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The bee that everyone wants to save

naturalist.bearblog.dev

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Re: The bee that everyone wants to save

#71

Post by FarmerPotato »

MostlyStable wrote: post #9

My wife and I had wanted honey bees for a long time, but when we finally moved to a place that we could have had them, we noticed that we regularly saw at least 5 native bee species. We decided not to get a hive since they compete for resources and can spread disease. Given that there are neighbors that have them within about a mile, and that either those or feral colonies are close enough that we also see honey bees…

For North America, you can read much about native bees (and more) at Xerces.org.

They have many regional habitat-planting guides. Two books covering native bees:

  Managing Alternative Pollinators

  Attracting Native Pollinators
C'mon, you know you want to join a 'Society for Invertebrate Preservation'.

Re: The bee that everyone wants to save

#72

Post by t-3 »

2muchcoffeeman wrote: post #24
MostlyStable wrote: post #9

My wife and I had wanted honey bees for a long time, but when we finally moved to a place that we could have had them, we noticed that we regularly saw at least 5 native bee species. We decided not to get a hive since they compete for resources and can spread disease. Given that there are neighbors that have them within about a mile, and that either those or feral colonies are close enough that we also see honey bees…

Can you “build colonies” for native species?

Most of the native bees/wasps/flies that are important for pollination are solitary, but you can still help them with nesting areas.

Mason bees can be relatively easy: drill some small holes in a post and let it be. You can also get way more complicated with it.

https://colinpurrington.com/2019/05/guide-to-diy-mason-bee-h...

Bumblebee make nests for breeding, you can sometimes find nests in birdhouses or in gaps of buildings, but they apparently usually go for old mouse burrows. I've seen guides similar to the following, but covering a nest of dried grass with a clay pot, with a buried hose connecting the inside of the nest to the outside.

https://www.ars.usda.gov/ARSUserFiles/20800500/BumbleBeeRear...

Planting native flowers and shrubs can also provide habitat for many insects.

Re: The bee that everyone wants to save

#73

Post by t-3 »

bombcar wrote: post #44
chongli wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You just need to supply the native plants they prefer to pollinate, they’ll do the rest. If you’re wondering about whether you can harvest honey from them, I don’t think so. Most native pollinator species don’t produce honey. Bumblebees do produce a kind of honey, but it’s much thinner and less concentrated than proper honey (which has had most of the water evaporated off by the wing beats of the bees).

A thousand years of effort might be able to "domesticate" the bumblebee and make it produce something akin to usable amounts of honey - but unlikely to be worth it.

Bumblebees are being "domesticated" to some extent, for pollinating greenhouses, but they're used as labor animals rather than food.

Re: The bee that everyone wants to save

#74

Post by t-3 »

moebrowne wrote: post #20

> The honeybee is not endangered. It never was. There are several severe threats to honey bees which without human intervention would cause a significant number of hives to be lost. There's the varroa mite and the things it carries like deformed wing virus, then there is the increasingly prevalent Asian hornet which European honey bees are unable to deal with, and colony collapse disorder where the bees literally dis…

Wild honeybees adapt to deal with mites. What they struggle with are insecticides and monoculture deserts. Domesticated varieties that have been selected for productivity and placidity are the ones that haven't quickly adapted to the introduction of parasites, diseases, and predators, because they don't have to, as the humans worry about those problems.

Re: The bee that everyone wants to save

#75

Post by 7952 »

danybittel wrote: post #30

Very well said, also many other non bees are also pollinators, such as butterflies, some beetles.. even ants. Any flower is a hotspot of life. Tangential, have a look at a Gaussian splat of a honeybee I recently captured: https://superspl.at/scene/3ae6a716

That is spectacular. Can you keep the camera still and let the bee fly?

Re: The bee that everyone wants to save

#76

Post by b3ing »

matt_kantor wrote: post #51
bombcar wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither are humans, apparently. I wonder if it would be possible to experiment a bit - ban honeybee hives in a 10 mile square radius, or perhaps in that area that bans all radio transmitters. See what happens.

> Neither are humans, apparently. That depends on how you draw the line. Most would consider buffalo[0] to be native to North America, but they arrived less than 200000 years ago. If you go far enough back, no life is native to anywhere except wherever abiogenesis occurred. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_bison

Camels originated in North America, interesting enough. Yeah, we could go on for hours

Re: The bee that everyone wants to save

#78

Post by adolph »

pfdietz wrote: post #50
bregma wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's not as much crossover as you might think. In North America the native pollinators are adapted to the native plants and can't even pollinate the introduced eurasian ones. And it goes the other way: honeybees can't pollinate the native plants, only the introduced eurasian ones. If course, if you're in Europe, honeybees are the native pollinators. At least around the Mediterranean.

So, what you're saying is that honeybees are facilitating the spread of invasive plants in North America? Seems like a definite negative.

See also earthworms facilitating spread of invasives:

  Invasive species of earthworms from the suborder Lumbricina have been 
  expanding their range in North America. . . . Their introduction to North 
  America has had marked effects on the nutrient cycles and soil profiles in 
  temperate forests. . . . Some species of trees and other plants may be 
  incapable of surviving such changes in available nutrients. This change in 
  the plant diversity in turn affects other organisms and often leads to 
  increased invasions of other exotic species as well as overall forest 
  decline. They are considered one of the most invasive animals in the 
  Midwestern United States along with feral swine.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasive_earthworms_of_North_A...

Re: The bee that everyone wants to save

#79

Post by MostlyStable »

bregma wrote: post #34
MostlyStable wrote: post #9

My wife and I had wanted honey bees for a long time, but when we finally moved to a place that we could have had them, we noticed that we regularly saw at least 5 native bee species. We decided not to get a hive since they compete for resources and can spread disease. Given that there are neighbors that have them within about a mile, and that either those or feral colonies are close enough that we also see honey bees…

There's not as much crossover as you might think. In North America the native pollinators are adapted to the native plants and can't even pollinate the introduced eurasian ones. And it goes the other way: honeybees can't pollinate the native plants, only the introduced eurasian ones. If course, if you're in Europe, honeybees are the native pollinators. At least around the Mediterranean.

While I haven't done an intense study of it, I very frequently see multiple bee species, natives and honey bees, on the same flowers. This includes things like raspberries, mint, dandelions, various fruit blossoms, as well as vegetables. I'm sure there is specialization in at least some of the natives, but some of them, the bumblebees especially (or maybe that's just because they are bigger and easier to see), seem to be pretty generalist foragers much like the honey bees

Re: The bee that everyone wants to save

#80

Post by pruetj »

Appreciate the write up! I’ve always wanted a hive on my property. I’ve seen some carpenter bees and bumblebees at work around the garden and this is giving me second thoughts about introducing more competition for them via honeybees.

I think I’ll let nature take its course here and enjoy the natural wild life.

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