Agent Orange is a herbicide and defoliant chemical, one of the "tactical use" Rainbow Herbicides. It is widely known for its use by the U.S. military as part of its herbicidal warfare program, Operation Ranch Hand, during the Vietnam War from 1961 to 1971. It is a mixture of equal parts of two herbicides, 2,4,5-T and 2,4-D. In addition to its damaging environmental effects, traces of dioxin found in the mixture have caused major health problems for many individuals who were exposed, and their offspring.
The bald eagle is a bird of prey found in North America. A sea eagle, it has two known subspecies and forms a species pair with the white-tailed eagle. Its range includes most of Canada and Alaska, all of the contiguous United States, and northern Mexico. It is found near large bodies of open water with an abundant food supply and old-growth trees for nesting.
Roundup is the brand name of a systemic, broad-spectrum glyphosate-based herbicide originally produced by Monsanto, which Bayer acquired in 2018. Glyphosate is the most widely used herbicide in the United States. As of 2009, sales of Roundup herbicides still represented about 10 percent of Monsanto's revenue despite competition from Chinese producers of other glyphosate-based herbicides. The overall Roundup line of products, which includes genetically modified seeds, represented about half of Monsanto's yearly revenue. The product is marketed to consumers by Scotts Miracle-Gro Company.
A beehive is an enclosed structure in which some honey bee species of the subgenus Apis live and raise their young. Though the word beehive is commonly used to describe the nest of any bee colony, scientific and professional literature distinguishes nest from hive. Nest is used to discuss colonies that house themselves in natural or artificial cavities or are hanging and exposed. Hive is used to describe an artificial/man-made structure to house a honey bee nest. Several species of Apis live in colonies, but for honey production the western honey bee and the eastern honey bee are the main species kept in hives.
Operation Ranch Hand was a U.S. military operation during the Vietnam War, lasting from 1962 until 1971. Largely inspired by the British use of 2,4,5-T and 2,4-D during the Malayan Emergency in the 1950s, it was part of the overall herbicidal warfare program during the war called "Operation Trail Dust". Ranch Hand involved spraying an estimated 20 million U.S. gallons (76,000 m3) of defoliants and herbicides over rural areas of South Vietnam in an attempt to deprive the Viet Cong of food and vegetation cover. Areas of Laos and Cambodia were also sprayed to a lesser extent. Nearly 20,000 sorties were flown between 1961 and 1971.
Beekeeping is the maintenance of bee colonies, commonly in man-made hives, by humans. Most such bees are honey bees in the genus Apis, but other honey-producing bees such as Melipona stingless bees are also kept. A beekeeper keeps bees in order to collect their honey and other products that the hive produce, to pollinate crops, or to produce bees for sale to other beekeepers. A location where bees are kept is called an apiary or "bee yard".
A top-bar hive is a single-story frameless beehive in which the comb hangs from removable bars. The bars form a continuous roof over the comb, whereas the frames in most current hives allow space for bees to move up or down between boxes. Hives that have frames or that use honey chambers in summer but which use management principles similar to those of regular top-bar hives are sometimes also referred to as top-bar hives. Top-bar hives are rectangular in shape and are typically more than twice as wide as multi-story framed hives commonly found in English speaking countries. Top-bar hives usually include one box only, and allow for beekeeping methods that interfere very little with the colony. While conventional advice often recommends inspecting each colony each week during the warmer months, heavy work when full supers have to be lifted, some beekeepers fully inspect top-bar hives only once a year, and only one comb needs to be lifted at a time.
Johann Dzierzon, or Jan Dzierżon or Dzierżoń, also John Dzierzon, was a Polish apiarist who discovered the phenomenon of parthenogenesis in bees.
American foulbrood, caused by the spore-forming bacteria Paenibacillus larvae ssp. larvae, is a highly infectious bee disease. It is the most widespread and destructive of the bee brood diseases.
David Quammen is an American science, nature, and travel writer and the author of fifteen books. His articles have appeared in Outside Magazine, National Geographic, Harper's, Rolling Stone, The New York Times Book Review, The New Yorker, and other periodicals.
Nosema ceranae is a microsporidian, a small, unicellular parasite that mainly affects Apis cerana, the Asiatic honey bee. Along with Nosema apis, it causes the disease nosemosis, the most widespread of the diseases of adult honey bees. N. ceranae can remain dormant as a long-lived spore which is resistant to temperature extremes and dehydration. This fungus has been shown to act in a synergistic fashion with diverse insecticides such as fipronil or neonicotinoids, by increasing the toxicity of pesticides for bees, leading to higher bee mortality. It may thus play an indirect role in colony collapse disorder. In addition, the interaction between fipronil and N. ceranae induces changes in male physiology leading to sterility.
The environmental effects of pesticides describe the broad series of consequences of using pesticides. The unintended consequences of pesticides is one of the main drivers of the negative impact of modern industrial agriculture on the environment. Pesticides, because they are toxic chemicals meant to kill pest species, can effect non-target species, such as plants, animals and humans. Over 98% of sprayed insecticides and 95% of herbicides reach a destination other than their target species, because they are sprayed or spread across entire agricultural fields. Other agrochemicals, such as fertilizers, can also have negative effects on the environment.
Commercial Beekeeping in the United States dates back to the 1860s.
Colony collapse disorder (CCD) is an abnormal phenomenon that occurs when the majority of worker bees in a honey bee colony disappear, leaving behind a queen, plenty of food, and a few nurse bees to care for the remaining immature bees. While such disappearances have occurred sporadically throughout the history of apiculture, and have been known by various names, the syndrome was renamed colony collapse disorder in late 2006 in conjunction with a drastic rise in reports of disappearances of western honey bee colonies in North America. Beekeepers in most European countries had observed a similar phenomenon since 1998, especially in Southern and Western Europe; the Northern Ireland Assembly received reports of a decline greater than 50%. The phenomenon became more global when it affected some Asian and African countries as well.
Gene Ezia Robinson is an American entomologist, Director of the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology and National Academy of Sciences member. He pioneered the application of genomics to the study of social behavior and led the effort to sequence the honey bee genome. On February 10, 2009, his research was famously featured in an episode of The Colbert Report whose eponymous host referred to the honey Dr. Robinson sent him as "pharmaceutical-grade hive jive".
Bees for Development is an international charity working to alleviate poverty through beekeeping. Beekeeping contributes to supporting sustainable livelihoods in poor and remote communities; honey bees provide an essential ecosystem service. Bees for Development currently runs projects in Uganda, Zanzibar, Ethiopia and Kyrgyzstan. Its offices are in Monmouth, South Wales.
The Decorah Bald Eagles is a website featuring a live-streaming webcam trained on a bald eagle nest and family in Decorah, Iowa. The Raptor Resource Project installed and runs the live stream for research purposes. It is one of more than a dozen eagle webcams across the United States.
Taekjip Ha is a South Korean-born American biophysicist who is currently a Bloomberg Distinguished Professor of Biophysics and Biomedical Engineering at Johns Hopkins University. He was previously the Gutgsell Professor of Physics, at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where he was the principal investigator of Single Molecule Nanometry group. He is also a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator.
Savannah Bee Company is an American company based in Savannah, Georgia and founded by Ted Dennard in 2002. The company sells honey-related products and books, beauty products, beverages, and candles. The Savannah Bee Company has 15 locations in the United States.
