Climate change may be decreasing pollination by disrupting the natural synchronization between the times when flowers open each spring and when bees emerge from their winter hibernation, according to new research.
Scientists, farmers and beekeepers have been worried for some time about the mysterious disappearance of honeybees due to colony collapse disorder as well as declining populations of other pollinators, especially given the importance of pollination to agriculture and the world food supply. Roughly one-third of all fruits and vegetables, not to mention most flowers, depend on bees and other pollinators for their very existence.
James Thomson, a biologist at the University of Toronto, conducted a 17-year pollination study on glacier lilies in the Colorado Rockies, an area relatively free of pesticides and human disturbance, but still subject to climate change. He routinely compared glacier lilies that he pollinated by hand with those he left to pollinate naturally. Over the years, he found a progressive decline in pollination among the flowers he left untreated.
Thomson said more research would be needed to see whether the trend was global or local, whether it would continue, and to confirm whether climate change was really the primary driver.
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