stop to observe the different bees buzzing about on our blue spirea and wonder where their hives were! Informative, readable and compelling, with plenty of color photos for poring over. Let's hope the mystery of colony collapse disorder is solved soon!

[themulhern · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A good book tackling a significant subject. Just a little too much human interest cliche in it and not enough science.

[shillson_3 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The Hive Detectives covers the strange disappearance of honey bees from hives around the world, a condition called Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD). The book examines the efforts of scientists and bee keepers to identify the cause of the problem. Information about the anatomy, development, and social behavior of honey bees are also included throughout the text. The book also demonstrates the the process of scientific investigation, the challenges of research projects, and the importance of investigating a variety of possibilities. There is a lot of text and some scientific knowledge is necessary, therefore I would recommend it to students in grades 4 and up. However, there are great color photos that make this book appealing for younger students too. Appended are lists of recommended books, magazines, films, and Web sites as well as a glossary and a source bibliography. All of the pictures have captions and the pictures clarify and extend the text. The information is presented clearly and directly and the language is vivid and interesting.

[klsulliv · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Hive Detectives provides information about honey bees, beekeeping and why honey bees are important to us. This book also gives readers insights into how scientists work to solve problems. Children will love this book because it encourages people to experiment to solve problems. Science is all about exploring and testing in order to solve problems. Children will learn all about bees in this book. Children will be amazed with all of the findings they read in this text!