Bee #GratefulFor Pollinators!
By: Usfws Columbia Pacific Northwest Region
Tags: Thanksgiving, Gratefulfor, Pollinators, Conservation, Wildlife

Photo: Did you know pollinators are responsible for more than 75% of what we eat? Coffee, chocolate, and pretty much all of the ingredients needed for pumpkin pie rely on pollinators so show them some love today!

When most people think about pollinators, they imagine graceful butterflies, or a busy and buzzy honey bee, pollinating crops and flowers to bring the pollen back to their hives and create honey. But pollinators include more than honey bees, as there are all different types of bees, bats, birds, and bugs that specialize in pollinating the plants native to their homes or ecosystems. In fact, some native plants and pollinators have a co-dependent relationship — meaning that one cannot exist without the other!

For example, birds like the i’iwi have long, curved beaks, perfect for drinking the nectar from flowers in places like Hakalau Forest National Wildlife Refuge in Hawaii. As they move from flower to flower, they pollinate the plants.

Photo: I’iwi or scarlet Hawaiian honeycreeper. Photo credit: Megan Nagel/USFWS

Pollinators not only keep plants healthy and growing, but they are also indicators of healthy habitats because they are so sensitive to threats like the changing climate, habitat loss, environmental toxins, and invasive species. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service works to ensure the future of fish, wildlife and their habitat and the National Wildlife Refuge System creates refuges dedicated to their conservation.

“Refuges are important for pollinators because they protect relatively undisturbed, natural habitats that provide the critical resources, such as food, nesting and overwintering sites required by pollinators, said Regional Refuge Biologist Joe Engler. “Pollination is critical for the existence of healthy plant populations which in turn provide the fruits and seeds eaten by the many species of wildlife that refuges were established to protect. The pollinators themselves, both adults and larvae, are also a food source for wildlife.”

Because pollinators play an important role in keeping refuges healthy, and are facing so many threats, refuge biologists in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Pacific Region with the assistance of the USGS Native Bee Inventory and Monitoring Lab, and the USDA ARS Bee Biology & Systematics Laboratory are studying bees on refuges in Idaho, Oregon and Washington.

Photo: Bombus nevadensis on Steens Mountain thistle. Photo credit: USFWS

This study currently focuses on conducting inventories of the primary bee species on 11 national wildlife refuges in the Pacific Northwest. With over 800 species of bees occurring in this region, once completed, this study will tell what types of bees are living on the refuges, what types of habitats they prefer, and provide important data and specimens for research and educational purposes. This study is leading the way for the Service to better understand the role that pollinators play in keeping refuges healthy, but also how refuges support bee populations. The information that results from this study will help refuge managers improve bee habitat and populations as needed.

“Because different types of bees have different requirements for their food, nesting and overwintering sites, each refuge plays a unique role in supporting the wide diversity of bees found in the Pacific Northwest,” said Engler.

Photo: Bombus vosnesenskii or calignosus on checkermallow. Photo credit: USFWS

Studies like this are vital as there is growing evidence that pollinators are in decline world-wide. In the United States, four species of bumble bees are known to be in decline and considered vulnerable to extinction. This includes the western bumble bee (Bombus occidentalis), which was once considered to be one of the most abundant bumble bees in the Western United States, and Franklin’s bumble bee (Bombus franklini), a species restricted to southern Oregon and northern California which hasn’t been found since 2006. Within Idaho, Oregon, and Washington, the Xerces Society’s Red List of at-risk to endangered pollinators includes five species of butterflies and 19 species of bees; the Xerces Society is an organization of national and international scope dedicated to the conservation of invertebrates. In Hawaii, one butterfly and 26 bees are considered at-risk, including the Blackburn’s sphinx moth which is federally listed as endangered in Hawaii.

Photo: Arctic skipper on Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge. Photo credit: USFWS

Bees and other pollinators, through their pollination activities, are critical for the production of over 100 food crops world-wide, and over 75% of all plant species depend on them for pollination.

“For a relatively unknown and often maligned group of insects, it is sobering to think that almost all life on this planet, including humans, depends on these industrious creatures,” said Engler. “They are intricately involved in helping weave and maintain the foundation of human existence as we know it.”

Learn more about pollinators and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service by clicking here.