In response to the National Academy of Science’s 2006 report on the recent decline of honey bee colonies in the United States, May Berenbaum, professor of entomology and department head, and a team of graduate students have developed a Web site designed to encourage local bee enthusiasts and citizen-scientists to post and learn information about wild bees in Illinois.

The academy’s report showed that as research studies focus more on actively managed bees or colony bees, little is known about wild bees. Berenbaum says that her Web site, BeeSpotter, will hopefully improve the knowledge of wild bees in the United States.

“The Web site will point us to where in the state (wild bees) can be found,” she said.

Members of the site can upload pictures of bees they find in their backyards, read biographies of various bee species and interact with bee experts.

Though Berenbaum said the site is “not quite done yet,” with the help of the graduate students, it should be completed by the end of the fall semester. Until then, the team of students will take turns adding links and features to the site.

Reed Johnson, graduate student and member of the team, said he thinks the site is a great idea and will help to fill a void.

“We think a lot of people would like to identify and learn about the bees they see around them, but right now there really aren’t many tools for them to use,” Johnson said. “I think BeeSpotter will fill this void.”

In addition to updating and creating the site, the students have also reached out to local elementary school children informing them about the site. The students teach the children how to identify various species of bees and how to take and upload photos for the BeeSpotter site.

It is an initiative that Berenbaum said will improve the overall success of the Web page.

“Whether (the site) has an impact depends on how many citizen-scientists we can recruit,” Berenbaum said. “The more people interested, the better the site will be.”

With a decline in bee colonies and a possible decline in wild bees, Berenbaum and the Web site supporters say the earth can suffer several negative effects. Dr. Sydney Cameron, associate professor of entomology, agreed.

“As a biologist who has studied bumble bees for 25 years all over the world, I can only say that the decline of some species appears real,” Cameron said. “If this potentially serious situation is not studied now, we may indeed lose some of our most valued pollinators.”

Valued pollinators, Berenbaum says, pollinate as much as three-fourths of all flowering plants, including sunflowers, almonds and various fruit.

Though Berenbaum hopes BeeSpotter will bring awareness to the bee colony decline, the professor has also taken several additional steps to raise awareness, including testifying before Congress about the decline and chairing the National Resource Council committee giving reports on North American pollination status. Last week, she unveiled the Web site at the Chicago Cultural Center with the presentation “Disappearing Bees.”

As of now, however, interested citizen-scientists can log onto http://beespotter.mste.uiuc.edu, create an account for the site, upload bee spotting data or find bees in their area using digital maps.

If wild bees and colonial bees are declining, Web site supporters say the information site members give will be important.

“No one has developed a robotic bee for pollinating apples and oranges,” Johnson said. “If you like to eat fruit, that’s a job we really need healthy, living bees for.”