Bumblebee listed as endangered by US Fish and Wildlife Service

For the first time, a bee species in the continental United States has been declared endangered by the US Fish and Wildlife Service. The rusty patched bumblebee is in worrisome decline and it is a race to keep it from becoming extinct, the agency said. "Listing the bee as endangered will help us mobilize partners and focus resources on finding ways right now to stop the decline," Wildlife Service Midwest Regional Director Tom Melius said. The population of the rusty patched bumblebee has shrunk by 87 percent since the late 1990s, the wildlife service said. Bees help pollinate 35 percent of the world's food, and bumblebees pollinate everything from tomatoes to cranberries, blueberries and melons. There are a number of reasons for the crash of pollinator bees worldwide. Mainly, those are habitat loss (nearly 40 percent of all land is used for agriculture, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization), climate change (the land that's left is changing, and this is shrinking the ranges of some bees) and rampant chemical use...more