{"id":4193,"date":"2015-12-23T18:38:13","date_gmt":"2015-12-24T00:38:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valleywatch.net\/?p=4193"},"modified":"2015-12-23T18:38:13","modified_gmt":"2015-12-24T00:38:13","slug":"first-ever-national-wild-bee-map-shows-major-decline-in-crucial-agricultural-regions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/valleywatch.net\/?p=4193","title":{"rendered":"First-Ever National Wild Bee Map Shows Major Decline in Crucial Agricultural Regions"},"content":{"rendered":"

December 22, 2015 – by Cole Mellino in EcoWatch<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Web<\/a>

Simple observation in the Valley Watch garden over the last few years bears out the severe reduce ion in honey bees in this region. This bee was an early explorer several years ago in the garden e=collecting pollen from a crocus in February. \u00a9 BlairPhotoEVV<\/p><\/div>\n

A team of researchers at the University of Vermont (UVM) created the first national\u00a0study<\/a>,\u00a0which\u00a0mapped wild bee populations. Their findings, which were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,\u00a0confirm that native pollinators are in major decline in crucial agricultural regions of the U.S.\u00a0They estimate that between 2008 and 2013, wild bee abundance declined in\u00a023 percent of the contiguous U.S.<\/p>\n

\"Wild<\/span><\/a>
Wild bee populations are in serious decline across the U.S. Photo credit: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cIf losses of these crucial pollinators continue, the new nationwide assessment indicates that farmers will face increasing costs\u2014and that the problem may even destabilize the nation\u2019s crop production,\u201d\u00a0the researchers said.<\/p>\n

The study\u00a0found<\/a>\u00a0that\u00a039 percent of U.S. croplands that depend on pollinators\u00a0face a \u201cthreatening mismatch between rising demand for pollination and a falling supply of wild bees.\u201d\u00a0They propose setting aside\u00a07 million acres of land for pollinators over the next five years.<\/p>\n

They identified 139 counties where this\u00a0\u201cmismatch\u201d is most striking.\u00a0These counties included agricultural regions of California such as the Central Valley, Pacific Northwest, upper Midwest and Great Plains, west Texas and the southern Mississippi River valley.\u00a0Crops such as\u00a0pumpkins, watermelons, pears, peaches, plums, apples and blueberries are most at risk because they are most dependent on pollination.<\/p>\n

\"Researchers<\/span><\/a>
Researchers identified 139 counties that are especially at risk for pollinator decline. Photo credit: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cUntil this study, we didn\u2019t have a national mapped picture about the status of wild bees and their impacts on pollination,\u201d Koh, a researcher at\u00a0UVM\u2019s Gund Institute for Ecological Economics<\/a>, said\u2014even though each year more than $3 billion of the U.S. agricultural economy depends on the pollination services of native pollinators like wild bees.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0researchers\u00a0cite \u201cnumerous threats\u201d to wild bees, including pesticide use,\u00a0climate change<\/a>, disease and habitat loss.\u00a0<\/p>\n

They\u00a0also highlight how the conversion of bee habitat into cropland is devastating wild bee\u2019s numbers. The study identified 11 key states, where the amount of land tilled to grow corn spiked by 200 percent in five years\u2014replacing grasslands and pastures that once supported bee populations. \u201cThese results reinforce recent evidence that increased demand for corn in biofuel production has intensified threats to natural habitats in corn-growing regions,\u201d the study noted.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s well known that both wild and commercial\u00a0bee<\/a>\u00a0populations are in serious danger. The U.S. Department of Agriculture\u2019s\u00a0annual\u00a0report<\/a>\u00a0found that the\u00a0U.S. honeybee population plummeted<\/a>\u00a0by more than 40 percent within the last year. A growing body of evidence has linked a class of pesticides\u2014neonicotinoids<\/a>\u2014to\u00a0the massive bee die-offs.<\/p>\n

In May, the White House\u00a0Pollinator Health Task Force\u00a0announced<\/a>\u00a0new steps to promote pollinator health\u00a0and called for a national assessment of wild pollinators and their habitats. While nonprofits, such as Food & Water Watch, lauded the goals of the task force, they criticized Obama\u00a0for failing to take \u201cdangerous pesticides off the market<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s clear that pollinators are in trouble,\u201d said\u00a0Taylor Ricketts, the senior author of the study and director of UVM\u2019s Gund Institute. \u201cBut what\u2019s been less clear is where they are in the most trouble\u2014and where their decline will have the most consequence for farms and food.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWild bees are a precious natural resource we should celebrate and protect,\u201d Ricketts said. \u201cIf managed with care, they can help us continue to produce billions of dollars in agricultural income and a wonderful diversity of nutritious food.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

December 22, 2015 – by Cole Mellino in EcoWatch A team of researchers at the University of Vermont (UVM) created the first national\u00a0study,\u00a0which\u00a0mapped wild bee populations. Their findings, which were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,\u00a0confirm … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4193","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/valleywatch.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4193","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/valleywatch.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/valleywatch.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/valleywatch.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/valleywatch.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4193"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/valleywatch.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4193\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4194,"href":"http:\/\/valleywatch.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4193\/revisions\/4194"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/valleywatch.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/valleywatch.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/valleywatch.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}