<
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/apr/02/the-secret-to-finding-endangered-rusty-patched-bumblebees-us-dogs>
"On a summer day in Somers, Wisconsin, Dave Giordano heard an unexpected
buzzing in his back yard. What he found shocked him – a rusty patched bumblebee
nest. The discovery was so rare it made the local news.
Once widespread across the midwest and eastern US, the rusty patched bumblebee
has seen its population plunge by nearly 90%, prompting its listing in 2017 as
the first federally endangered bumblebee in the US.
Each spring, a solitary rusty patched bumblebee queen emerges from hibernation
and starts a colony – often in an abandoned rodent burrow. She raises workers
through summer, then shifts to producing males and new queens, or ‘gynes’.
After mating, the gynes burrow into the soil to overwinter, while the rest of
the colony dies off.
Since the species was listed, only a dozen nests have been documented – leaving
big gaps in understanding, says Jay Watson, a conservation biologist with the
Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. Most bee conservation work has been
focused on planting flowers, but nesting habitat is just as important, adds Amy
Toth, an entomologist at Iowa State University. “If they don’t find a good
location to nest, the entire colony can fail.”
Finding those nests has proved exceptionally difficult, however. Scientists are
spending a significant amount of time searching, and not finding any, says
Watson. To improve their odds, researchers have turned to conservation
detection dogs."
Via
Reasons to be Cheerful:
<
https://reasonstobecheerful.world/what-were-reading-forest-therapy-wildfire-survivors/>
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
