A Primer on Idaho's Native Bumble Bees

We have a lot to learn from nature about how to weather climate change. For centuries, native bees in Idaho have weathered invasive, competitive species and disappearing habitat, and in the last few decades, a rapidly warming climate. But to start learning those lessons, we need to first get familiar with the way they live.

For starters, 80% of bees native to this region don’t live in the big, honeycombed hives hanging from trees that remind us of “Winnie the Pooh.” They live underground — some bees live in solo dwellings, but bumblebees, who are members of the Bombus genus, all live in colonies.

They often opt to occupy abandoned rodent holes for their underground “nests” because they’re lined with fur, which make for warmer underground cavities to last the winter in.

Native honeybees have some disadvantages to their European counterparts who have colonized the U.S., including their annual life cycle, meaning the colony’s founding queen and all the other bees die during the fall and early winter.

Within the Bombus genus (bumble bees), there are over 250 species. There is a ton of information out there about all of them, but here’s a visual to identify a few of the most common ones we have based on their coloration, all of which you can learn more about.

For example, I just found out that one of them, the white-shouldered bumble bee (Bombus appositus) likes tall fringed bluebells, one of my favorite native flowers.

You can participate in tracking native bumblebees online, and figure out some plants that native pollinators might like to find in your yard. Even if you’re not ready to rip out your whole lawn — or like me, you don’t even have one — you can still help out native bumble bees as they fight climate change and keep our ecosystems alive.

Here are some good places to find bees and maybe practice identifying them. And here, learn about one way the City of Boise is curbing habitat loss by letting parks run a little wild.