I have "May Night" salvia by my mailbox, and it is literally covered in honey bees--in fact, I had to get out there at dawn the other morning to deadhead the salvia before the bees got up! A very encouraging sign, I hope. The news about bees is very sad---scary, in fact.

My coneflowers and lambs ears and white clover are usually covered with honey bees and bumble bees but there are none.

Have not seen bees around here in the past couple of years but have quite a few this year in the white clover. Maybe they are making a comeback. Sure hope so.
Norm

I'm seeing a lot of bees and wasps at the birdbath, stopping off for a sip of water.
There were a lot around the tulips and especially the grape hyacinths this spring.

I think, like a lot of things, the die off of honey bees has been overexaggerated by the media. We've got bees same as last year and the year before. I read somewhere that this is not a new occurrance and it is only one or two species that seem to be affected.

Unfortunately I didn't save the link.

Maybe there's been things that I haven't seen in the news, but, in my experience, the die-off has been grossly under reported and under exaggerated. As a matter of fact, I am wondering if many people are even aware of the issue. The problem, as reported by professionals in the bee keeping field is definitely deserving of more attention and study.

Below is one website for information for anyone interested in learning more or investigating further.

Here is a link that might be useful: Mid-Atlantic Apiculture Research and Extension Consortium

My yard is mostly clover... or should I say mostly honeybees. They are everywhere. You can't take one step without disturbing a few. I also have quite a few borage plants in my herb garden and they are constantly loaded with honeybees. I mentioned this to a lady who lives in the area (I'm near Chattanooga) because I had read that a good percentage of the population has disappeared and I thought they had just been misplaced and were all here in my yard, and wondered if she had a lot of them too. She said she hadn't seen a honeybee in her gardens in 2 years, but that her neighbors use a lot of chemicals. I try to stay as organic as possible (not strictly) and I don't have neighbors' yards bordering mine.

It seems strange that it's so spotty. So many here and none there. Might that be explained by areas where more people are or are not using pesticides that are not bee-friendly?

Chris

Well I am now having lots of honey bees. Maybe it took more time for my plants to bloom and them to find them....I'm glad to have them. I only hand pollenated zuchinni once and now they are very well taken care of by the bees :) They were slow in coming around my place and I have lots of clover, of course in this drought, it's dying....

We've had bees this year, but after the rain last night and last week, there are more out today than I've seen so far. They're all over everything that's blooming.

Becky