Buzzkill: How Fear Hinders US Bee Conservation

Photo by mauro mari on Unsplash

Bees, those industrious pollinators of our world, play an indispensable role in sustaining our ecosystems and food supply. In the United States alone, the USDA reported $15 billion worth of crops are pollinated each year thanks to honeybees and (alongside other pollinators) $200 billion in ecosystem services like pollinating the plants that wildlife then eat. However, pesticide use, parasites, and habitat loss due to urbanization and herbicide use have caused unprecedented threats to domestic honeybee and wild bee colonies. An analysis conducted in 2017 by the Center for Biological Diversity reported that 1 in 4 species of bee was at an increased risk for extinction, and with the highly publicized phenomenon of Colony Collapse Disorder, public attention has turned toward the plight of the pollinators. Yet, conservation efforts often encounter an unexpected stumbling block: people’s fear of bees.

One study published in Frontiers in Psychology analyzed how human emotions can drive conservation efforts. They found that animal species considered aggressive, dangerous, or a threat to human life garnered less public support for protective efforts than those who did not. Similarly, a study out of the University of Bayreuth, Germany published in PLoS One, found “perceived danger” was tied to an individual’s willingness to protect bees; citing bee stings as the major…