No bees on my azaleas. I have two large azalea shrubs (10ft tall) that

[bluerum]

are in full bloom in front of my house. Every year you can hear the hum of bumble bees doing their work gathering pollen. It is sight to see and hear. This year, the azaleas are silent. It is eerie.

Maybe the weather has been too cool for the bumblebees to come out. But normally the weather, the azaleas, and the bumblebees are synchronized.

Something is a-foot.

[flyarm]

1. THAT IS SCAREY!!..EOM

[valerief]

2. I think it hasn't been warm enough long enough in MA to reach

that conclusion.

I know I'm looking forward to them, but I won't be surprised if the don't appear. The world is the ruling class's toilet now.

[Cleita]

3. Wait a little longer when the weather warms up.

I have had bees coming when the weather was warm and then cold snaps have arrived. It's been a really weird winter her ranging from summer weather one week and near freezing the next week, and it hasn't stopped. I keep switching between winter clothes and summer clothes. I think this also might be not only affecting the bees but the butterflies as well. At this time of year we have Monarch butterflies gallore and this year I've hardly seen any.

Another strange thing that has happened is flocks of birds swooping in and eating all my new spring planting that I put out. I had to cover everything with bird netting. They ate all the flowers on my plum tree, so I know I won't get any plums this year. It's possible that the bees have had their source of nectar stolen from them by the hungry birds. I hope biologists look into this very carefully leaving no possibility unexplored.

[bluerum]

9. I can wait. But the azaleas will be done blooming in few days. The bees

will miss out, and the azaleas will miss out on their yearly pollination ritual.

I am lying in wait for the first hummingbirds of the season. Usually after mothers day in my yard. The fuchsias await.

[Cleita]

12. I put up a little decorative fountain I found at K-Mart in my garden . It has a

fairy or pixie holding some lily-like cupped flowers that the water flows through. The hummingbirds have discovered it and use it for a birdbath and shower. The cupped flowers are just the right size for them. It's so cute to watch them.

[irislake]

17. Maybe folks shouldn't feed hummingbirds

We need them to pollinate flowers now!

[Cleita]

18. Turn your sprinklers on to bring them around. After they drink

and flit around in the water they head for the flowers.

[HockeyMom]

15. I agree

I haven't seen any bees either. But we have had an exceptionally cold Spring. Although the day temps are in the 60s to around 70, the nights are still in the 40s. My heat is still coming on at night and I still have my flannels and down on the beds.

It is probably still too cold. I have not seen any BUGS yet either.

[Cleita]

22. Woohoo! It was a hot day yesterday. Today when I watered, there

were bees around the lavanders that I have planted and a nice big fat bumble bee sucking nectar from the flowers blooming on my Purple Robe Robinia tree. I think we who have yards and gardens should concentrate on encouraging bees and other bugs into our gardens with organic garden practices and putting out water for them. I put shallow dishes with rocks and fill them with water. The bees and butterflies use the rocks to land on to drink the water.

[Sanity Claws]

4. I saw some bees this morning on my coteneaster

This is Washington State. I heard that Oregon and Washington have not experienced the colony die-off that other areas have.

[grasswire]

6. last summer here in Oregon we noticed that bees were dying...

...in our garden. It started in late July. We'll see what happens this year.

[The Backlash Cometh]

5. Bumble bees came to me.

In early April. They converged on the Redbud tree. Lots of them. And then they stopped coming.

Now everything is blooming in my garden. But very few pollinaters.

It is getting hotter.

[drthais]

8. we had the EXACT same thing happen with the big bumblebees

early, on the redbuds.
then gone.
then nothing.

Yesterday, we picked up two bee hives.
for now, we have bees.

[Cant trust em]

7. This is really freaking me out

I heard that this could be the result of cell phone radiation. Let's see if the telecommunications lobby comes out against this.

[mike_c]

10. CCD does not affect bumble bees....

In fact, bumble bees are either solitary bees or only mildly social-- under no circumstances do they form colonies like honey bees.

