{"id":13656,"date":"2022-07-08T09:27:00","date_gmt":"2022-07-08T15:27:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=13656"},"modified":"2022-07-07T13:29:06","modified_gmt":"2022-07-07T19:29:06","slug":"native-bees-need-love-too","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=13656","title":{"rendered":"Native Bees Need Love Too!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Native pollinators as important as honeybees<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Written by Susan Himes<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service expert wants people to better understand and appreciate our native bee pollinators.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


\u201cWhen people see a bee in their garden, many assume it is a honeybee when, odds are, it is actually a native bee,\u201d said Molly Keck, AgriLife Extension integrated pest management specialist and entomologist, San Antonio.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


She said, in the simplest of terms, a native bee is usually any bee except a honeybee since honeybees are not native to the Americas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


And while bees can look very similar or very different from each other, most bees have a \u201cfuzzy\u201d looking body, unlike wasps who are shiny and \u201csmoother\u201d looking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Giving credit where credit is due
<\/em>There are over 200,000 species of pollinators, and about 199,000 of them are insects.
There are over 4,000 species of bees in the U.S., making them the MVP of pollinators. And a bee\u2019s work is never done, considering that 90% of flowering plants require a pollinator.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


Honeybees play a key role in agriculture, but native bees are just as important, Keck said.
\u201cThere are native bee species that are 17 times more efficient as pollinators than honeybees,\u201d she said.
Native bees are also better at pollinating some of the most beloved backyard crops \u2014 including tomatoes, blueberries and pumpkins \u2014 making them the heroes of home gardeners everywhere.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Natives thrive on variety
<\/em>Whereas honeybees prefer blanketed areas of the same food source, such as a field of a single crop, native bees are all about variety.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


The more types of flowers, fruits and vegetables that grow in a garden, the more native bees you can expect to see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


\u201cEssentially, to attract native bees, you want to have many different mini-landscapes inside your yard,\u201d Keck said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Any bee aside from a honeybee is considered a native bee, such as these bumblebees. (Michael Hodgins\/pexels.com photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n


She said to get an example of a native bee\u2019s ideal habitat, picture an English garden with hedgerows, pasture, plants and flowers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


Bees are drawn to flowers because of their scent as well as the shape of their flower. They also are attracted to bright colors, especially blues and violets. Red they see as dark, like brown and black, and isn\u2019t as appealing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


\u201cNative bees feed in \u2018pockets,\u2019 so you don\u2019t need as much space to attract them as honeybees,\u201d Keck said. \u201cYou\u2019ll just need a variety of food sources for them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n


Although bees may have a harder time finding their way to a garden balcony in a large city, a pollinator garden can be a success anywhere. Having gardens in cities also provides a key nutritional resource in what could be a food desert for native bees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


Texans with yards may consider not having turf everywhere, leaving some land uncultivated and allowing some ground to stay bare. Some native bees, like the mason bee, use mud as mortar to build their homes and having mud on the ground when the weather allows is also attractive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


Around 70% of bees nest underground rather than the traditional hives many people envision and that honeybees call home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That might (not) sting
<\/em>Although all female bees can sting, most native females won\u2019t sting unless trapped, hurt or directly threatened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


\u201cNative bees are unlikely to sting you,\u201d Keck said. \u201cHoneybees are more territorial and likely to defend with a sting.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n


In other words, don\u2019t try to catch a native bee and you won\u2019t have too much to worry about. However, if you are allergic to bees, it is smart to avoid all types, as well as wasps and other flying-insect venoms, Keck warned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


A native bee retains its stinger after a strike, whereas a honeybee sting is fatal for the bee. And male bees? Neither honey nor native has any sting at all. However, there are far more female than male bees, so it is safe to assume a bee you see does have a stinger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Extinction concern?
<\/em>Keck said it\u2019s important for every Texan to be aware of the need to protect bee habitats, although there is no threat of extinction in our state quite yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


\u201cI think the amount of undeveloped land we have in Texas is part of the reason our numbers are still good,\u201d she said. \u201cBut as urban areas expand and the sprawl increases, we could start to see the same bee population problems some other areas face.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n


Whereas honeybees have been domesticated or managed for thousands of years, native bees are still independent contractors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


\u201cNative bees do an equally important job as honeybees and for some crops like fruit, native bees are even better pollinators,\u201d Keck said. \u201cTo create an environment for them to thrive is something every Texan can support.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Native pollinators as important as honeybees Written by Susan Himes A Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service expert wants people to better understand and appreciate our native bee pollinators. \u201cWhen people see a bee in their garden, many assume it is a honeybee when, odds are, it is actually a native bee,\u201d said Molly Keck, AgriLife […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13656","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13656"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13656\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13657,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13656\/revisions\/13657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}