Tag: pollinators
Do bees farm microbes? Rethinking what it is to be a bee

Bees have not been eating what we thought they were. The work of Dr Prarthana Dharampal and Dr Shawn Steffan, University of Wisconsin, USA, shows bees are not strict vegetarians requiring just pollen and nectar for food. Larval bee health is also reliant on eating the microbes that are feeding on the pollen supplies. The bee larvae are further up […]
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The bees are back in town: Pollinators in an urban ecosystem

The growing urbanisation of the landscape poses a major threat to insect pollinators. The reduction in number of these insects, especially bee species, could have a severe impact on agricultural production as many of the crops that we rely on could not produce seeds without pollination. Working with the Volusia Sandhill Pollinator Project, Professors Cindy Bennington and Peter May investigate […]
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