{"id":828985,"date":"2026-07-27T10:22:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T10:22:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/828985\/"},"modified":"2026-07-27T10:22:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T10:22:10","slug":"fredericton-backyards-abuzz-with-an-insect-thats-finally-being-tracked","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/828985\/","title":{"rendered":"Fredericton backyards abuzz with an insect that’s finally being tracked"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Text<\/p>\n

Listen to this article<\/p>\n

Estimated 4 minutes<\/p>\n

The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology. Mispronunciations can occur. We are working with our partners to continually review and improve the results.<\/p>\n

Equipped with insect nets, vials and a temperature-controlled cooler, Nature NB is searching across Fredericton this summer to document an important but not well understood neighbour: the native bumblebee.<\/p>\n

The conservation group is carrying out its first season of field surveys to track bumblebee species in the capital.<\/p>\n

The program, developed by the Mi’kmaq-led Unama\u2019ki Institute of Natural Resources in Cape Breton, is working to create a comprehensive map of bumblebee locations and habitats in New Brunswick and the rest of the Maritimes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cNo one has ever surveyed these sites on a consistent basis,\u201d said Francie Morgan, a program co-ordinator for Nature NB leading this initiative. \u201cSo we don’t have any baseline data with which to compare the state of our bumblebees moving forward.<\/p>\n

“What we’re really trying to do is create a basis for conservation work so that we can make informed choices around protecting habitat behaviour.\u201d<\/p>\n

WATCH | How Nature NB identifies bumblebees by putting them \u2018into a torpor state\u2019:\"\"<\/p>\n

Fredericton bumblebees get their own population survey<\/p>\n

As New Brunswick pushes to protect threatened bumblebee species, Nature NB\u2019s field surveys show that saving local pollinators starts with baseline data.<\/p>\n

One of her central efforts is to support landowners and municipal partners in making more educated decisions to protect pollinators.<\/p>\n

Nature NB is part of a growing provincial mapping effort alongside the Amlamgog (Fort Folly) Habitat Recovery team, who first brought the survey to New Brunswick, as well as EOS Eco-Energy and the Pays de Cocagne Sustainable Development Group.<\/p>\n

Survey efforts<\/p>\n

Morgan and her team are surveying three sites in three neighbourhoods on Fredericton\u2019s north side this summer.\u00a0<\/p>\n

They identify each species on-site by examining distinct colour patterns and shapes on the bee\u2019s abdomen and thorax.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Although early in the season, Morgan documented six different species during the initial survey in June. According to the province<\/a>, there are 18 different bumblebee species in New Brunswick.<\/p>\n

\"WomanFrancie Morgan, program co-ordinator at Nature NB, places the bumblebee into a state of torpor, allowing her to use paintbrushes to carefully reposition the bee for photographs. (Olivia Zhong\/CBC)<\/p>\n

Collected data is shared with the Unama\u2019ki Institute, the Atlantic Canada Conservation Data Centre, and iNaturalist, an open-source global database accessed by researchers worldwide.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomebody in Ontario could use that to inform the research and conservation efforts they\u2019re making,\u201d Morgan said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat’s particularly important for species that migrate, like monarchs, but equally as important for bumblebees, so that we know which areas of our city are succeeding in supporting pollinators.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Morgan, when you protect one species, you protect another.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we protect habitat for bumblebees, we protect habitat for wasps and monarchs and hummingbirds, and in turn, we protect habitat for all of the creatures that use them as a food source,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe choices that we make around protecting land have a ripple effect throughout the ecosystem.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nature NB\u2019s program comes at a critical time. The New Brunswick government just released a draft recovery strategy<\/a> for two threatened local bumblebee species: the Bohemian cuckoo bumblebee and the yellow-banded bumblebee.<\/p>\n

The Bohemian cuckoo bumblebee had gone undetected and was presumed gone from 1980 to 2010 until it was located again in northern New Brunswick in 2021.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The strategy now calls for a standardized monitoring protocol across the province.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cTo go from not thinking we had them at all in the province to now having some handful of observations, I think it’s pretty clear that we do not have a clear understanding of where [bumblebees] are in the province,\u201d said Shaylyn Wallace, species at-risk manager at the Department of Natural Resources. <\/p>\n

Collecting more information about bee locations will help with conservation, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe definitely need support from researchers [and] from not-for-profits to help us fill these gaps.\u201d<\/p>\n

Native bumblebees play a unique biological role in keeping surrounding ecosystems stable, resilient and balanced.<\/p>\n

\"WomanShaylyn Wallace, species at-risk manager at the Department of Natural Resources, said better education about the importance of bumblebees is important for conservation efforts. (Olivia Zhong\/CBC)<\/p>\n

\u201cNative bumblebees are really important for maintaining native plants, and that plant diversity is what creates resilience and a sustainable ecosystem in the face of things like climate change and extreme weather.\u201d<\/p>\n

For local residents looking to support wild pollinators, Morgan said, the most effective action starts right at home with letting yard space grow wild.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf everybody in a neighbourhood chose to just not mow 50 square feet of their yard or even smaller, even if it was just five feet of their yard, those plants will work together in partnership with all of the other patches of native plants to be able to create foraging habitat for bumblebees.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to this article Estimated 4 minutes The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":828986,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[49,48,66,323],"class_list":["post-828985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-science","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=828985"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/828985\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/828986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=828985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=828985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=828985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}