Great effort to dramatize in your graphic presentation of the article "Climate Change: It's a buzzkill for Bumblebees, Study Finds". Congratulations! But the climate reality, and the real possibility of bees dying, then crops failing, then people starving to death, etc., is plenty dramatic already. Your headline reference to "climate change" is antiquated; your article is really all about an urgent climate emergency, or a climate crisis, or at least the making of a climate crisis! Your front page is the appropriate place for headline news of this magnitude.

European honeybees compete for resources with native bumblebees and as honey production expands to meet the ever growing demand for honey, the number of European honeybees combing the landscape and working for human beings continually expands, and the bumblebee gets less and less. Add global warming and insecticides and you have a recipe for extinction. Then we’ll be depending entirely on the maladapted, inbred and diseased honeybee for all bee pollinating.

The planet has seen cataclysm countless numbers of time over the course of the few billion circling's of its fusion bonfire. According to the archaeological record it has come in any number of fashions. Fire and Ice seem the favored mode. This time 'round, though, it appears humanity is the big asteroid hitting the planets complex web of life. We are destroying everything we impact. But there's an aspect few think about with this sort of metaphor. Such asteroid events, while cataclysmic in its impact, also obliterates the causal agent in the process. I fear the same will hold true this time. Nature never exactly repeats, but boy she sure likes to rhyme. Ultimately the counterpoint to this little ecological ditty involving the severe reduction and hammering of the web of life may, probably will, be the reduction in our species, too. So it goes. John~ American Net'Zen

Trump will be happy.

Our habits create multiple threats to the other species we share the place with. Diversity of species is declining everywhere as we change landscapes, add toxic chemicals and endocrine mimics, shift the climate and raise sea levels. Another recent study found it's not just the bumblebees - "Far fewer bee species are buzzing across Earth today, following a steep decline in bee diversity during the last three decades, according to an analysis of bee collections and observations going back a century. " https://www.sciencenews.org/article/collectors-find-plenty-bees-fewer-species-than-1950s The best approaches to helping them survive is to change our farming methods to restore diverse habitat and plant life in monocropped areas, reduce chemical use, and get off of the fossil fuels. A more dangerous approach to helping them fight things like pathogens is in the following article - engineering a gut microbe in honeybees to release RNA that harms parasitic mites and weakens viruses. We want to be extremely careful before putting tools like that to use in the wild. https://www.sciencenews.org/article/engineered-honeybee-gut-bacteria-trick-attackers-self-destructing

Why are these pesticides even legal at this point? I hate how irresponsible we are in our quest to save a dollar now at the expense of tomorrow. This is why I'm voting for Bernie. Not because of his MFA stance (though I approve of that), rather because I trust him to put someone with our collective interests in charge of the EPA.

I love standing under our weeping Japanese cherry trees listening to the buzz of these wonderful creatures. Agreed that weed killers on lawn, ant and tick killers on lawns etc all are digested by worms and those worms eaten by birds and up the chain. We all need to think. Scott's lawn care should be thinking of safe ways to promote the ever-desirable suburban green lush lawn. Thank you for the article.

Climate change? In the millions of years the bees family has been around they have seen climate change, and they survived. but Monsanto, Roundup and the rest of the chemicals people use to make sure they have green grass with no bugs, that is new. And that they cannot survive. Enjoy your green grass, that is all that you will have at the end. Hope you can eat it as there will be no food left to eat without bees and bumblebees.

I live in Florida and have a nest of wild honeybees that moved in near my patio. I have thousands of flowering plants; their main food. Almost every house in the neighborhood sprays poison over their grass(grass is a desert for most insects). We need the bees to pollinate. People want to kill every insect; seeing them as the enemy. The poison they spray gets washed into our water supply. The Bees die; we may be next. Ray Sipe

Psychologists say that crisis instigates change. When will we wake up to our climate crisis? Is the plight of the bumble bee the tipping point? Or will we by like the proverbial frog in the beaker of water being heated by a bunsen burner beneath it that keeps adjusting to the increasingly hotter water until it's too late.

I guess it begs the question, what's the effect on the bumblebee population from the European Honeybee?

