Bees

Soya bean and sunflower farming is set to go a notch higher as farmers in Rongai Sub-County, Nakuru County embrace contract farming. During a farmers' field day on Friday, farmers expressed their willingness to start the venture. 10,000 FARMERS The initiative is part of an ongoing campaign by leading cooking…

The commercial honeybee industry wants access to national parks. Credit: Flickr Among the vast number of native species damaged by the recent bushfire crisis, we must not forget native pollinators. These animals, mainly insects such as native bees, help sustain ecosystems by pollinating native plants. Native pollinator populations have been…

This story was originally published by The Guardian and appears here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration Mike Potts was aware he was at risk of being a victim of crime, he just didn’t think it would happen to him. But Potts is an owner of an increasingly valuable…

Credit: CC0 Public Domain Pollinating insects could thrive if improvements are made to agri-environment schemes across Europe, according to a new collaborative study involving scientists from Trinity. More than 20 pollinator experts from 18 different countries looked at a range of wildlife habitats on farmland– named Ecological Focus Areas (EFAs)…

Photograph: Sebastien Nogier/EPAMike Potts was aware he was at risk of being a victim of crime, he just didn’t think it would happen to him. But Potts is an owner of an increasingly valuable commodity that thieves are targeting with growing sophistication in the US: bees.A booming demand for honeybees…

Researchers use a working dictionary of 1,500 dance moves that bees use to communicate with each other to study what pollen sources they like bestScientists in Minnesota studied two bee colonies in reconstructed prairielandThey observed the way bees communicate through a system of dance 'waggles'The bees communicated about pollen location,…

CALL ME A SEED NERD and I won’t mind because yes, I’m obsessed with where seed comes from and specifically how critical it is to support organic seed breeders and farmers with our seed-shopping dollars. I’m also drawn to the stories of particular seeds—and not just old varieties or heirlooms,…

In Brazil there is a plant so strange that researchers predicted -- and 27 years later, proved -- that opossums are key to its pollination. The findings are published in the Ecological Society of America's journal Ecology. The plant Scybalium fungiforme, a little-known fungus-like species of the family Balanophoraceae, has…

A violet-capped Woodnymph hummingbird visits the inflorescence. Credit: Felipe Amorim. In Brazil there is a plant so strange that researchers predicted—and 27 years later, proved—that opossums are key to its pollination. The findings are published in the Ecological Society of America's journal Ecology. The plant Scybalium fungiforme, a little-known fungus-like…

Scientists say that half-a-million insect species face extinctionParis, France: Half of the one million animal and plant species on Earth facing extinction are insects, and their disappearance could be catastrophic for humankind, scientists have said in a "warning to humanity"."The current insect extinction crisis is deeply worrying," said Pedro Cardoso,…