A state bee expert is warning of a nationwide honeybee crisis after a survey released today revealed that one-third of commercial beekeepers' colonies died over the winter, the fourth consecutive year that's happened.
"These numbers are all indicators that a crisis is coming. It will reach a perfect storm, the way the credit crisis did," said Dennis van Engelsdorp, a bee researcher with the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture.
Nearly 34 percent of the country's managed honeybee colonies were lost over the winter, according to the survey of 4,331 beekeepers.That compares to losses of 29 percent in 2008-09, 35.8 percent in 2007-08 and 31.8 percent in 2006-07.
Honeybees are used to pollinate everything from apples to pumpkins to blueberries and add $15 billion each year to agricultural output in the United States, according to the USDA. Crop production could be at risk if honeybees are found in increasingly short supply and if cash-strapped beekeepers leave the business, which some insist they might be forced to do.
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