Greetings and welcome to my bee blog!
Here I hope to spread the word about the amazing four thousand plus species of bees that we have here in North America! Honey bees (Apis mellifera) has gotten most of the media attention when it comes to the "Save the Bees" campaign. This is problematic for a few reasons that I will try to highlight briefly in this intro:
- Honey bees are just one species, yet dominate the space in terms of agricultural use, conservation focus, and media attention
- They have only been in the Americas for the few hundred years since European settlers brought them over, compared to others that have spent millions of years here
- Apis mellifera is not like other farm animals, it can multiply and fly off into the wild with relative ease compared to cows, pigs, chickens, etc.
These "feral" colonies that escape can be a huge boon on native bee populations. Honey bees will easy reproduce and then soak up many of the resources in the area, having a negative impact on other species. Not only this, but you know how colonists brought deadly disease to the Americas, like smallpox? Well, the honey bees did the same thing...a parasite by the name of Varroa destructor preys on the growing larvae of honey bees inside the colony; this parasite actually managed to hop hosts and cause the same kind of havoc in bumble bee (Bombus) colonies, as well. They do not call it destructor for nothing! It is a very devastating condition to befall a bee colony.
In this blog, I hope to bring attention to problems such as this, and other issues facing native bees, such as habitat destruction in the form of development or deforestation. Stay tuned if you are interested in learning how to help Save the Bees, the right way!
Thanks for reading!
