Tens of millions of bees in the western part of the United States die every day due to car collisions, according to a new study by researchers at Utah State University.
Americans drive miles of long, winding roads on the daily, without giving much thought to the insects that splatter on their windshields as their vehicles barrel down highways.
One of these victims is bees. Their deaths are a big deal because bees pollinate almost 75 percent of food crops around the world, and they are already at risk because of climate change.
A previous report revealed that the cost of pollinating services for bees in the U.S. comes out to $20 billion a year. As you can see, bees provide so much for us and nature. Yet, we are treating them rather poorly in return.
To calculate the bee deaths that were caused by car collisions, a team of researchers counted the number that were killed by their own vehicles during driving trips around Utah.
In the past, research has shown that bee populations around the world are dwindling. Many factors based on human activity are responsible for the decline, such as pesticide use and global warming. Now, collisions with cars can be added to the list.
“Bees play a pivotal role in our ecosystem. The consequences of their frequent collisions with vehicles extend well beyond a minor travel inconvenience,” said Joseph Wilson, the lead author of the study and a professor at Utah State University Tooele.
“In fact, the impacts of bee deaths, occurring minute-by-minute each day, may have a greater negative impact than we realized.”
The team applied sticky paper to the bumpers of their vehicles and drove them around Utah on 29 different trips that took place from 2018 to 2021. After each trip, they removed the dead bees from their bumpers, identified the genus, and counted the total that were killed.
Javier – stock.adobe.com – illustrative purposes only
Overall, the researchers drove about 5,800 miles and found that at least one dead bee from every trip.
Some trips were worse than others. From Salt Lake City to Moab, there were between 50 and 175 bee deaths, depending on the weather conditions.
Then, they considered the size of the sticky traps and how many bees were stuck to them in order to estimate the total bee kills per vehicle.
They noted that approximately 94,000 trips are made across the stretch of highway from Salt Lake City to Moab every day.
They calculated that during warm weather, millions of bees would be killed every single day just along that roadway alone.
When other roads and highways in Utah and other nearby western states are taken into account, the estimates shoot up to the tens of millions, perhaps even the billions.
The results of the experiment indicate that a lot more bees are being killed by car collisions than previously thought.
The researchers suggested that flowers should not be planted in the median strip between roadways to reduce the amount of bee deaths.
The study was published in the journal Sustainable Environment.
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