In the Life of Bees: Nesting in Darkness

When you think of bees, you probably imagine the things they do on sunny days, like flying around and pollinating flowers. But this is only half of the story, as most of the 20,000 species of bees found around the world nest belowground, and spend the majority of their lives in darkness. What are they doing underground? How do they navigate their burrows and communicate with other bees? What happens when it rains? There are many interesting questions surrounding this lifestyle, and also plenty of uncertainties remaining to be resolved about subterranean living. In this webinar, we will learn about the diversity of ways that bees live and reproduce belowground, and we’ll ponder some of those unsolved mysteries. We’ll also talk about how the belowground lifestyle affects threats to bees, such as exposure to pesticides and pathogens. This webinar will cover some bees you may be familiar with, such as bumble bees, but we’ll be focusing our time on soil-nesters who we generally know less about, including the many solitary bees that do not live in colonies.