India’s native dwarf honey bee faces a quiet urban crisis

• The dwarf honey bee, Apis florea, is a vital urban pollinator, but its numbers are declining due to urbanization, habitat destruction, pesticide application, and increasing temperatures.
• Recent studies indicate that the dwarf honey bee’s open-air nesting and slow development make it more vulnerable to environmental changes and slower to recover from population declines.
• As urban areas replace flowering plants with concrete, preserving nesting habitats and floral diversity is essential for maintaining pollination services and urban food security.

In April, Bengaluru experienced temperatures soaring to 38.5°C, prompting natural landscape architect Akshay Vidhate to notice the absence of wild honey bees in his terrace garden filled with 30 flowering plant varieties.