Clearing Opium Fields Hurts Honeybees
Originally published in August 1911
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“Some unexpected results are found from the movement against the production of opium in China. In the Yunnan, one of the provinces where opium was produced in large quantities, it appears that the poppy is no longer cultivated, owing to the recent measures. However, this has had a disastrous effect on the honey culture of the region. As the bees find no more flowers, the production of honey is stopped. The new crops which replace the poppy, such as wheat or peas, are not such as will give as good a honey yield. On another side of the question, it appears that the opium habits of the population are not suppressed by the present legislation, as some supposed would be the case, but are again on the rise.”
—Scientific American, August 1911
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