Interesting, but short and shallow article. For example; “We can go to these bright spots where things are going well, and we can see what it is about those regions and those areas that’s allowing species to persist under climate change,” Mr. Soroye said. He added that researchers could take lessons from those spots and potentially apply them to other areas to help mitigate or possibly even reverse the declines seen. Why not share some details on the lessons learned. There are a lot of people out there who would take some action to help the bees if they knew exactly what to do.

Thank you for this extremely informative article and beautiful graphics. I had no clue of the different types of bumblebees nor how their population is depleting due to global warming. These little cutie pies look like gerbils with wings. Fortunately, there are so many flowering perennials in our back yard, we see a lot of bumblebees every summer. Sometimes I see them lined up on the rim of the birdbath, waiting for their turn to drink water.

“They are the ghosts from the childhoods of baby boomers in Europe and North America.” Wow, what a powerful and heartbreaking statement to end the piece. Gen-Xers, at least this one in Southern California, experienced bumble bees as well throughout the 1970s. I saw them buzzing by often as a child playing outside with friends. We always marveled at their fat, fuzzy, and slow-moving appearances and knew they didn’t sting like honeybees. We’d freak at the first sound of loud buzzing but then someone in our group would say, “It’s okay, it’s only a bumble bee!” to our collective relief and fascination. Now, I see them only occasionally here and it makes me very sad.

I thought Rachel Carson's Silent Spring had put paid to dangerous chemicals being used as pesticides. Apparently not. It sometimes seems that animals humans either like or are useful to us (or both) are the ones that are hit hardest by various causes. Meanwhile wasps, ticks, and cockroaches do well.

“They are the ghosts from the childhoods of baby boomers in Europe and North America.” Wow, what a powerful and heartbreaking statement to end the piece. Gen-Xers, at least this one in Southern California, experienced bumble bees as well throughout the 1970s. I saw them buzzing by often as a child playing outside with friends. We always marveled at their fat, fuzzy, and slow-moving appearances and knew they didn’t sting like honeybees. We’d freak at the first sound of loud buzzing but then someone in our group would say, “It’s okay, it’s only a bumble bee!” to our collective relief and fascination. Now, I see them only occasionally here and it makes me very sad.

Thank you for the article. I have a garden where these bumblebees are thriving. I replaced a manicured lawn with fruit trees, flowers, grasses and vegetables some years ago. For the past 5 years I have had bumble bees nesting in hidden protected spots in my garden. They are thriving along with many other kinds of insects and birds and animal life. I provide fresh water daily and there is ample pollen for them throughout the year. This morning I saw a large queen flying low, looking for a good spot to nest.

Good story, but the headline appears dismissive of the calamitous implications of bee extinction, which include collapse of the very ecosystems that keep US alive.

We have our own impending bumblebee disaster right here in NYC. Manhattan's East River Park is home to a thriving population of Bombus fervidus, the Golden Northern Bumble Bee-- critically imperiled in NY state. They will be destroyed when the city bulldozes and elevates the park in the name of coastal resilience, and the city declines mitigation.

I live in a suburban area that is heavily wooded. My neighbors all have children and love their lawns. They all subscribe to companies that spray their lawns to kill mosquitoes. My wife and I notice (1) a decline in birds and (2) a decline in all kinds of pollinating insects, including bees and butterflies--not to mention mosquitoes. Yet this article fails to address this subject and the web seems full of misinformation. Will the Times assign a reporter to explain or investigate the relationship between the use of pesticides and the downturn in insect populations? Please!

when the bees go, we go, and that is good for the planet

Each day, Trump and his Republicans act to make our planet less & less inhabitable for our children and grandchildren around the world. The window of opportunity to effectively mitigate Climate Change is rapidly disappearing. The remaining 2020 Democratic Candidates will try to cut & paste portions of Governor Jay Inslee’s comprehensive & actionable Climate Change Mitigation Plan. We must go with the Real Deal. Just wringing our hands won’t get the job done. The winning Democratic Party 2020 Ticket: President Warren (build a green economy) + Vice President Inslee (save a blue planet)! W+IN 2020! +++++++++++++++ FYI: Here’s an excellent article by David Roberts of Vox which explains Governor Inslee’s Climate Change Mitigation Plan: https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2019/7/30/20731958/jay-inslee-for-president-climate-change-justice-plan-green-new-deal

