Every year, the bloom of thousands of almond trees in California spurs one of the world’s largest, albeit artificial, migrations of animals; as billions of #honeybees are loaded onto trucks and sent to deliver lucrative pollination fees for their human keepers.
This insect odyssey ensures paydays for often struggling beekeepers, the production of most of the world’s almonds, and increasingly, an opportunity for enterprising thieves.
Standing in the way of the bee rustlers — often alone — is #Rowdy#Freeman, a deputy at the Butte County Sheriff’s Office in California’s Central Valley.
Freeman is a steely sort of bee detective. Angular, with a shaved head and fond of wearing wrap-around sunglasses, the taciturn deputy is a beekeeper himself and is aghast at how hive thefts have become so ubiquitous.
Last year, according to Freeman calculations, a record of more than 🔸2,300 honeybee hives were stolen in the Central Valley🔸.
This year’s thefts could easily surpass that number, with Freeman recording nearly 2,000 hives stolen already.
Despite the growing scale of this crime, Freeman is typically the only law enforcement officer working with beekeepers to track the stolen hives and their thieves.
“I’m trying to get more help for this because it’s become a major problem, it’s getting out of control,” Freeman said.
While California has state branches devoted to stamping out the theft of #horses or #cattle, no such task force exists for bees, he notes with no small amount of envy and frustration.
The federal government is also uninterested in the issue, despite what Freeman describes as clear-cut evidence that stolen hives have been transported over state lines @thebeeguy @ai6yr @firephoto
