Our only hope is that the microbeads don’t become airborne before the election. But on a serious note, is colony collapse disorder hoakum? I’d heard ten different reasons for it, but last I heard was that the bees are back in force.
There are loads of claims about it; my wild guess is and was that it’s related somehow to the throat mites which had become epidemic in the 1980s in the domesticated bee population. Domesticated bees have a moderately narrow genetic base, bred for a specific purpose. Other, wilder bees (Orchard Mason bees are or were popular among organic gardeners and farmers) have been taking over pollination duties. Even here in cold old Michigan, the “killer bee” hybrids are becoming the wild bee population. They are crossed with the domestic bee. The two breeds have the same number of hairs on their bodies, but the Africanized bees are narrower, so they look hairier.