The rate at which pesticides and herbicides are killing off insects and birds is alarming, and they're doing it even faster than climate change. I highly recommend reading Lee Fang’s excellent article recently published in the Intercept entitled “The Playbook for Poisoning the Earth.” The in depth article explores the link between neonicotinoids with bee die-offs and the how behind the scenes political factors and chemical companies like Bayer, Syngenta, and Monsanto have engaged in a disinformation and funding campaign in order to keep these devastating products on the market. The author explores how "Studies have tied neonics to the disappearance of native bees, butterflies, mayflies, dragonflies, amphipods, and a range or waterborne insects, as well as earthworms and other insect invertebrates. Several species of bumblebees in the U.S. and Europe are approaching extinction, a die-off researchers say is tied to the use of neonics and other pesticides.” This is an emergency, not only for bees and other insects but for humans. At this rate, where will things stand in five or ten years? We need to get the public much more aware about the harm these chemicals are doing because it's not just sad; it's a major crisis that threatens our very existence.

Thanks for a great article and graphics.. I wish there was a way to "send" or print this article to a neighbor who is a beekeeper but not technically/internet savvy. His bees dine on our blueberries each year.

Can they move North? In the past two months, I have had very sick honeybees swarming at night to my backdoor porch light. They can't move North. I live next door to a golf course so it is probably the pesticides and herbicides they use. Still, in my 50 years in Hawaii, I have experienced climate change first hand.

We have a small working farm here in South Jersey. I am amazed at the work of these insects in the garden and appreciate not only their work ethic but their company when I am out there in the field. Keep a couple of things in mind. Many things pollinate in nature. Any insect that travels from one plant to another is a pollinator. That includes “bad” guys such as mosquitoes. Think big picture here and keep all of our insect friends in mind if you have a garden or yard. Sometimes targeting one species can have an effect on another one with unintended consequences. Finally, as I have written in reply to other posts, suburbia needs to be included in this conversation. I know other posters have talked about this but it is usually the use of neonicotinoids by farmers that get the finger pointed at. Homeowners and the unbelievable worship of green lawns is doing its share of damage too. While we all like to point out the different flowers that attract these insects, no one ever talks about where they go when they are not out pollinating. Some burrow in the ground. Some live in wood cavities. This needs to be called to attention as well.

There is so much wrong in the world, but we can all do something to help bees: plants wildflowers instead of monoculture lawns. It's not a solution to climate change, but it's something individuals can do. I've turned my lawn into a wildflower patch, though I have to say my neighbors in a tony suburb complained that I was bringing down property values -- with bee balm, clover, and lupines. The point is that lawns, golf courses, and rolls of grass that cover areas once flowered are just as problematic as industrial agriculture, but we think of these things as normal. Fight back!

Scientists at unidentified industrial laboratories are already hard at work on robot bumblebees. They will be controlled by chips embedded in the trees and other larger plants to be pollinated, which will send out signals to guide the robots in and out at appropriate seasonal times. The robot's tiny engine will make the kind of buzzing sound so many of us have come to appreciate. Admittedly, the current prototype is not as visually appealing as the natural models, but it is expected that with further development pleasing aesthetic refinements can be made. And here is the best part: the robot bees are designed to run on the atmospheric emanations of pesticides. So the tree to be pollinated will also serve as an efficient onsite refueling facility.

If you live in Florida, tell your neighbor to tell their "lawn care"/pest control company to stop regularly applying pesticide. Millions of homes and homeowners have a monthly service that applies pesticides indiscriminately. This practice and industry should be regulated much more tightly. The pollinators of all varieties, and the birds and bats are much more important than a "perfect" green lawn.

