Bees and Acorns

Much has been written about the decline in bees across the United States. Some numbers have the bee population down 60% in the last two years. Bees help pollinate many plants, especially food crops, and there population decline has been in some cases due to disease. Cell phone use has also been speculated to be helping the decline in population.

Recently, field botanists have also noticed a shocking absence of acorns and hickory nuts up and down the east coast. Oak trees are wind pollinated, but based on a sharp drop off to zero acorns, which I also noticed in my yard, the decline in bee population may be related. On the other hand, if acorn production goes back to normal next year, some other factor may be the root cause. If trees such as oaks and other nut trees are pollinated by bees, a domino effect might start to be seen in the food chain.