Home : News : Strange :

File Photo: A colony of honeybees is seen at the United States Department of Agriculture's Bee Research Laboratory in Beltsville, Md. (AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari)

More News

Police: 'Thong Cape Scooter…

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A man who wears thong underwear and a cape while riding his scooter …

Car uses tweets and social media to run

The car is an old-school Volkswagen Karmann Gia, but there's …

Brown hounded for calling…

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Dan Brown's description of Manila as "the gates of hell" in …

Fugitive in LA attempted-murder…

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A man wanted for 13 years on attempted murder charges in Los Angeles …

Council members abstain from…

YPSILANTI, Mich. (AP) — Three members of a Michigan city council have abstained from …

Washington state's first 'zombie bees' reported

Updated: Monday, 24 Sep 2012, 3:31 PM EDT
Published : Monday, 24 Sep 2012, 2:56 PM EDT

SEATTLE (AP) -- Washington state has its first "zombie bees."

Novice beekeeper Mark Hohn in Kent found that his bees are infected with a parasite that causes them to fly at night and lurch around erratically until they die.

The Seattle Times reports (http://is.gd/ji7UNX ) it's the first time the bee infection has been found in the state, according to tracking by San Francisco State University biologist John Hafernik through his website ZombeeWatch.org.

Zombie bees were first discovered in California in 2008.

Bee populations already have been dropping in recent years due to another ailment called Colony Collapse Disorder, in which all the adult honey bees in a colony suddenly die.

Zombie bees also are being studied by Steve Sheppard, chairman of the entomology department at Washington State University.

------

Information from: The Seattle Times, http://www.seattletimes.com

Comments

With WDTN.com's new commenting system you don't need to register. You can login with an existing Facebook, Yahoo!, Google, or Twitter account and more.