Latest Insect ecology Stories

Police in Pennsylvania said a beekeeper successfully relocated a 4-inch-thick swarm of 7,000 to 8,000 bees from a resident's fence. Southwest Regional police Chief John Hartman said he was awed by the sight of the bees when he and other police arrived at the scene of the swarm outside Bernadette Rodger's Belle Vernon home, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reported Thursday. It looked like a rug hanging over the fence, Hartman said. But you could see that the bees were moving around. It was...

Scientists at the University of Cambridge in Britain have found that tiny conical structures on the surface of flowers provide bees something to hold on to, increasing their foraging efficiency.  Furthermore, the bees actually prefer these easy-to-grip petals, the study found.Most insect-pollinated flowers have cone-shaped surface cells, in contrast to other flowers with flat surfaces.  It was long believed that these conical "bumps" existed to attract pollinators.However,...

Researchers have discovered why most insect-pollinated flowers have special cone-shaped cells on the surfaces of their petals. They literally help bees get a grip, according to a report published online on May 14th in Current Biology, a publication of Cell Press.What's more, the researchers also showed that bumblebees will preferentially choose to land on petals that are easier to hold on to. The findings exemplify both the intricacy and the elegant simplicity that can be found in nature, the...

Despite shrinking numbers of wild honey bees in the U.S. and Europe, several species of domesticated bees are on the rise, said a study released on Thursday."The honey bee decline observed in the USA and in other European countries including Great Britain, which has been attributed in part to parasitic mites and more recently to colony collapse disorder, could be misguiding us to think that this is a global phenomenon," according to Marcelo Aizen of Universidad Nacional del Comahue in...

A Harvard University biologist says there are many beneficial relationships between organisms but she has discovered a rather strange ant-plant arrangement. Harvard researcher Megan Frederickson said Myrmecophyte plants often provide home for several species of ants by sheltering them in hollow spaces in its limbs or leaves. The ants, in turn, protect the plant from other insects or encroaching vegetation. But Frederickson says sometimes that balance tips toward one partner or the other....

Nature is full of mutually beneficial arrangements between organisms"”like the relationship between flowering plants and their bee pollinators. But sometimes these blissful relationships have a dark side, as Harvard biologist Megan Frederickson describes in an article for the May issue of The American Naturalist.Generally, the relationship between ants and plants is a great example of biological mutualism. Myrmecophyte plants"”otherwise known as ant-plants"” often provide home for...

Canadian researchers say they've determined the scent of grapevine flowers comes from pollen grains stored in the anthers, not just the petals. University of British Columbia scientists from the school's Wine Research Center and Michael Smith Laboratories were studying grapes used to produce Cabernet Sauvignon from British Columbia's Okanagan region when they identified a gene that produces and regulates fragrance from the vines' tiny clusters of green blossoms. This was a surprise in...

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa., March 26 /PRNewswire/ -- To speed the search for the cause of an epidemic killing honey bees - and threatening food crops across the country - Wyman's of Maine, the premier brand of wild blueberries, today presented $50,000 to the Department of Entomology at The Pennsylvania State University. The funds will support research into Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), a phenomenon describing the mysterious death of one in three honey bee colonies in the US since December...

Superpremium Ice cream Maker Pledges to Donate Two Million Flower Seeds to Help Create More Bee Habitats OAKLAND, Calif., March 25 /PRNewswire/ -- The new vegetable and herb garden at the White House will not only provide produce for the First Family, but will also be an important food source for honey bees. Without the bees, the fruits in the garden may not be adequately pollinated. The Haagen-Dazs brand today announced its goal of distributing two million bee-friendly flower seeds in...

Insects such as honeybees and bumble bees are predictable in the way they move among flowers, typically moving directly from one flower to an adjacent cluster of flowers in the same row of plants. The bees' flight paths have a direct affect on their ability to hunt for pollen and generate "gene flow", fertilization and seed production that results when pollen moves from one plant to another. The study of gene flow has experienced more attention in part due to the recent introduction...