Franklin's bumblebee (''Bombus franklini'') is one of the most narrowly distributed bumblebee species, making it a critically endangered

bee Bees are winged insects closely related to wasps and ants, known for their roles in pollination and, in the case of the best-known bee species, the western honey bee, for producing honey. Bees are a monophyletic lineage within the superfamil ...

of the western United States. It lives only in a area in southern

Oregon Oregon ( , ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is a part of the Western U.S., with the Columbia River delineating much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while t ...

and northern

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

, between the Coast and Sierra-Cascade mountain ranges. It was last seen in 2006. Franklin's bumblebee is a generalist

forager A forager is a person who collects edible plants or fungi for consumption. Urban foragers may collect in city parks, private lands, and sidewalks. Urban foraging has gained in popularity in the 21st century, as people share their knowledge, exper ...

which collects nectar and pollen from several wildflowers, such as

lupin ''Lupinus'', commonly known as lupin, lupine, or regionally bluebonnet, is a genus of plants in the legume family Fabaceae. The genus includes over 199 species, with centres of diversity in North and South America. Smaller centres occur in No ...

California poppy ''Eschscholzia californica'', the California poppy, golden poppy, Mexican poppy, California sunlight or cup of gold, is a species of flowering plant in the family Papaveraceae, native to the United States and Mexico. It is cultivated as an or ...

, and horsemint.

Description

Franklin's bumblebee is distinguished from other bumblebees by a solid black abdomen, with a yellow U-shaped pattern on the anterior thorax. Females have black hair on their faces and the vertices, with some light hairs mixed above and below their antennal bases, where most similar bumblebee species have yellow.Bumble bees: Franklin’s bumble bee (''Bombus franklini'').
Xerces Society. Males of this species are similar except their malar spaces are as long as they are wide, the hair on their faces is yellow, and tergum 6 has some pale hairs laterally.

Conservation

The population of this bumblebee species has decreased drastically since 1998, with last sighting in Oregon, in 2006. Some experts, such as professor

Dave Goulson Dave Goulson (born 30 July 1965) is Professor of Biology (Evolution, Behaviour and Environment) at the University of Sussex. Specializing in the ecology and conservation of insects, particularly bumblebees, Goulson is the author of several boo ...

at the

University of Sussex The University of Sussex is a public university, public research university, research university located in Falmer, East Sussex, England. It lies mostly within the city boundaries of Brighton and Hove. Its large campus site is surrounded by the ...

, say this species is already extinct, but until more concrete evidence is shown, it has been assigned a conservation status rank of G1 (critically imperiled) by NatureServe, and categorized as critically endangered by the IUCN Red List. A petition was submitted by the

Xerces Society The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation (Xerces Society) is a non-profit environmental organization that focuses on the conservation of invertebrates considered to be essential to biological diversity and ecosystem health. It is name ...

Defenders of Wildlife Defenders of Wildlife is a 501(c)(3) non-profit conservation organization based in the United States. It works to protect all native animals and plants throughout North America in their natural communities. Background Defenders of Wildlife is a ...

, and the Center for Food Safety to the California Fish and Game Commission in October 2018 to list ''Bombus franklini'' and three others as endangered under the

California Endangered Species Act In 1970 California became one of the first states in the U.S. to implement an act that conserves and protects endangered species and their environments. The California Endangered Species Act (CESA) declares that "all native species of fishes, amph ...

.Hatfield R, Jepsen S, Jordan SF, Blackburn M and Code A. 2018. ''A Petition to the State of California Fish and Game Commission.'' https://nrm.dfg.ca.gov/FileHandler.ashx?DocumentID=161902&inlineCalifornia Department of Fish and Wildlife. 2019. ''Evaluation of the Petition From the Xerces Society, Defenders of Wildlife, and the Center for Food Safety to List Four Species of Bumble Bees As Endangered Under the California Endangered Species Act.'' https://nrm.dfg.ca.gov/FileHandler.ashx?DocumentID=166804&inline The California Department of Fish and Wildlife evaluated this petition in a report for the California Fish and Game Commission completed in April 2019. On June 12, 2019 the California Fish and Game Commission voted to add all four bumblebees, including ''Bombus franklini'', to the list of protected species under the California Endangered Species Act.Weiland P. 2019. ''Fish and Game Commission Adds Four Bumble Bees to Candidate List.'' Endangered Species Law and Policy. https://www.endangeredspecieslawandpolicy.com/fish-and-game-commission-adds-four-bumble-bees-to-candidate-list A subsequent legal challenge of the CESA's definition of a fish as "a wild fish, mollusk, crustacean, invertebrate, amphibian, or part, spawn, or ovum of any of those animals" was eventually overruled, because the explicit intent was for all invertebrates (therefore including insects) to be qualified for protection under this legal definition.

References

External links

* {{Taxonbar, from=Q2264002 Bumblebees Hymenoptera of North America Endemic insects of the United States Fauna of California Natural history of Oregon Critically endangered fauna of the United States Critically endangered fauna of California Insects described in 1921