Bees added to endangered species list

I've written a lot about bees on this blog beginning with Discovery News and PhysOrg on colony collapse disorder in 2013 and continuing through Space and sustainability news for the fifth year of Crazy Eddie's Motie News.  This week, more news came out about bees, but it wasn't about honeybees and colony collapse disorder.  Instead, it was that the Rusty Patched Bumblebee Is Officially Endangered.  Wochit News reports.

This week it has been declared that the rusty patched bumblebee is endangered in the United States. It is the first bee species to ever be put on the endangered list. The rusty patched bumblebee has seen it’s population diminish significantly over the past 20 years. Tom Melius, the regional director of the US Fish and Wildlife Service, stated, “Pollinators are small but might parts of the natural mechanism that sustains us and our world. Without them, our forests, parks, meadows, and scrublands, and the abundant, vibrant life they support, cannot survive, and our crops require laborious, costly pollination by hand.” Environmentalists are ready to fight for the lives of rusty patched bumblebees.

While these are both the first bumblebees and mainland bees to be placed on the endangered species list, they aren't the first U.S. bees on the list.  Last September, several species of Hawaiian bees earned that dubious distinction.  KHON reports in Native bee species now protected under Endangered Species Act.

Seven yellow-faced bee species are now under protection, a first for any bees in the nation.

While these are not honeybees, this is still bad news.

Enough DOOM!  Stay tuned for two entertainment entries, one including the first celebration of the fake holiday Norther on Sunday and one celebrating Martin Luther King Day on Monday.