Environment meets app: With ’BeeLife’ to the ’wild sisters’ of honey bees

World Bee Day on May 20, 2022 - [Picture: Grafikdesign Marina González] Our gardens are filled with buzzing and humming sounds again, and one might notice how diverse the hungry guests are that cavort on the blossoms. Among the wild bees in particular, we find numerous extremely vibrant pollinators. About 560 native wild bee species are known, and their habits are as varied and diverse as their outward appearance. Some of these species are so-called oligolectic insects that can only attain their food source from very specific plants. If such plants are destroyed over a wide area, the wild bee species depending on them cannot survive either - one of the reasons why approximately half of the native species are on the Red List or have already gone extinct. This is tragic because wild bees are extremely lively and very efficient pollinators. Without them, not only would our gardens be less colorful, but our tables would have a very limited assortment as well.