I definitely don't want to downplay a crisis, but I feel like I've been seeing headlines saying "all the bees are dying and we don't know why" every year for nearly 20 years now.

I'm no bee expert. Just seems to me, based on the headlines, bees would've been extinct 10 years ago.

Some cursory searching led me to Colony Collapse Disorder which seems to have no agreed-upon cause. It appears devastating losses to honey bee colonies started being reported around 1900. But it also mentions:

In 2024, the United States Census of Agriculture reported an all-time high in commercial honey bee hives (mostly in Texas), making them the fastest-growing livestock segment in the country.[38]

Link to the source cited there: https://archive.is/nfeb2

Apparently last year saw the largest honey bee populations in US history. Though they write that huge boom in honey bee population is a threat to other native pollinators, so I guess that presents its own unique problems.

Remember when our biggest fear was killer bees? What a quaint time in our history.

Honey bees are dying but you can help native bees in your area. Find out what they like and plant that shit. Also just letting weeds grow helps a lot of species.

I get leafcutter bees at my place as well as a few other solitary species

I don't like this meme

Actual link for those interested

Most domesticated bee species aren't native to the US. It's quite possible they are just getting bee-ported.

Was it to make room to fit the 690% increase in newborns?

Nowhere in the article does it say we lost 80% of the bee population. You are spreading misinformation

Bees aren't the only arthropods having this problem, but for most of the other non-pollinators people seem to think "good less bugs to bother me. " I guess we should just give up on the survival of the food chain.

The news for insects is not entirely bad, emerald ash borers are finding the ability to survive in areas that were formerly too cold for them. This allows them to kill more trees turning them into kindling for lightning strikes and other fire starting events.

Who could have known that fucking with our habitat might have negative consequences for us?

hello frog, that is sad to hear, have you tried calling doompost?

(how is there no !doompost??)

Not the bees!!!!!

make sure you retract words like bias and gender from your articles and they will come back. they are just extremely bigoted.

Remember that honey-producing bees are terrible pollenators compared to the specific pollenators who don't produce honey. The honey producing bees being kept by everyone are artifically outcompeting the specific pollenators, which are what we really need to be supporting.

Have you tried persecuting all the scientists yet??

The running thought is these non-native European honeybees couldn't find forage at the right times due to climate change and these massive commercial hives died of malnutrition. That's why introduced species and monoculture agriculture don't work out so well.

I'm not a bee, you're not a bee, so it sounds like a them problem.

(On the internet, nobody knows you're a bee.)

Probably the same reason we had 40+ tornadoes, huge hailstorms, floods, and drought-enabled wildfires in six adjacent states within 48 hours. Anthropogenic climate change is real, whether you believe in it or not.

The upside is now farmers won’t have to worry about what to do with the crop surplus from trade wars, dismantled USAID, and defunded school lunch program.

I know it’s likely pesticides, but have we officially ruled out bee assassins?