[Dover]

11. Must be something unique to this country...

The bees are out in full force in southern Europe.

[hashibabba]

13. Germany is having problems

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,473166,00.html

[Dover]

14. Thanks. Mine was only observation so I'm guessing there IS more of a problem

than I was aware. I thought this was interesting (from Wikipedia). I didn't know honeybees weren't native to North America.

Honey bees are not native to the Americas, therefore their necessity as pollinators in the US is limited to strictly agricultural/ornamental uses, as no native plants require honey bee pollination, except where concentrated in monoculture situations - where the pollination need is so great at bloom time that pollinators must be concentrated beyond the capacity of native bees (with current technology).

They are responsible for pollination of approximately one third of the United States' crop species, including such species as: almonds, peaches, soybeans, apples, pears, cherries, raspberries, blackberries, cranberries, watermelons, cantaloupes, cucumbers and strawberries. Many but not all of these plants can be (and often are) pollinated by other insects in small holdings in the U.S., including other kinds of bees, but typically not on a commercial scale. While some farmers of a few kinds of native crops do bring in honey bees to help pollinate, none specifically need them, and when honey bees are absent from a region, there is a presumption that native pollinators may reclaim the niche, typically being better adapted to serve those plants (assuming that the plants normally occur in that specific area).

However, even though on a per-individual basis, many other species are actually more efficient at pollinating, on the 30% of crop types where honey bees are used, most native pollinators cannot be mass-utilized as easily or as effectively as honey bees - in many instances they will not visit the plants at all. Beehives can be moved from crop to crop as needed, and the bees will visit many plants in large numbers, compensating via sheer numbers for what they lack in efficiency. The commercial viability of these crops is therefore strongly tied to the beekeeping industry...>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colony_Collapse_Disorder

[irislake]

16. I live in South Eastern Ontario

Last summer I was terrified to notice that within one year bumblebees has gone from plentiful to two or three a day visiting the planters on my deck. Wild honeybees that were abundant ten years ago have been totally wiped out.I have not seen honeybees for years. I saw no (zero) little irridescent brightly-coloured dragonflies that once were so abundant that they perched on my hand when I was out on the pond in my boat. Large black dragonflies were down from thousands to maybe hundreds. A biologist said gnats are gone from these parts. On rainy days and nights the roads used to be covered with thousands of frogs. No longer. I do hear spring peepers now in the woods around me but biologists report there are fewer of them.

Living in the country as I do I am in total despair. My daughter has one year old twins. Emails, "I can't stop kissing them!" I don't think there will be a world for them to grow up in. I think it is too late. Edgar Mitchell (astronaut) wrote 30 years ago that it was urgent to act then to save the planet. He said he thought we only had a couple of decades.

I think it is too late. My poor children and grandchildren. What have we done? Not that I will give up but it's very scary.

[Shoelace]

19. same thing in my part of Oregon, no bees or bumblebees

very sad state of affairs here. They say Oregon was not affected but in my plentiful flower garden, haven't seen any bees and only 1 single Bumblebee so far this season.
Our honeybee population has been down to almost nothing for about 5 years.
Few if any dragonflies and no hummingbirds. It's been a cold Spring but the frogs disappeared years ago even though we have plentiful water but I blame that on the huge amounts of pesticides, herbicides used by Grass seed growers in our valley. They pretty much own our legislature so they can do whatever they want.
Silent Spring is not what I wanted to bequeath to my grandkids either.

[july302001]

20. North Carolina -

In the mountains of North Carolina, I've seen a few bumblebees visiting rhodies and azaleas.

We've had a few of our usual May beetles attracted to lights at night, but they're not really out in force yet.

We've had dry weather except for a good spell of rain this weekend.

[slackmaster]

21. I had honeybees in my bottle brush tree this morning

Huge swarm of them. It was a relief to see some finally.

[Javaman]

23. I was worried about my cantaloupes but lo and behold, they have been

pollinated and I'm seeing my yield. :)