Comment by filoeleven

3 months ago

European honeybees do not behave the same way as their native solitary counterparts. They gather honey by visiting every flower on a plant, then moving to the next plant. Native bees OTOH visit only one or two flowers per plant. So if imported honeybees outcompete natives (and studies show they do), it very much affects the viability of monoecious plants, which experience a drop in genetic diversity. I don't want to find out the long-term results of that experiment.

I don't think that's a reason to eradicate honeybees in the US or anything like that, but it does point to a misplaced focus on "just" solving colony collapse disorder while ignoring the plight of the native pollinators.

If you don't keep bees, or if you do but have a large enough property, you could put up a bee hotel. They can be bought or constructed pretty easily, and you'll get to see a wide variety of who's around your area!