The Williams Lab (UC Davis) happily digging for queens in Monterey California (Photo: Neal M. Williams)
Help solve this simple problem: where do queen bumble bees overwinter?
You and your friends could be the ones who solve it!
The official 2021 Queen Quest Blitz is October 16th, but you and your team can collect data any time!
Visit the Protocol section for specifics of how to collect data!
You and your friends could be the ones who solve it!
The official 2021 Queen Quest Blitz is October 16th, but you and your team can collect data any time!
Visit the Protocol section for specifics of how to collect data!
Queen Quest is a collaborative effort between researchers at the U.S. Geological Survey, Xerces Society, University of Vermont, University of Nebraska - Lincoln, and other universities. We hope to learn more about where queen bumble bees overwinter through a coordinated blitz.
Inspired by recent success finding overwintering sites of bumble bee queens in Monterey California, we seek to understand where queens might be overwintering in other parts of North America. We need folks to go out and do a bit of raking to try finding overwintering queens, take some photos, and tell us where they found them (or where they did not)!
Why? Frankly, it’s because we don’t know much about where they overwinter and figuring that out will help us create better bumble bee habitat and allow us to study this important, but poorly understood, part of the bumble bee life cycle.
Inspired by recent success finding overwintering sites of bumble bee queens in Monterey California, we seek to understand where queens might be overwintering in other parts of North America. We need folks to go out and do a bit of raking to try finding overwintering queens, take some photos, and tell us where they found them (or where they did not)!
Why? Frankly, it’s because we don’t know much about where they overwinter and figuring that out will help us create better bumble bee habitat and allow us to study this important, but poorly understood, part of the bumble bee life cycle.
What do you mean "overwintering"?
Bumble bees are a familiar site on flowers in the summer and maybe you have even gotten lucky and stumbled across a nest full of workers. However, bumble bees are annual species and aren't social year round. After colonies are done for the summer, they begin producing males and queens. After a brief mating season, the queens seek out overwintering (or hibernating) spots on their own.
Bumble bees are a familiar site on flowers in the summer and maybe you have even gotten lucky and stumbled across a nest full of workers. However, bumble bees are annual species and aren't social year round. After colonies are done for the summer, they begin producing males and queens. After a brief mating season, the queens seek out overwintering (or hibernating) spots on their own.
A linear look at the bumble bee life cycle. You can see a queen emerging from her hibernaculum in early spring on the far left, and settling in for her long winter's nap on the far right. Illustration by Alix Lukas.
A few scattered natural history notes report finding hibernating queens in loose soils, mossy ground cover, or leaf litter. Some species even seem to dig into sod, but we don't know how common any of these strategies are. It seems likely that queens often overwinter by burrowing into loose leaf litter beneath conifer trees, but it's yet to be shown that this is truly common or that we can reliably find these individuals. With Queen Quest, you can help us find out!
Questions? Comments? Send us a message at [email protected]
