“Bee” a hero for biodiversity
We need bees. And now bees need us. Please consider supporting our work to save bees and other ecologically important insects.
The Threat to Bees
Insects make the world go ’round. They provide the protein that fuels entire food chains, aid the decomposition process that keeps soil healthy, and pollinate crops and wild flowering plants alike.
We can’t do without them — but they are vanishing.1
Chilling data from a recent study shows declines in insects of up to 80% at over a dozen research sites.2 And some of our best-studied insects, the humble honeybee and its wild cousins, are hit the hardest.
Our bees and the rest of the earth’s bounty of pollinators face a wide range of troubles:
- Neonics, the most widely used type of pesticide in the world, are linked to steep bee declines. Even when they don’t kill, these chemicals damage bees’ cognition and ability to communicate.3
- Last summer, the Trump administration lifted a pesticide ban that will now allow spraying in some wildlife refuges, where bees ought to be able to count on being safe.4
- The area around the now-diminished Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument is a pollinator diversity hotspot — but 84 species, including some new to science, are now found only outside the protected border of the monument.5
How You Can Help
We’re working to ban harmful pesticides and keep critical habitat safe for bees — but we depend on support from members like you to make it all possible.
You’ve been a part of our answer to every one of these problems: Our members have submitted tens of thousands of public comments to urge bans of the most harmful pesticides, keep wildlife refuges safe for bees, and speak out against the reduction of the public lands that provide so much irreplaceable habitat.
Our voices, raised together, can have a powerful impact for bees. But to keep our work going, we need your support.
1. Brooke Jarvis, “The insect apocalypse is here,” The New York Times, November 27, 2018.
2. Gretchen Vogel, “Where have all the insects gone?” Science, May 10, 2017.
3. Jennifer Hopwood, et al., “How Neonicotinoids Can Kill Bees: The Science Behind The Role These Insecticides Play in Harming Bees,” Xerces Society For Invertebrate Conservation, 2016.
4. Tom Barnes, “Trump Administration Reverses Ban On Bee-harming Pesticides In Wildlife Refuges,” The Independent, August 5, 2018.
5. Josh Gabbatiss, “Trump’s plan to shrink national park could drive dozens of unique bees to extinction, study suggests,” The Independent, December 4, 2018.