According to researchers, climate change is reportedly threatening the survival of bumblebees but significantly destroying their habitats.
They say that the natural ranges of bumblebees are being compressed in various parts of North American and Europe. This analysis also showed that warming is having more of an impact on them as compared to land use or pesticides. In order to ensure their survival, humans may have to help them to move to cooler areas.
A large number of creates, like butterflies, have responding to this warming by moving to higher ground. Bumblebees have largely disappeared from part of the southern ranges but they haven’t yet started moving north.
The research was carried out by a group of scientists from the US, Canada and Europe. They examined 420,000 plus historical as well as current records between 1901-2010 related to sixty seven types of bumblebees.
Their baseline was established between the period of 1901 and 1974. They saw that recent decades with their increased temperatures have started killing off bees in the south in both North America and Europe. What’s worse, these impacts are considered quite large and already underway. They aren’t something for future generations to worry about.
These losses have resulted in a loss of 9 km per year or around 300 km in total from the traditional southern habitats of bumblebees. They believe that the bees are not moving further to the north because they lack the ability to multiply while moving.
Bumblebees aren’t just considered important when it comes to pollinating food crops but for a lot of other wild flowers and plants as well. Pollination is a very important process which is responsible for around a third of what we humans eat or drink. Bumblebees, with their large bodies can generate additional heat which allows them to fly for longer periods of time as well as in cold weather which is better than most other types of bees.
Basically, if we want to preserve bumblebees for future generations then humans will have to intervene in an extensive and significant way in order to help them to adapt.
