‘Wake-up call': A sting in the bee love story for native pollinators
Public attention on the plight of European honeybees could be coming at a cost for 1700 species of Australian native bees that also play a crucial role as pollinators.
Dr Judy Friedlander, an adjunct fellow in sustainability at the University of Technology Sydney, said hosting native bees in backyards or on balconies was one of the biggest things that urban dwellers could do to boost biodiversity.
'When people read about the supposed decline of European bee here due to things like the varroa mite, they panic, and they think that it's the end of the world and the end of our agriculture, but it's not,' Friedlander said.
'Beekeepers should be supported, and it needs to be taken seriously, but the focus on [varroa mite] has been to the detriment of native bees and native beekeepers. The whole varroa mite thing should be a big wake-up call because when we start relying on one species for our crop pollination, we're in big trouble.'
Dr Katja Hogendoorn, of the University of Adelaide, said there were not enough native bees to pollinate all crops, so European honeybees (Apis mellifera) were also needed – but they did not belong in nature.
Hogendoorn, who recently published a paper that described 71 new species of native bee, said there was 'a lot to discover still'. She previously published a review that found European honeybees compete with wild bees globally, including native species in Australia.
'In my head, there is no shadow of a doubt that honeybees, especially in this country where we've got enormous densities, have a negative impact on our native bee populations,' Hogendoorn said.
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