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If we give the BUMBLEEBEES a chance, then we get a chance.

Explore this website to find out more about the critical condition of this bee, and the things you can do to help prevent this vital species from fatally disappearing from the face of the earth.

The Rusty Patched Bumble Bee (Bombus affinis) is a bumblebee native to the eastern United States and southeastern Canada. This unique bee is a buzz pollinator, and is a contributor to the pollination of nearly â…“ of the plants that provide our food such as tomatoes and peppers (Colla, 2010). However, in recent years, a 95% decline in the Rusty Patched Bumble Bee leaves it in an utterly dangerous position (Jepson, 2013), and if the Rusty Patched cannot pollinate plants for our food, then people will have to do the work of the pollinators themselves, and food prices will skyrocket. Unfortunately, while this species was declared as critically endangered on the endangered species list in Canada in 2010, the United States has refused to come to terms with the immediate threat these bees are facing, and the consequences that would come from their extinction (Bombus affinis, 2015).

 

              

Luckily, the Xerces Society, a large-scale organization for invertebrate conservation, filed a petition in 2014 to place the Rusty Patched Bumble Bee on the endangered species list (Jepson, 2013). The petition currently sits amongst a pile of other petitioned species on the verge of extinction in the Fish and Wildlife database, with no real action toward an endangered declaration. EVERY SINGLE DAY that goes by without the Rusty Patched Bumble Bee being declared as endangered is another day before a recovery plan is created, and most importantly before conservation measures are put into action. Every single day, the population of this species is RAPIDLY GOING DOWN, and hardly anything can be done until the United States acknowledges this detrimental danger.

how to identify

How to Identify the Rusty-Patched Bumble Bee

 Bumblebee

The Rusty Patched Bumble Bee is on the right as opposed another typical bumble bee species. The Rusty-Patched Bumble Bee workers have a distinctive rusty patch on the front half of their second abdominal segment. The first abdominal segment and the rear half of their second abdominal segment are both yellow. All other abdominal segments are black. (Differences in Honey Bee, 1999)


 

Rusty Patched Bumble Bee
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