The drastic decline in honeybee populations is no secret. For years, pesticides were thought to be the leading cause of increased die-offs. But new studies suggest that the parasite Varroa destructor, which sounds like it belongs in a sci-fi film, might be affecting bee health more than we thought.

Fluffy black and yellow-striped honeybees are the poster species for environmentalists working to save these struggling insects. But what about the other thousands of bee species pollinating crops and flowers? Hosts Adam Allington and David Schultz explore how the honeybee came to be the classic bee.

Commercial honey bees take laps around the U.S. to pollinate fruits, veggies and nuts – and their services aren’t cheap. But they are essential. Hosts Adam Allington and Tiffany Stecker talk with farmers in California about the rising costs of hives and how those traveling bees could be pushing native pollinators out of their habitats.

Hosts Adam Allington and David Schultz take us back to the earliest days of beekeeping in Egypt and tell us how humans and honeybees formed a partnership that has spanned thousands of years and several continents. In addition to the obvious benefits of producing honey, Apis Mellifera, also known as the European honeybee, has also inspired the imagination of thinkers and philosophers from the “land of milk and honey,” up to a 19th century minister who invented the modern beehive. 

In the premiere episode of Business of Bees, we dive deep into the modern bee-conomy. Hosts Adam Allington and Tiffany Stecker start in the almond fields of California, where farmers need bees for the largest managed pollination event in the world. The effects of Colony Collapse Disorder are still being felt, but we find out that the business of bees is actually booming. 

These days about one in three bites of food you eat wouldn’t be possible without commercial bee pollination. And the economic value of insect pollination worldwide is estimated to be about $217 billion. But as important as bees have become for farming, there’s also increasing signs that bees are in trouble. In the decade-plus since the first cases of Colony Collapse Disorder were reported, bees are still dying in record numbers, and important questions remain unanswered. 

Over the course of one year, host Adam Allington and environment reporters David Schultz and Tiffany Stecker traveled to all corners of the honeybee ecosystem from Washington, D.C., to the California almond fields, and orchards of the upper Midwest to bring back answers to these questions.