The Red Bees of Red Hook

( 0 Votes )

Friday, 10 December 2010 21:21

Brooklyn, New York, December 2010 — (You may have already read about this, but just in case you missed it, we thought it was worth reprising and passing on. The story first appeared a few weeks ago in the New York Times, and was later picked up by countless other newspapers and bloggers, and reported.) A woman living in the Red Hook section of Brooklyn, raises and cares for a colony of honey bees, and in dutifully caring for them, expected them to share her values of food sources being free of high-fructose corn syrup and synthetic, petroleum-based artificial food coloring, or dyes. But then one day her bees, which foraged over Red Hook and on Governor’s Island, began coming home to their hives looking strange. They were showing up carrying unexplainable stripes of color. Where amber should have been appearing in the membranes of their bodies there was instead a bright red. Their honeycombs, too, reflected this shade. When no one could find the answer as to why this was happening, a friend of the bee-keeper suggested the bees were nipping on the maraschino cherry juice that could be found in the vats of a maraschino cherries company nearby. Although this notion seemed far-fetched, it seems the Red Hook bees fell for the same mouth feel and taste as humans often do, preferring artificial flavor over the real thing. To be sure, samples of the red stuff were sent to an apiculturalist, who found the samples riddled with Red Dye No. 40, the same used in the maraschino cherry juice, an ingredient ubiquitous in our food system against which many influential nutritionists and dieticians have been lobbying the government to remove from our food and beverage supply. Could the tastiest nectar, even close by the hives, compete with the charms of a liquid so abundant, so vibrant and so cloyingly sweet? Perhaps the conundrum raises another disturbing question: If the bees cannot resist those three qualities, what hope do the rest of us have? The answer to that question is yet to come. In the meantime, steps are being taken to encourage the bees to go back to their ‘honey’ ways, which will most likely be a task made easier if those who wish it are able to get synthetic Red 40 off the shelves. Warning labels are also being considered, but in this case that wouldn’t work, since bees can’t read. SOURCE: New York Times; Several other publications < Prev   Next >