U of M Researchers Excel at Developing the Full Potential of the Bee- Using Honey Bees to Find Land Mines and Revitalize Agriculture in War-Torn Countries

The United Nations estimates that there are 110 million unexploded land mines worldwide. These mines maim or kill about 26,000 people each year, or one person every 15 minutes.

Professor Jerry J. Bromenshenk
Asst. Professor Colin B. Henderson

Division of Biological Sciences University of Montana

Croplands are mined to render fields uncultivable and produce agricultural shortfalls, leading to malnutrition and famine. The first step in restoring agriculture in war torn countries is to locate and remove mines, unexploded ordinance (UXO), and other chemical and biological warfare agents.

The second step is to bring back agriculture. In both instances, honey bees can play a critical role. Under funding from the Defense Advanced Research Agency (DARPA), we have shown that bees can be conditioned or trained to find trace levels of a variety of chemicals and biologicals, including explosive’s vapors from land mines.

Bees offer the only mine and UXO detection system that does not require a person to either walk through or be in close proximity to the mine field. Bees function much like mine finding dogs, which is the leading technology for mine clearance.

Bees are also critical to revitalizing agriculture, based on their roles as pollinators and producers of honey and wax and other products. As such, re-establishing beekeeping is a necessary step in re-establishing sustainable agriculture in more than 83 countries globally.

For more information on this and the many other research projects to further understand the wide range of abilities of the bee visit:
http://beekeeper.dbs.umt.edu/bees/