The purpose of this listserve is to disseminate information and foster discussions regarding the inventory and monitoring of bees as well as their identification.
List of North American Introduced & Alien Bee Species
Now Available - List of North American (North of Mexico) Introduced and Alien Bee Species (July 2008)!
Compiled by Sam Droege (USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center) from information drawn from literature, consultations with active collectors, online collection data available via the Global Mapper on http://www.discoverlife.org/, and John Ascher's compilation of distributional data. With special thanks for contributions from Mike Arduser, John Ascher, Rob Jean, Jack Neff, and Robbin Thorp.
National Academy of Sciences released a Report on the Status of Pollinators in North America on October 18, 2006. The report provides an analysis of the status of managed and unmanaged pollinator populations in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. It can be purchased from the National Academies Press web site. Free PDF copies of the Report in Brief or the Executive Summary are also available for download from the web.
Quote: "For most North American pollinator species, long-term population data are lacking and knowledge of their basic ecology is incomplete."
Call for Research Proposals Related to Honey Bee Health
National Pollinator Week is your chance to listen to a series of podcasts and learn more about the essential birds, bees, bats, and even beetles that pollinate your food and flowering plants, and make our wild areas beautiful and healthy.
From native bees in urban areas to climate change and pollinators, endangered pollinators and plants, and how to make your landscape more pollinator-friendly, these podcasts will give you the inside buzz on North America's pollinators.
Monday, June 23. The Pollinator Partnership: Bringing Together Pollinators and People. Discusses an overview of pollinator issues, The Pollinator Partnership and Pollinator Week events, gardening guides for pollinators, educational curriculum and free posters and pollinator wheels.
Tuesday, June 24. Endangered Butterflies and Plants. Discusses imperiled butterflies and plants as well as some of the challenges facing their recovery.
Thursday, June 26. Busy Bees in the Beltway: Native Bees and Cities. Focuses on specific studies of native bees in Capital-area national parks and reveals how natural areas in even urban environments contribute to the conservation of native bees.
The latest edition (June, 2008) of "The Very Handy Manual: How to Catch and Identify Bees and Manage a Collection" is now available!
Compiled mainly by Sam Droege at the USGS Native Bee Inventory and Monitoring Lab with input from specialist researchers and taxonomists over several years from 2004-2008, this guide provides detailed instructions on bee monitoring techniques including specimen collection, processing and management; bee identification; and more!
Together with specialists around the world, the Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS), a partner of the NBII, has completed a checklist of the 19,436 named bee species of the world. The entire checklist (with some synonyms and subspecies) is fully integrated into the ITIS database and can be accessed online at http://www.itis.gov/beechecklist.html.
"The bee checklist acts as a taxonomic 'Rosetta Stone' that will enhance communication, information exchange and data repatriation about bees. The completed checklist is a first step in modeling and forecasting future population trends," Mike Ruggiero, ITIS.
Haagen-Dazs(R)' new HelpTheHoneyBees web site provides a fun, colorful and informative explanation and exploration of the importance of honey bees as pollinators and the importance of their pollination services to the Haagen-Dazs(R) product range.
"Bee pollination is essential for ingredients in nearly 40 percent"of Haagen-Dazs(R) super-premium ice cream flavors. The web site also includes a "bee store" with bee-friendly merchandise. Profits from the"bee store" go towards funding honey bee research. Bravo Haagen-Dazs(R)!
The NBII Program is administered by the Biological Informatics Office of the U.S. Geological Survey
