Word: almond
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...bees' behavior changed. When they went back in the hive, they started wiggling about differently. The next step is to correlate the exact position of the sun with the direction in which they do their dance. It's detective work, basically. (Read about honeybees in California's almond orchards...
...want Valerie to think she has to be conventionally beautiful to be loved." So when Valerie asked for a doll at Christmas, her mother bypassed buxom Barbie and purchased Elizabeth (retail price: $175) from S.C.-based retailer Downi Creations. Featuring 13 physical characteristics of Down Syndrome, including almond-shaped eyes, low-set ears, a horizontal crease in her palms and a slightly protruding tongue. Elizabeth, says Perry, is "different but beautiful at the same time." (See pictures of Barbie's 50 years...
...sweet, symbiotic relationship: the annual pilgrimage keeps California's $2.2 billion almond industry ticking and is a huge moneymaker for more than half the country's commercial beekeepers. But this year, some worry that relationship is starting to sour. Driven by surging global demand, California's almond growers have doubled acreage since 1981, forcing them to lean heavily on imported bees from as far away as Vermont. Drive along the unlined roads around Hughson, and it's easy to find 10 different almond farmers renting hives from 10 different states. Orin Johnson, whose family has been keeping bees around Hughson...
...industrial pollination may be starting to take its toll on the bees. Many keepers are feeding their colonies corn syrup, sugar and pollen substitute to artificially bulk up hives ahead of the almond season, while killing off parasitic mites with pesticides. Plus, parking the hives smack in the middle of this land of almonds "is comparable to us going to McDonald's every day for a month," says Johnson. "In the past, you'd have a blend of sources, and [the bees] seemed so much healthier." Johnson and many bee researchers believe this monocultural diet may have contributed...
Consequently, California's almond growers are getting stung. Dave Phippen, a partner in his family's farm in nearby Manteca, just paid $150 per hive to a Texas supplier. "If we didn't put any bees out here, I think we'd have a crop failure," he says, "and I'm not about to learn." Three years of record yields have depressed almond prices to half their peak; many growers will be lucky to break even this year. Meanwhile, a drought led Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to declare a state of emergency on Feb. 27. Some almond farmers didn't even...