To save the bees or not to save the bees: honey bee health in the Anthropocene

As honey bee colonies continue to perish at high rates, beekeepers are divided on how best to keep bees healthy and productive. In this article, I describe the tensions between conventional beekeepers and a new wave of beekeepers hoping to “save the bees” through a more “natural” approach to beekeep...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Agriculture and human values 2019-12, Vol.36 (4), p.891-902
Main Author: Andrews, Eleanor
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Agricultural Economics
Agriculture
Animals
Anthropocene
Apiculture
Apis mellifera
Beekeeping
Bees
Contemporary problems
Ecology
Education
Environmental aspects
Environmental changes
Environmental protection
Ethics
Evolutionary Biology
Genetics
Health problems
History
Honey
Philosophy
Pollination
Sustainability
Symposium/Special Issue
Veterinary Medicine/Veterinary Science
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Summary:As honey bee colonies continue to perish at high rates, beekeepers are divided on how best to keep bees healthy and productive. In this article, I describe the tensions between conventional beekeepers and a new wave of beekeepers hoping to “save the bees” through a more “natural” approach to beekeeping. Drawing on animal studies and multispecies literature, I show how beekeepers in both camps are constrained by the reality of the Anthropocene: novel ecologies, shifting baselines, and the hybridity of honey bees themselves—part wild animal subject to environmental change, part industrial organism, embedded in circuits of migratory pollination. Beekeepers on both sides are investing in genetics as a solution to honey bee health problems. Thinking with bees helps deepen the literature on multispecies encounters and interrogate the idea of sustainability in agriculture, while thinking with the Anthropocene prompts us to ask what “saving the bees” even means in today’s changing world.
ISSN:0889-048X
1572-8366
DOI:10.1007/s10460-019-09946-x