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Difference between revisions of "Honey, Bees, and Pollination"

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=== Harm ===
 
=== Harm ===
  
* Bees '''die''' in the production of commercial honey. One national survey conducted in the United States showed that "the nation’s beekeepers lost 40 percent of their commercial honey bee colonies" to '''parasites, pests, and diseases''' in one 12 month period.<ref>“US Beekeepers Lose Four of Every 10 Managed Colonies in 2017-18.” Auburn University. Accessed March 31, 2019. http://ocm.auburn.edu//.htm.</ref> On the other hand, wild bees are doing well.<ref name="nymag2015">“It Turns Out Bees Are, Quite Literally, Worrying Themselves to Death.” Intelligencer, June 17, 2015. http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/06/bees-are-literally-worrying-themselves-to-death.html.</ref>
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* Farmed bees '''die''' in the production of honey and as a result of being used for pollination. One national survey conducted in the United States showed that "the nation’s beekeepers lost 40 percent of their commercial honey bee colonies" to '''parasites, pests, and diseases''' in one 12 month period.<ref>“US Beekeepers Lose Four of Every 10 Managed Colonies in 2017-18.” Auburn University. Accessed March 31, 2019. http://ocm.auburn.edu//.htm.</ref> On the other hand, wild bees are doing well.<ref name="nymag2015">“It Turns Out Bees Are, Quite Literally, Worrying Themselves to Death.” Intelligencer, June 17, 2015. http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/06/bees-are-literally-worrying-themselves-to-death.html.</ref>
  
* The '''queens are often killed''' and replaced after living half of their natural lifespan to "prevent swarming, aggression, mite infestation, and to keep honey production at a maximum."<ref>“Why Honey Is Not Vegan.” Accessed March 31, 2019. http://www.vegetus.org/honey/honey.htm.</ref>
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* ''Queen bees are often killed''' and replaced after living half of their natural lifespan to "prevent swarming, aggression, mite infestation, and to keep honey production at a maximum."<ref>“Why Honey Is Not Vegan.” Accessed March 31, 2019. http://www.vegetus.org/honey/honey.htm.</ref>
  
 
* Queens are artificially inseminated in a process that '''kills the male'''.<ref>“Artificial Insemination of Queen Honeybees.” Accessed March 31, 2019. http://www.vegetus.org/honey/art.htm.</ref>
 
* Queens are artificially inseminated in a process that '''kills the male'''.<ref>“Artificial Insemination of Queen Honeybees.” Accessed March 31, 2019. http://www.vegetus.org/honey/art.htm.</ref>
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=== Sustainability ===
 
=== Sustainability ===
  
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* Commercial honeybees, which have high rates of parasitic disease, are killing<ref>Clark, Laura. “Commercial Hives Might Be Saving Crops, But They’re Killing Wild Bees.” Smithsonian. Accessed March 31, 2019. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/commercial-hives-might-be-saving-crops-theyre-killing-wild-bees-180953934/.</ref>wild honeybees.
  
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* The use of the single species imported honeybee is crowding out the native species is crowding out the over 4,000 species of wild bees just in the United States.<ref>Keim, Brandon. “Forget the Ordinary Honeybee; Look at the Beautiful Bees They’re Crowding Out.” Nautilus, April 24, 2015. http://nautil.us/blog/forget-the-ordinary-honeybee-look-at-the-beautiful-bees-theyre-crowding-out.</ref> This creates an ever-increasing dependence on commercial bees which are much more susceptible to disease than wild bees, making the sustainability of commercial bees questionable.
  
 
=== General Information ===
 
=== General Information ===

Revision as of 10:23, 31 March 2019

Context

The question of whether honey is vegan is frequently brought up by those new to or considering veganism. According to the most widely accepted definition of veganism, and the definition embraced by JFA, honey is implicitly proscribed. Veganism is "a way of living that seeks to exclude, as far as possible an practicable, all forms of exploitation of and cruelty to animals for food, clothing, or any other purpose."[1]

Considering the information presented below in the talking points, it would be hard to deny that bees are exploited and harmed when the honey they have made for themselves is taken from their hives for human consumption. In addition, honey provides no essential nutrients and can be easily avoided.

Advocacy

Less clear and more nuanced than the question of whether honey is vegan, is the degree of zeal and insistence we should convey when we respond to inquiries about honey. Discussions about honey should be done with a sensitivity to these facts:

  1. Insects rank low on society's hierarchy of concern for animals, and
  2. Bees may have been used to pollinate some of the fruits and vegetables that we eat.

In light of this awareness, one way to respond is as follows:

  • State that vegans avoid honey because it involves the exploitation of animals.
  • Briefly describe how bees are harmed in the making of commercial (see below).
  • Explain that commercial bees are not necessary for pollination, and may actually be harmful to sustainability (see below).
  • Invite your interlocuter to research both sides of the issue then decide for themselves.
  • Point out that if they still feel after researching the topic that it's OK to eat honey, it would be illogical to use that as a justification for eating other animal products, or as a justification to dismiss other aspects of veganism as invalid.
  • If called for, explain that avoiding honey is not inconsistent or hypocritical just because we may be eating plant-based foods that have been pollinated with commercial bees. We avoid animal products as far as "possible and practicable." Just because we can't be perfect does not mean we should not do what can easily be done—avoiding honey.