Recently I saw a bumblebee gathering nectar from seaside daisies, one of the earliest native wildflowers to bloom along our coast, and I’ve been thinking about how much my daughter loved bees. When she was young, bumblebees often landed on her. Maybe they liked her warmth. She’d carefully make a small nest out of her hand and walk the length of the beach talking about the bee and to the bee. The bumblebees were so big that they’d fill her entire hand. She’d gently pet the thick black & yellow fur and hold the bee close to her eyes to study. My heart could have broken for joy at the sight of that small child loving that small creature. Sometimes people would stop me on the beach and reprimand me for letting my child hold a bee, which always made me laugh a little. In a world of fast cars and guns, why would bees frighten me. Anyway we’re not allergic to them. My daughter, I would tell them instead, was so gentle that the bees did not seem to feel threatened. They never stung her. Usually I’d have to tell my daughter that we couldn’t take the bees to our home; we had to leave them in theirs. That was ten years ago, and my daughter has learned (though not from me) to be less comfortable around bees. But I still like to remember those days when we walked down the beach together, my little marvel holding that other little marvel in the palm of her hand. A world without bees would be a world without magic.

Okay, I am visually impaired so maybe I missed something, but I didn't see mentioned anywhere in this article information on the effect of pesticides on bees. Can a study that does not mention other such factors as pesticides be really accurate? The problem is not only climate change, and to find real workable solutions to the bees' problems, scientists will have to include other dangers to bees as well in their conclusions.

We need leaders in every area of society to step up and make the climate crisis a priority. We need action, we need education, it must be the number one issue and there is no time to waste. If you have land, plant a garden, grow plants for bumblebees and butterflies, don't use pesticides. Every one of us needs to help.

I used to see bumble bees at my house in the early 90s. I haven’t seen one in about 10 years come to think about it...

Regarding loss of biodiversity, we have overhunting and fishing, habitat loss, pollution and now global warming. None of these happen in a vacuum but there are synergies among them which make the whole vastly greater than the sum of the parts. The paleoclimate record indicates that disruptions in long term carbon cycles roughly coincided with several mass extinctions. The worst, the end-Permian event, turned Earth into basically a lifeless rock for millions of years. The climate change we’ve made so far is small compared to natural variability (+5 degrees C coming out of glaciations) but we could make change as big as any natural change and a whole lot faster. And we’re pushing the system in multiple ways.

Plant flowering plants with pink blossoms - bumblebees prefer them over other colors. We can all do our part to help them.

"...Their tongue length (they can come in short, medium or long) and rapidly vibrating wings, which give bumblebees their characteristic buzzing sound, make them better than honeybees at pollinating certain plants, like sweet peppers and tomatoes, that are native to the Americas." Tomatoes originated from China...

Over the past several months the Times has done superb reporting on various declines in populations of native animals and plants. I find the "series" of articles fascinating in that one article seems to stand alone rather than join other articles in a true series. These articles seem to leave larger conclusions and the linking of individual stories in the hands of readers. I admire that approach that I'm also imagining is a conscious editorial decision by the Times. That seems a strategy for the Times to avoid being labelled as taking a doctrinaire "environmental" orientation or being seen as an advocate for the environment. However, these articles individually and as a group are either correct in their analysis of environmental degradation or they are not. If they are correct and the Times stands behind the accuracy of these stories, I believe the New York Times should continually bring this information to bear on the Trump administration. Trump was impeached for abuse of power and obstruction of justice. I believe readers should be reminded at the same time and the link made at every opportunity between Trump's climate change denial and such realities as the impending extinction of bumblebees. Mr Trump who calls adversaries names with a lack of respect and imagination personifies environmental destruction. He should be called on the carpet at every turn for his dereliction of duty to protect the living beings of this country and this planet.

Wonderful graphics and photos, and so great to see these researchers' meticulous work featured in the Times. I am sure these same researchers would be quick to emphasize that numerous factors are responsible for bee declines, and of insect declines generally. The emphasis on climate change may lead some readers to conclude only action on emissions, but even as the world warms its possible to help native insects right in our own yards, parks, and conservation areas. For New England, here's a good resource listing which specific flower species to plant in our gardens, plus other habitat improvements, to help native bees https://umaine.edu/mafes/wp-content/uploads/sites/98/2018/07/Bees-and-Their-Habitats-in-Four-New-England-States.pdf. More generally, the Xerxes Society is a conservation organization offering a lot of good info on pollinator conservation.

Kendra and Nadja, Thank you for this important article. I agree with the last sentence: "They are the ghosts from the childhoods of baby boomers in Europe and North America." I remember them buzzing by when I played outside, and later when I took nature hikes in wild places. Bumblebees are amazing creatures. I hope their decline reverses.