Bee populations, both introduced European honey bees and native bee species, have been collapsing across North America for the last decade. The first native bee species were just added to the Endangered Species List. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...id=hp_no-name_hp-in-the-news:page/in-the-news The bee crisis has a major impact on everyone because of the role that bees play in pollinating our crops. It seems like just about every zoo could have a native bee garden and/or a bee hive on exhibit and some kind of interpretive exhibit about the bee crisis and what people can do to help them (creating bee habitat in yards, reducing pesticide use, etc.) Does your local zoo have a bee conservation display of some kind?
The only zoos in California I know of that have bee conservation exhibits are the San Diego Zoo and the Happy Hollow Zoo in San Jose which both have honey bee colonies and bee-friendly gardens. Are there any other zoo bee exhibits out there?
Hi David. Many zoos have on-display hives, but the two most extensive examples I know of are in Vienna (ZooLex Exhibit) and North Carolina (NC Zoo Honey Bee Exhibit | North Carolina State Beekeepers Association – NCSBA, https://shiftncsu.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/hanser_hbg_casestudylayout_rev.pdf). This paper about St Louis Zoo's pollinator conservation initiative might also interest you: http://www.titag.org/2014/2014papers/POLLINATORSEDSPEVAK.pdf.
While many (most?) zoos today have "pollinator gardens" to educate the public, the Saint Louis Zoo has gone further https://www.stlzoo.org/conservation/wildcare-institute/center-for-native-pollinator-conservation/
Many zoos in Europe (especially Germany) have hives with honeybee (though the beehive in Cologne is in the middle of the bee-eater exhibit, so so far for conservation). But in many zoos there are now "insect hotels" which consists of dried mud, dead sticks and other materials that are used by wild insects and especially wild solitary bees profit from this. Most zoos also have some education around these "hotels".
