Took a little detour up a residential street on the way to the grocery store today and saw so many different bees!! (Despite the preponderance of traditional neatly manicured Old Italian People lawns.)
Haven't a clue what families/genera most of these are, suggestions welcome!
#bugstodon #insects #bees #NativeBees #SolitaryBees #Hymenoptera #Anthophila #Halictidae #Apidae #Megachilidae
Working to conserve #NativeBees
"Tropical Queensland still has one of the fastest land clearing rates on Earth."
"To conserve our crucial pollinators of native plants and agricultural crops, we need to stop further land clearing of tropical forests, which provide cooler microclimates in an otherwise very warm environment."
"As well as conserving native vegetation, #Australia needs to slow its greenhouse gas emissions so we can secure pollination (of both native and agricultural plants) and food security into the future." >>
#FossilFuels #bees #landclearing #tropics #pollinators
This speaker isn’t holding back re: honey bees. Love it.
She refers to them as “mini livestock” and just dropped the term “bee washing.”
#Missouri #Conservation #MasterNaturalist #BeeHotel #NativeBees #SolitaryBees #SaveTheBees
Pretty sure the answer is generally “NO*!” But I’m open to what they have to say.
*My understanding that unless time/dedication allows for strict maintenance they are more of a problem then a help. Also believe they should be less “dense”
#Missouri #Conservation #MasterNaturalist #BeeHotel #NativeBees #SolitaryBees
🐝 A new effort by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service aims to help the endangered rusty patched bumble bee recover.
🐝Since 2000, only 13 states have had confirmed sightings of the rusty patched bumble bee which used to be found from Maine to Georgia West to the Dakotas. (NC is one.)
🐝Roughly 1.5 million acres of land across five states – Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, Virginia, and Wisconsin, plus West Virginia – has just been designated as critical habitat for the bee.
https://www.fws.gov/species/rusty-patched-bumble-bee-bombus-affinis
Historically, the rusty patched bumble bee was broadly distributed across the eastern United States, Upper Midwest, and southern Quebec and Ontario in Canada. Since 2000, this bumble bee has been reported from only 13 states and 1 Canadian province: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, Wisconsin and Ontario, Canada. Rusty patched bumble bees live in colonies that include a single queen and female workers. The colony produces males and new queens in late summer. Queens are the largest bees in the colony, and workers are the smallest. All rusty patched bumble bees have entirely black heads, but only workers and males have a rusty reddish patch centrally located on the back. Resources for Rusty Patched Bumble Bee Researchers and Surveyors Are you looking for resources on survey protocols, recovery permits, the habitat connectivity model, and maps of the high and low potential zones? Visit our Rusty Patch Bumble Bee Researcher and Surveyor Guidance Library.
Mating bumblebees, seen just now in Cambridge, UK. Seems late for the season, wondering if these are new reproductives, in which case they are out rather early.
Bombus terrestris (presumably), garden bumblebee.
http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/369266431
#iNaturalist #Hymenoptera #nativebees #bumblebees #entomology
I’ve finally completed and made a small series of my print “Our Fate is Tied To That of The Insects” available. People kept asking for the one that is on exhibit. Get your native bee and other pollinator propaganda now!
https://minouette.etsy.com/listing/4512155120
#linocut #printmaking #sciart #nativeBees #pollinators #mastoArt
From 2020: #Mexico has 1,900 species of #bees and they’re all at risk: biologist
by Susy Buchanan
May 21, 2020
"All of Mexico’s 1,900 different species of native bees are at risk of extinction, says Ricardo Ayala Barajas, a National Autonomous University researcher based at the Chamela Biology Station in Jalisco.
"Most of Mexico’s bees do not sting and only 47 species produce honey, but all native species are endangered, explained the researcher on the United Nations World Bee Day, May 20.
"In an interview with the newspaper Milenio, Ayala said that around the world there are approximately 20,000 different named species of bees, and like in Mexico, every one is threatened by the use of #insecticides and #deforestation.
" 'A great effort is required to try to reduce the use of insecticides and make more careful use of natural resources, for the future of humanity and to care for the bees that help plants reproduce and generate fruits and seeds,' Ayala said. 'We must appreciate and understand them more in order to prevent them from disappearing.'
"Bee conservation is on the rise in Mexico, just as it is globally.
"In #Guanajuato, people who kill #bees or harm their #habitat can be fined up to 8,000 pesos (US $350). In #Yucatán, the government and communities are collaborating on a bee conservation project after significant bee populations have died, thought to be a result of crop dusting. A similar campaign is underway in #Campeche."
Source:
https://mexiconewsdaily.com/news/mexico-has-1900-species-of-bees-and-theyre-all-at-risk-biologist/
#WorldBeeDay #SaveTheBees #NativeBees #YucatanBees #BeeConservation
From 2018... So, it looks like a relative of the #EuropeanHoneyBee did once exist in #NorthAmerica -- but they went extinct many years ago!
"In 2009, paleontologists uncovered a single fossilized worker bee in the Stewart Valley Basin of west-central Nevada. This was no European honey bee. It was Apis nearctica, an extinct species of honey bee that lived during the middle Miocene epoch—14 million years ago. Preserved in a delicate paper shale deposit alongside other ancient insects, the fossil offers the first definitive evidence of #HoneyBees native to North America."
However, #NativeBees (#MeliponaBeecheii) produce honey as well!
"Ancient Honey, Without Honey Bees?
If honey bees didn’t return to North America until the 1600s, how did the Maya harvest honey long before that?
The answer lies in a different lineage of bees entirely: stingless bees of the tribe #Meliponini. These bees, especially those in the genus Melipona, are native to the tropics and subtropics. Revered by the ancient Maya, stingless bees were more than pollinators—they were spiritual symbols. The Mayan bee god, #AhMuzenCab, was honored for the gift of honey.
The Maya’s favorite stingless bee was Melipona beecheii, or kolil kab in Yucatec Maya, meaning 'royal lady.' Unlike the vast colonies of honey bees, Melipona beecheii lives in smaller colonies and produces just two liters of honey per year—a fraction of the five gallons a typical honey bee hive can yield.
Families traditionally kept hives in hollow logs near their homes. But the spread of aggressive Africanized honey bees has threatened this ancient practice, as stingless bees are unable to compete for resources."
https://nativebeeology.com/2018/01/26/native-honey-bees/
#WorldBeeDay #YucatanBees #MayanBees #NativeBees #BeeHistory
Women Work to Save #NativeBees of #Mexico
A happy story about #bees, #BeeConservation, and empowering women in Mexico.
Mar 5, 2014
Excerpt: "Spaniards introduced European #honeybees to Central America around 1620, and they are now well established. European honey bees (and their Africanized form) do compete with gentle #NativeBee species for pollen and nectar on flowers. #MeliponaBeecheii is a #ForestBee, so if they could find flowering trees and shrubs, competition with honey bees might not be a problem. Alas, #Yucatan is heavily logged.
"The Yucatan peninsula sits right in the path of a lot of big storms; quite a few hurricanes, floods, and droughts have caused beekeepers to lose all or most of their hives. Native stingless bees are quite sensitive to #pesticides, so that isn't helping either."
Learn more:
https://www.wired.com/2014/03/women-work-save-native-bees-mexico/
Archived version:
https://archive.ph/C5qzc
Link to video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4c4v1E2mRhw
#WorldBeeDay #SaveTheBees #EmpoweringWomen #YucatanBees #IndigenousWomen
neville park
NSW.Biodiversity
JL Johnson 
Joe Wynne 🌻🚗⛰️
Albert Cardona
Ele Willoughby, PhD
DoomsdaysCW
