Sign up to save your podcasts
Or
Share 5 Million Bees Under a Cemetery: Your Dead Relatives Are Saving Native Bees!
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Or
5 Million Bees Under a Cemetery: Your Dead Relatives Are Saving Native Bees!
In 2021, researchers noticed something unusual about the northeast corner of a cemetery in Ithaca, New York. The ground was full of tiny holes. A Cornell University team set up emergence traps and counted what came out. The answer: 5.6 million solitary bees, emerging from beneath the headstones every spring, quietly pollinating a university apple orchard 600 meters away. Then the same team found 651,440 more bees in a suburban lawn — collecting grass pollen nobody knew they wanted. These populations are hiding everywhere in plain sight, in the patches of ground we've never thought to study. And the safest place a wild bee can nest might just be the one piece of land nobody ever builds on.
www.secretpollinators.com
KEY SOURCES
- Hoge ST, Kueneman JG, Fordyce R, Dobler C, Odanaka K, Danforth BN (2026) Emergence dynamics and host-parasite associations in a large aggregation of Andrena regularis (Hymenoptera: Apoidea: Andrenidae). Apidologie 57:29. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13592-026-01256-6
- Giulian J, Danforth BN, Kueneman JG (2024) A large aggregation of Melissodes bimaculatus (Hymenoptera: Apidae) offers perspectives on gregarious nesting and pollination services. Northeastern Naturalist 31(3):402–417. https://doi.org/10.1656/045.031.0314
- Population estimate: 5.56 million A. regularis (range 3.1–8.0 million) from 6,523 m² nesting area at East Lawn Cemetery, Ithaca NY
- Collection records of A. regularis at ELC date to 1935 (GBIF)
- Cornell apple orchard 600m from ELC; A. regularis most abundant pollinator 2008–2016
- Melissodes bimaculatus aggregation: 651,440 bees in suburban upstate New York lawn
- Selfish-herd hypothesis: dense nesting aggregations dilute individual parasite risk (Giulian et al. 2024)
- Grass pollen (Poaceae) preference: previously undocumented diet preference for M. bimaculatus (Giulian et al. 2024)
- Cemetery biodiversity: Kowarik et al. (2016) — 604 species including 48 of conservation concern in Berlin cemetery
- "Sentinels of biodiversity where the dead protect the living": Barrett & Barrett (2001); Dybas (2025)
- Scientific American coverage: Mogensen, Jackie Flynn. "Scientists just discovered 5.6 million bees under a New York cemetery." April 14, 2026
#SecretPollinators #5MillionBees #CemeteryBees #AndreaBees #AndenaRegularis #NativeBees #GroundNestingBees #SolitaryBees #BeeDiscovery #HiddenBees #EastLawnCemetery #CornellUniversity #PollinatorScience #WildBees #BeeConservation #ApplePollination #MelissodesBimaculatus #TwoSpottedLonghornBee #GrassPollen #BeeResearch #NativeBeeResearch #PollinatorConservation #SaveTheBees #BeeNerd #BeeFacts #InsectScience #SciencePodcast #NaturePodcast #NatureLovers #EntomologyNerd #Entomology #DidYouKnow #MindBlown #ScienceIsAmazing #HiddenNature #UnexpectedNature #BeesOfInstagram #PollinatorHabitat #SacredGround #TheDeadAreKeepingBees #NewEpisode #Ghosts #Dead #Cemetery #headstones #wildbees
View all episodes
By Kelly ParksIn 2021, researchers noticed something unusual about the northeast corner of a cemetery in Ithaca, New York. The ground was full of tiny holes. A Cornell University team set up emergence traps and counted what came out. The answer: 5.6 million solitary bees, emerging from beneath the headstones every spring, quietly pollinating a university apple orchard 600 meters away. Then the same team found 651,440 more bees in a suburban lawn — collecting grass pollen nobody knew they wanted. These populations are hiding everywhere in plain sight, in the patches of ground we've never thought to study. And the safest place a wild bee can nest might just be the one piece of land nobody ever builds on.
www.secretpollinators.com
KEY SOURCES
- Hoge ST, Kueneman JG, Fordyce R, Dobler C, Odanaka K, Danforth BN (2026) Emergence dynamics and host-parasite associations in a large aggregation of Andrena regularis (Hymenoptera: Apoidea: Andrenidae). Apidologie 57:29. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13592-026-01256-6
- Giulian J, Danforth BN, Kueneman JG (2024) A large aggregation of Melissodes bimaculatus (Hymenoptera: Apidae) offers perspectives on gregarious nesting and pollination services. Northeastern Naturalist 31(3):402–417. https://doi.org/10.1656/045.031.0314
- Population estimate: 5.56 million A. regularis (range 3.1–8.0 million) from 6,523 m² nesting area at East Lawn Cemetery, Ithaca NY
- Collection records of A. regularis at ELC date to 1935 (GBIF)
- Cornell apple orchard 600m from ELC; A. regularis most abundant pollinator 2008–2016
- Melissodes bimaculatus aggregation: 651,440 bees in suburban upstate New York lawn
- Selfish-herd hypothesis: dense nesting aggregations dilute individual parasite risk (Giulian et al. 2024)
- Grass pollen (Poaceae) preference: previously undocumented diet preference for M. bimaculatus (Giulian et al. 2024)
- Cemetery biodiversity: Kowarik et al. (2016) — 604 species including 48 of conservation concern in Berlin cemetery
- "Sentinels of biodiversity where the dead protect the living": Barrett & Barrett (2001); Dybas (2025)
- Scientific American coverage: Mogensen, Jackie Flynn. "Scientists just discovered 5.6 million bees under a New York cemetery." April 14, 2026
#SecretPollinators #5MillionBees #CemeteryBees #AndreaBees #AndenaRegularis #NativeBees #GroundNestingBees #SolitaryBees #BeeDiscovery #HiddenBees #EastLawnCemetery #CornellUniversity #PollinatorScience #WildBees #BeeConservation #ApplePollination #MelissodesBimaculatus #TwoSpottedLonghornBee #GrassPollen #BeeResearch #NativeBeeResearch #PollinatorConservation #SaveTheBees #BeeNerd #BeeFacts #InsectScience #SciencePodcast #NaturePodcast #NatureLovers #EntomologyNerd #Entomology #DidYouKnow #MindBlown #ScienceIsAmazing #HiddenNature #UnexpectedNature #BeesOfInstagram #PollinatorHabitat #SacredGround #TheDeadAreKeepingBees #NewEpisode #Ghosts #Dead #Cemetery #headstones #wildbees