I keep honey bees and don't know much about bumble bees, but have noticed that their population seems to vary from year to year. For a few years I noticed there were hardly any and wondered what happened to them. Last year they seemed to come back, and this year there are more than ever around here.
So far in this area honey bees have been fine. There are dozens of small scale and backyard beekeepers with anywhere from 2 to 20 hives. It's also a good mix of small towns and small scale farms. A few beekeepers I know move 2 or 3 hives for pollination. I think that if we could get back to the time when more things were done on a local scale (and there seems to be some movement in that direction) we'd all be better off. I'm always trying to encourage people to get started with one or two hives. I live near the middle of town in what used to be a mill house and have 6 hives in my backyard with no problems or complaints from neighbors.

My garden is quiet, too. I have always been proud in the amount of bees, wasps, hornets, butterfles, etc, attracted to my flower and vegetgable garden. (Even though I get stung). We are organic gardeners and I never spray pesticides.

Last year we counted more than a dozen different species on my gooseneck loosetrife at the same time.

This morning I saw one yellow jacket and one little white moth.

I live next to a pond and I don't even have any dragon flies - in the past, there is almost always one perched on every fence post.

I haven't even seen a hummingbird and I ususlly see those every day in the summer - dive bombing me if I get too close to the bee balm.

We had several cases of EEE last year in our area and I know the towns sprayed last year and the state is offering free spraying for residents this year. Could this be killing off our beneficials too?

I have a lot of melon plants waiting for pollenation and I especially miss my big bumble bee buddies. If you listen, you can hear them saying yum, yum yummm! in the hollyhocks.

I am worried about the future. What can we do?

I garden in Lancaster County and I see lots of bumblebees in my garden. There are so many that I have to be careful to avoid them when I'm catching Japanese beetles

They love the monardas, heliopsis, salvia and cosmos, among others.