Bees Content

Protecting Bees During Disasters

Cody Kitaura — July 15, 2025 - 2:40pm

Patrick Hardy, a master beekeeper in the ɫ��APP��-based California Master Beekeeper Program, or CAMPB, designed and implemented the world’s first, and so far, only honeybee disaster response team. His creation, a nonprofit called Bee Platoon, is designed to protect honeybees and help beekeepers during natural disasters.

“We help small hobbyist beekeepers evacuate their bees, recover beehives after disasters and help first responders move the swarms,” Hardy said. “Those are the three major planks of what we do.”

What Makes Queen Bees So Smart?

Andy Fell — November 07, 2024 - 2:22pm

A bumblebee’s brain is smaller than a sesame seed. But it can still accomplish quite a bit.

“You don’t need a big brain to learn well,” said Felicity Muth, an assistant professor in the Department of Neurobiology, Physiology and Behavior and a National Geographic Explorer who studies cognition in bees and other animals. “Bumblebees are capable of many of the same cognitive feats as many vertebrates.”

Climate Change Is Ratcheting Up the Pressure on Bees

Katherine E Kerlin — October 14, 2022 - 2:43pm

Extreme weather like drought, heat and storms also affects wild and native bees, says Jennie L. Durant in this essay for The Conversation.

Pesticides Can Affect Multiple Generations of Bees

Amy M Quinton — November 29, 2021 - 11:52am

A ɫ��APP�� study finds that pesticides not only directly affect bee health, but effects from past exposure can carry over to future generations.

Genome Sequencing Shows Climate Barrier to Spread of Africanized Bees

Andy Fell — October 21, 2020 - 10:20am

Since the 1950s, “Africanized” honeybees have spread north and south across the Americas until apparently coming to a halt in California and northern Argentina. Now genome sequencing of hundreds of bees from the northern and southern limits shows a gradual decline in African ancestry across hundreds of miles, rather than an abrupt shift.

Pesticides and Food Scarcity Dramatically Reduce Wild Bee Population

Amy M Quinton — October 06, 2020 - 9:30am

The loss of flowering plants and the widespread use of pesticides could be a double punch to wild bee populations. In a new study, researchers at the University of California, Davis, found that the combined threats reduced blue orchard bee reproduction by 57 percent and resulted in fewer female offspring. The study was published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

THE DOWNLOAD: Steam Appears, Art Surprises, Bees Disappear

Cody Kitaura — February 07, 2017 - 9:00am

Most campus buildings are heated with steam pumped through a network of underground pipes. Overnight Thursday (Feb. 2), water flooded several of the underground vaults that house steam lines and other equipment needed to circulate it throughout campus. In this case, the flooding caused electrical shorts that temporarily disabled the pumps used to clear standing water from of the vaults. The mixture of cold rainwater and steaming hot pipes, led to steam escaping from a number of grates around campus.

Entomologists, Engineers Work Together to Weigh a Bee

Andy Fell — July 06, 2016 - 4:48pm

How to weigh an individual bee is the problem that brought together insect specialists at UC Davis and two teams of ɫ��APP�� engineering students this year. By understanding everything they can about a bumblebee colony, researchers hope to understand how California’s native bumblebees respond to changes in the environment and the availability of flowers, and how we can protect these insects that are so vital to both agriculture and wild plants.

Wild bees decline where crop pollination most needed, study finds

IET WebDev — December 21, 2015 - 12:00am

Wild bee populations have declined significantly since 2008 in Central California and some other key areas of the United States, according to a newly published study co-authored by ɫ��APP�� researchers.

The new study suggests that wild bee populations likely declined in areas comprising 23 percent of the nation between 2008 and 2013, a decline associated with conversion of natural wild bee habitat into intensive agriculture.

4 Animal Studies for the Wild and Endangered

Robyn Frances Huey — February 12, 2015 - 8:00am

Frustrated elephants, human-hippo conflict, endangered killer whales, climate change for bees. These are the topics that draw people to ɫ��APP�� graduate school.