From PennEnvironment (http://www.pennenvironment.org):
Imagine a summer’s day, where a warm breeze gently blows through a field of wildflowers. Can you hear the quiet hum of bees flitting from flower to flower?
Now imagine a world without bees. Would those flowers still be there? What about the nearby trees and bushes, whose flowers rely on bees for pollination?
Our world wouldn’t be the same without bees, but their numbers have been dropping across the planet.
We’re working to protect them: Join us in calling on the U.S. House to support legislation that would protect our best pollinators at https://pennenvironment.webaction.org/p/dia/action4/common/public/?action_KEY=51560.
Bees play a central role in the ecosystems in which they live — and their decline is threatening everything that relies on them.
Of the world’s flowering plants, more than 9 in 10 require an animal for pollination. And of the animal pollinators, bees are some of the best.1
Bees pollinate many of the food crops we rely on: apples, cranberries, melons, almonds and broccoli, just to name a few. Some fruits, like blueberries and cherries, are overwhelmingly dependent on bees for pollination.2
So when the bees disappear, the plants that need them struggle to reproduce — and struggle to survive.
That’s bad news for humans, who rely on these plants for food. But it’s also bad news for every other plant and animal in the ecosystem that relies on these plants to survive.
We’re already seeing the impact of bee die-offs — and for some species, the rate of decline has been severe.
Two decades ago, the American bumblebee would have been found across North America. Now, it’s slipping further and further toward extinction.
Over the last 20 years, this bee’s population has declined by nearly 90%. This bee has disappeared entirely from eight states across the country, from New England to the Mountain West.3
In other states where it’s persisted, its numbers have dropped precipitously — more than half of the bees’ numbers have disappeared from states in the Midwest and Southeast, and in New York, their numbers have dropped by a whopping 99%.4
These bumblebees are crucial pollinators for both wildflowers and crops — but in the places where they’re disappearing, those plants are going unpollinated or underpollinated.5
The time to protect bees — and everything that relies on them — is now.
That’s why we’re calling on Congress to pass the Saving America’s Pollinators Act, which would empower the Environmental Protection Agency to more effectively shield bees from some of the worst pesticides behind their decline.6
You can help protect our best pollinators. Tell Congress: Pass the Saving America’s Pollinators Act today.
1. “Save the Bees,” Environment America, last accessed June 27, 2022.
2. “Helping Agriculture’s Helpful Honey Bees,” U.S. Food and Drug Administration, July 30, 2018.
3. Elizabeth Gamillo, “The American Bumblebee Has Nearly Vanished From Eight States,” Smithsonian Magazine, October 6, 2021.
4. Elizabeth Gamillo, “The American Bumblebee Has Nearly Vanished From Eight States,” Smithsonian Magazine, October 6, 2021.
5. Kelly Rourke, “The American Bumble Bee (Bombus pensylvanicus),” U.S. Forest Service, last accessed June 27, 2022.
6. “H.R.1337 – Saving America’s Pollinators Act of 2019,” Congress.gov, last accessed June 27, 2022.
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