Talking Points

Harm

  • Farmed bees die in the production of honey and as a result of being used for pollination. One national survey conducted in the United States showed that "the nation’s beekeepers lost 40 percent of their commercial honey bee colonies" to parasites, pests, and diseases in one 12 month period.[2] On the other hand, wild bees are doing well.[3]
  • Queen bees are often killed' and replaced after living half of their natural lifespan to "prevent swarming, aggression, mite infestation, and to keep honey production at a maximum."[4]
  • Queens are artificially inseminated in a process that kills the male.[5]
  • Much of the bees' honey is replaced by sugar water which lacks the nutritional richness of their natural diet—honey, nectar, and pollen.[6]

Sentience

  • Bees have cognitive abilities. Bees can be taught how to perform tasks that are foreign to their natural foraging behavior and can improve on the tasks they have learned by making generalizations. As one researcher put it, "The old-fashioned view is if an animal has a small brain, it’s not intelligent or smart...our study shows it’s not true that small brains are not capable of this kind of cognitive flexibility.”[7]
  • The wiggle dance of bees is so sophisticated it requires vector calculus to model. In addition, bees adjust their flight pattern in real time to accommodate the change in the sun's angle of one degree every 4 minutes.
  • Studies show that bees feel pain.[8][9] One study that did not conclude bees feel pain depended on injured bees choosing bitter-tasting morphine over sugar water, as if the bees had pharmacological knowledge that even a human would not have without a label.[10]

Sustainability

  • Commercial honeybees, which have high rates of parasitic disease, are killing[11]wild honeybees.
  • The use of the single species imported honeybee is crowding out the native species is crowding out the over 4,000 species of wild bees just in the United States.[12] This creates an ever-increasing dependence on commercial bees which are much more susceptible to disease than wild bees, making the sustainability of commercial bees questionable.

General Information

In the United States, there are about 30 billion managed bees in 2.7 million colonies, with more than half of the colonies shipped to the Central Valley to pollinate almond trees, which have only a five-day pollination window.[3]

See Also

Why Honey is Not Vegan


Footnotes

  1. “Definition of Veganism.” The Vegan Society. Accessed March 31, 2019. https://www.vegansociety.com/go-vegan/definition-veganism.
  2. “US Beekeepers Lose Four of Every 10 Managed Colonies in 2017-18.” Auburn University. Accessed March 31, 2019. http://ocm.auburn.edu//.htm.
  3. 3.0 3.1 “It Turns Out Bees Are, Quite Literally, Worrying Themselves to Death.” Intelligencer, June 17, 2015. http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2015/06/bees-are-literally-worrying-themselves-to-death.html.
  4. “Why Honey Is Not Vegan.” Accessed March 31, 2019. http://www.vegetus.org/honey/honey.htm.
  5. “Artificial Insemination of Queen Honeybees.” Accessed March 31, 2019. http://www.vegetus.org/honey/art.htm.
  6. “Honey Bee Nutrition and Supplemental Feeding | Beesource Beekeeping.” Accessed March 31, 2019. https://beesource.com/resources/usda/honey-bee-nutrition-and-supplemental-feeding/
  7. Loukola, Olli J., Clint J. Perry, Louie Coscos, and Lars Chittka. “Bumblebees Show Cognitive Flexibility by Improving on an Observed Complex Behavior.” Science 355, no. 6327 (February 24, 2017): 833–36. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aag2360.
  8. Balderrama, N. et al. (biologists) (1987). Behavioral and Pharmacological Analysis of the Stinging Response in Africanized and Italian Bees. Neurobiology and Behavior of Honeybees. R. Menzel & A. Mercer (eds.). New York: Springer-Verlag.
  9. Núñez, J. A., Almeida L., Balderrama N. and Giurfa M. (1997). Alarm Pheromone Induces Stress Analgesia via an Opioid System in the Honeybee. Physiology & Behaviour 63 (1), 75-80
  10. Groening, Julia, Dustin Venini, and Mandyam V. Srinivasan. “In Search of Evidence for the Experience of Pain in Honeybees: A Self-Administration Study.” Scientific Reports 7 (April 4, 2017): 45825. https://doi.org/10.1038/srep45825..
  11. Clark, Laura. “Commercial Hives Might Be Saving Crops, But They’re Killing Wild Bees.” Smithsonian. Accessed March 31, 2019. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/commercial-hives-might-be-saving-crops-theyre-killing-wild-bees-180953934/.
  12. Keim, Brandon. “Forget the Ordinary Honeybee; Look at the Beautiful Bees They’re Crowding Out.” Nautilus, April 24, 2015. http://nautil.us/blog/forget-the-ordinary-honeybee-look-at-the-beautiful-bees-theyre-crowding-out.