In the United States, there are over 3,600 species of wild, native bees! With our new State of the Bees Initiative, the Xerces Society aims to protect this incredible diversity of wildlife by completing an extinction risk assessment for each and every species!

Meet the wonderful wild bees

The United States’ native bees come in all different shapes, sizes and colors. Most of these species are solitary, in contrast to our native bumble bee species and the non-native European honey bee, which live in colonies with a caste system. Some bees are dietary generalists, collecting the pollen they feed to their offspring from many different plants. Many species are dietary specialists, and have evolved specialized relationships with plants over thousands of years, collecting pollen only from a restricted subset of plants — sometimes from just one plant species! 

Whether bees are generalists or specialists, they are all very effective pollinators, making them critical to a functioning ecosystem. Plant communities across wild and urban environments rely on pollination by wild bees to survive and reproduce. Many species of bees contribute to human agriculture through crop pollination as well — and in some cases, actually outperform honey bees. 

Not only are these wild bee species important for ecosystem stability - this diverse group of animals also lives fascinating lives. Some bees, like the common loosestrife oil bee (Macropis nuda), which is in decline in many parts of its range, collect floral oils instead of nectar to feed their young. Other bees, such as the bumble-bee-mimic digger bee (Anthophora bomboides), nest in aggregations, and build little mud turrets around their nest entrances to deter parasites. Although most bees forage during daylight hours, some bees, like the Texas nocturnal sweat bee (Lasioglossum texanum), which specializes on the pollen from the night-blooming evening primroses, have developed the ability to forage at night. Bees are as vast and varied as the landscapes they inhabit. 

Answering key conservation questions with the State of the Bees Initiative

Despite increasing evidence that wild bees are declining globally at unprecedented rates, the conservation statuses of the vast majority of wild bee species in the U.S. have not yet been determined. To date, only the bumble bees, and a few other groups of bees have undergone any extinction risk assessment. A conservation or extinction risk assessment is a scientific report that identifies species that are likely to become extinct without any conservation interventions. The assessment takes into account a species’ life cycle, diet, habitat requirements, population size, distribution, and how different factors put them in danger. 

Our limited understanding of bee conservation statuses greatly hinders our ability to protect them and address their threats. These assessments contribute to our ability to seek legal protections for a species, such as listing under the Endangered Species Act. We need a collective understanding of which bees are most imperiled and which ones are secure in order to effectively prioritize conservation, restoration, and habitat management, and to evaluate how successful restoration efforts are at helping imperiled bees.

Xerces is committed to conserving the diversity of wild bees in the U.S. through the State of the Bees Initiative. This program aims to advance our understanding of wild bee distributions, life histories and extinction risk, identify and address specific threats to imperiled species, and develop habitat management guidance for those bees. The State of the Bees Initiative is a multi-year undertaking, already underway in collaboration with research institutions and four state wildlife agencies from across the United States.

We are using a similar approach to that which we have applied to other insect conservation efforts, such as our Bumble Bee Conservation Program. About a decade ago, Xerces (led by senior conservation biologist Rich Hatfield) worked with other bee researchers to evaluate the extinction risk of all bumble bees in the U.S. & Canada. This effort led to the development of the Bumble Bee Atlases to investigate trends in understudied and at-risk species, and to focus conservation efforts on those species that needed help the most.

Assessing the extinction risk of U.S. bee species requires collaboration with many different experts and institutions from across the country. This includes the bee taxonomists who make it possible to describe and identify bees, researchers that allow us to use their data to investigate trends in bee populations, and ecologists who understand the habitats where these bees occur and the threats to their stability. We are grateful to work together with such a diverse group to protect and conserve these special animals!

For more information, visit the State of the Bees website or email [email protected].