US Puts Bumblebee On the Endangered Species List For First Time (npr.org)

For the first time for a bumblebee and a bee species in the U.S., the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has designated the bumblebee an endangered species. The protected status goes into effect on February 10, and includes requirements for federal protections and the development of a recovery plan. NPR reports: "Today's Endangered Species listing is the best -- and probably last -- hope for the recovery of the rusty patched bumble bee," NRDC Senior Attorney Rebecca Riley said in a statement from the Xerces Society, which advocates for invertebrates. "Bumble bees are dying off, vanishing from our farms, gardens, and parks, where they were once found in great numbers." Large parts of the Eastern and Midwestern United States were once crawling with these bees, Bombus affinis, but the bees have suffered a dramatic decline in the last two decades due to habitat loss and degradation, along with pathogens and pesticides. Indeed, the bee was found in 31 states and Canadian provinces before the mid- to late-1990s, according to the final rule published in the Federal Register. But since 2000, it has been reported in only 13 states and Ontario, Canada. It has seen an 88 percent decline in the number of populations and an 87 percent loss in the amount of territory it inhabits. This means the species is vulnerable to extinction, the rule says, even without further habitat loss or insecticide exposure. Canada designated the species as endangered in 2012.

Comments

This is one type; others have less decline

[Fencepost]

Just to note, this is not all bumblebees, it's the Rusty Patched bumblebee that's been put on the endangered list. Other bumble bees are still around, though most other types have also been declining. The range for this particular type is a rough triangle from the Dakotas down to northern Georgia and up to central Maine.

If you want information including things that you might be able to do take a look at Bumble Bee Watch (http://www.bumblebeewatch.org/) or the Xerces Society page on bumblebees (http://www.xerces.org/bumblebees/). The University of Maine in Farmington has also been tracking the decline of several of the species native to Maine (http://mainebumblebeeatlas.umf.maine.edu/), and other state universities may have similar programs going on.

Re:Roundup backpack=bad ?

[arglebargle_xiv]

It's not the roundup that's doing it, it's neonicotinoid insecticides. If you wanted to specifically design something to genocide bees, neonic insecticides would be about as close to ideal as you could get. So the solution to the problem would be to put neonics on the endangered-species list, and hope they fade out of the environment before the bees do.

Re:Lobbyists

[silentcoder]

That's exactly what DID happen when the EU banned Neonics a year or two ago. Bayer has been on a massive add-campaign ever since to try to get the ban lifted by claiming their pesticides are totally harmless to bees, bees actually like the stuff - they thrive when you spray them with it and think of all the job losses if we our massive multinational company has one less product to sell (which somehow didn't stop them from refusing to sell lethal injection meds to the US) etc. etc. etc.

Eventually they managed to raise enough dust to get the EU Safety Authority to set up a review committee to reconsider the decision. At time of writing the committee's results are not yet in... but I somehow have this idea that a lot of the committee members have been living large of late...

Re:Lobbyists

[Jfetjunky]

This type of thing already did happen once with DDT. It was a bit of fight, but it did happen. People expressed concern about it for ~10 years or so before it was finally banned. It was pretty strongly connected to population decline in many birds.