More bzzzz on bees
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- August
- 13
“Males, known as drones, perform no useful function except to mate. They are loutish and filthy, and the workers – sterile females – tolerate their presence for a few months a year, then systematically murder them.”
That was one sentence that jumped out at me in a recent New Yorker piece by Elizabeth Kolbert on honeybees and colony-collapse disorder. Much has been written in recent months on disappearing honeybees and how that might affect the world. This piece  pointed out by an avid Nature of Things reader  is entertaining as well as informative.
Honeybees, Kolbert says, will feed on almost anything that is blooming.
“This trait makes honeybees essential to modern agriculture, which has itself evolved to depend on their service,” she writes
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on Monday, August 13th, 2007 at 4:20 pm by Mike Risinit.
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Journal News staff writer Greg Clary writes Earth Watch, reporting on environmental issues in the lower Hudson region. Clary has been a reporter, editor and columnist at the Journal News since 1988 and has covered police and courts, transportation, municipal government, development and the environment in the Lower Hudson Valley, among other topics. 
Laura Incalcaterra covers the environment, open space and zoning and planning issues for The Journal News. A Boston College graduate, Laura grew up in Rockland, attended East Ramapo schools and has worked for The Journal News since 1993. Laura has written features and covered North Rockland, crime, government and a host of other issues.
Mike Risinit covers Patterson and Kent in Putnam County, as well as environmental topics touching on the Hudson River and the Great Swamp. Risinit has been a reporter at The Journal News since 1998.
“Males, known as drones, perform no useful function except to mate. They are loutish and filthy, and the workers – sterile females – tolerate their presence for a few months a year, then systematically murder them.�
I am guessing that sentence would probably stand out to Ms. Kolbert’s shrink, too.