Bumble bee collecting pollen from a flower.
dmitry grigoriev/unsplash.com
Humans obtain bacteria through the foods they eat. But how do bees collect bacteria that live in and on them? And where do they pick up these microbes?
Agave honey bee log hive honey comb harvest.
Neil Rusch/no reuse without permission
Wild bees provide many lessons. Watching and learning from them may help keep honeybees safe and thriving.
Some wasps are social insects, meaning they live in groups and have a queen.
umsiedlungen/Pixabay.com)
Bees aren’t the only species that has a queen.
A butterfly and medicine garden planted by ‘Finding Flowers’ at Maloca Community Garden, York University, Toronto.
(Dana Prieto)
Indigenous land stewardship, resource extraction and corporate interests remain critical issues to addressing large-scale environmental concerns such as pollinator loss in Canada and beyond.
Tobias Maschtaler/Unsplash
A new study has found that European and North American bumblebee populations have shrank by a third since 1970.
Bees learn better when they can explore.
Author supplied
Bees may provide surprising insights into the kinds of environments that are best for learning.
Individuals working together as one.
Orit Peleg and Jacob Peters
A swarm of honeybees can provide valuable lessons about how a group of many individuals can work together to accomplish a task, even with no one in charge. Roboticists are taking notes.
The Asian honey bee (Apis cerana) has been found in Cairns. It’s just one of the introduced bees buzzing under the radar.
Tobias Smith
Bees innocuously buzzing ‘round the birdbath may be a barometer for burgeoning bee invasions.
A fossilized bee in amber.
Fossilmuseum.net
How do we know that bees were around when dinosaurs still roamed the Earth? The main evidence comes from fossils – the mineralized remains of long-dead organisms.
A rich diversity of animals thrive in these rights-of-way.
Wild things thrive in transmission pathways that crisscross states.
Aleksandr Gavrilychev/Shutterstock
Beehive designs haven’t changed since the 1940s.
Shutterstock.
It’s unlikely that all species of bees will go extinct anytime soon – but current losses could still have a terrible impact on food supplies and ecosystems.
The eight-mile ‘river of flowers’ that grows alongside a motorway near Rotherham, UK.
Pictorial Meadows
Britain’s councils are cutting roadside verges less often to allow vibrant wildflower meadows to bloom.
Sean Xu/Shutterstock
Wildflowers, bees and butterflies – your lawn is a vibrant ecosystem waiting to be unleashed.
Climate change is altering the smell of rosemary, affecting its quality and quantity.
Grégoire Lannoy/Flickr
As climatic conditions change, plants’ odours are altered, with direct consequences for pollination, especially by bees.
Maybe the differences between human and non-human animals are not as great as we might previously have thought.
from www.shutterstock.com
We’re left wondering whether we as humans are so very special after all – that perhaps the ability to learn mathematics could be universal.
A bumblebee sips nectar from a clover.
Victoria MacPhail
Wild bees pollinate trees and shrubs that feed and shelter wildlife, provide flood control, prevent soil erosion and help regulate the climate.
Known sweat-collecting stingless bees, Tetragonula sp., from the bee family Apidae.
Tobias Smith
Bees might not be able to survive inside a person’s eye, but they can be drawn to disgusting food sources.
An ashy mining bee (Andrena cineraria ) – one of the species believed to be on the increase.
Ed Phillips/Shutterstock
Amid the insect extinction crisis, some species are actually increasing. Here’s why that’s not necessarily a good thing.
Szasz-Fabian Jozsef/Shutterstock
The mouse who tidied the shed he lives in fascinated human viewers, but cleanliness isn’t a virtue unique to humans.