Decline of bees, other pollinators threatens US crop yields

Crop yields for apples, cherries and blueberries across the United States are being reduced by a lack of pollinators, according to Rutgers-led research, the most comprehensive study of its kind to date.

Nesting aids make agricultural fields attractive for bees

Wild bees are important pollinators of many crop plants – sometimes they are even more efficient than honeybees. Their numbers can be increased sustainably using simple means as a recent study has found.

Franklin's bumble bee may be extinct

(PhysOrg.com) -- Native pollinator specialist Robbin Thorp, emeritus professor of entomology at the University of California, Davis, just returned from a scientific trip to southern Oregon and Northern California to see if ...

'Swindon Honeybee' could save Britain's bees

(PhysOrg.com) -- Honey bee numbers have been declining almost everywhere due to a pesticide-resistant mite called Varroa. Now a beekeeper in Britain claims to have discovered a strain of bee that destroys the parasite through ...

Why sunflowers face east

Sunflowers face the rising sun because increased morning warmth attracts more bees and also helps the plants reproduce more efficiently, according to a study by researchers at the University of California, Davis. The results ...

UN science report warns of fewer bees, other pollinators

Many species of wild bees, butterflies and other critters that pollinate plants are shrinking toward extinction, and the world needs to do something about it before our food supply suffers, a new United Nations scientific ...

Pollination by birds can be advantageous

Why have some plant species changed pollinators in their evolution? An international team of researchers from the Universities of Bonn and Xi'an Jiaotong-Liverpool University Suzhou (China) studied the reproductive systems ...

The farmer wants a hive—inside the world of renting bees

Almonds, blueberries, apples, melons – all of these fruits, and many more, rely on insect pollination. Some crops rely more on pollinators than others. Insect pollination isn't just about the number of fruits produced – ...

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