I learnt about a strange phenomenon yesterday. I was watching a movie and a statement by one of the actors caught my attention. He said, “Like Einstein said, no honey bees, no humans”. I rewind the movie and played that part again just to make sure that I heard it right. What he meant by this was that without Bees, and honeybees in particular, the human race would not survive and go extinct within a period of 3 to 5 years. The reason why it sounded a little out of place is because Einstein was a physicist and this statement sounded like it must have come from a botanist. But then Einstein’s genius was not only limited to Physics, he was a master of many studies including mathematics and philosophy so he could have said it. Never the less, I decided to do a little research on the quote and what I found was interesting indeed.
Many of us believe that plants just grow flowers on their own and their seeds just happen to be. As I was to learn, this is totally incorrect and hence the theory of Pollination which we all read about in schools but forgot completely. Like humans and animals, even plants have male and female parts and in order to reproduce, a fine to coarse powder called Pollen has to be transferred from the male part of the plant to the female part. Now like humans or animals, plants do not mate so this transfer has to be done by an outside source called Pollinator which in 90% of the cases happen to be the various type Bees.
A pollinator is the biotic agent (vector) that moves pollen from the male anthers of a flower to the female stigma of a flower to accomplish fertilization. The most recognized pollinators are the various species of bees, which are plainly adapted to pollination. Bees typically are fuzzy and carry an electrostatic charge. Both features help pollen grains adhere to their bodies. Honey bees travel from flower to flower, collecting nectar (later converted to honey), and pollen grains. The bee collects the pollen by rubbing against the anthers. The pollen collects on the hind legs, in a structure referred to as a “pollen basket”. As the bee flies from flower to flower, some of the pollen grains are transferred onto the stigma of other flowers. In simple words, Bees are the ones who do the task of carrying the reproductive substance from the male to the female parts in flowers.
Now what this means is that almost a third of global farm output depends on honey bees pollination. The theory that a world without bees would perish is often accredited to Albert Einstein but is highly disputed that he ever said it. Animal pollination is essential for nuts, melons and berries, and plays varying roles in citrus fruits, apples, onions, broccoli, cabbage, sprouts, peppers, avocados, cucumbers, coconuts, tomatoes and broad beans, as well as coffee and cocoa. If there are no bees to pollinate, the production of all these fruits & vegetables and several other crops would reduce drastically and food will become scarce all over the world, eventually leading the world to perish. It is said that every third mouth in the world is fed only because of honeybees. Not only humans but animals will also start to die as there will a severe shortage of food all over the globe.
There has been a severe decline in honeybee population all over the world. Over the time, several theories have developed in order to explain the sudden disappearance of several species of bees. “Colony Collapse Disorder” is the most recent theory developed in 2006 to find out the cause of disappearance of worker bees from a European honey bee colony. This is however not only limited to Europe and across several countries, many known species of honeybees are now extinct. The reservoir of bees is dwindling to the point where ratios are dangerously out of kilter. For example, the situation in China is so bad that farmers have started pollinating their crops by hand using feather brushes. Germany and France have recently banned several pesticides that were considered as dangerous for Bees. This explains that how serious and large this problem has grown to be.
But there are of course people who do not agree with this theory. Human race is known for its adaption and evolving capabilities. Even though the Bee population is declining, pollinated crop output has quadrupled since 1961. Produce like potato which is one of the most consumed crop all over the world do not need bees to pollinate. However another fact that cannot be ignored is that the grain shortage and all time high prices are already creating anarchy in several countries of the world. Europe and American nations too are struggling due to food shortage. So the big question here is, whether the human race will perish without bees or adapt to a new world where there are no Bees. We can either just wait to find out or take steps to ensure that we never reach such time.
