Wait, does America suddenly have a record number of bees?
Wait, does America suddenly have a record number of bees?
Analysis by Andrew Van Dam
Staff writer
March 29, 2024 at 6:00 a.m. EDT
Where in the unholy heck did all these bees come from?! ... After almost two decades of relentless colony collapse coverage and years of grieving suspiciously clean windshields, we were stunned to run the numbers on the new Census of Agriculture (otherwise known as that wonderful time every five years where the government counts all the llamas): America’s honeybee population has rocketed to an all-time high.
We’ve added almost a million bee colonies in the past five years. We now have 3.8 million, the census shows. Since 2007, the first census after alarming bee die-offs began in 2006, the honeybee has been the fastest-growing livestock segment in the country! And that doesn’t count feral honeybees, which may outnumber their captive cousins several times over.
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Howdy! The Department of Data seeks your quantitative queries. What are you curious about: Should we pay blood donors? When does spring really start? What’s the best time to get your flu shot? Just ask!
If your question inspires a column, we’ll send you an official Department of Data button and ID card. This week we owe one to ace news researcher Razzan Nakhlawi, who helped us track down several bee-data experts.
By Andrew Van Dam
Andrew Van Dam writes the Department of Data column each week for The Washington Post. He has covered economics and wrangled data and graphics for The Post and the Wall Street Journal. Twitter https://twitter.com/andrewvandam
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They are not in imminent danger of collapse, although they are under constant pressure from parasites, pollution, toxins, and disease, with new threats on the horizon worse than any ever seen before.
Wild pollinators are fairing far worse.
Honey bees themselves have the super power of rapid reproduction. You think rabbits reproduce quickly, you ain't seen nuttin, honey. 
Given the right resources and weather, you can split one colony into six, and then split each of those hives into two in one season. That's rare, and takes a lot of effort, but smaller splits are common, and drive the industry.
So while losses of 50% or more over a season and winter are common, the bees prolific breeding abilities make up for it.
So yeah, losses are horrific. That is true. But the industry is staying up with them. So far.
