Hi all
My chief problem with story was that it cites no author and no sources. One has to dig a bit to find out anything tangible. Which I did.

The original article was written by Nick Bowling, for High Country News:

https://www.hcn.org/issues/51.5/public-lands-commercial-honeybees-threaten-to-displace-utahs-native-bees-pesticides

But other recent stories give more details:

"It seems like everybody’s been affected," said Bret Adee, whose family runs the nation’s largest beekeeping outfit, in South Dakota. He thinks 2018 might be "the smallest crop in the history of the United States for honey production."

Drought in several top honey-producing states not only depleted bees’ forage, but also led to more herbicide use because stressed plants don’t easily absorb the chemicals. As a result, [Darren Cox, Utah] said, "you tend to have weaker hive strength because of lack of forage and nutrition."

> "We can only produce about 50 percent of the honey that we’ve produced prior to in-crop use of dicamba," [Richard Coy, Arkansas] said. "We have no choice but to leave Arkansas."

Liza Gross / January 23, 2019. Bees face yet another lethal threat in dicamba, a drift-prone pesticide. https://www.revealnews.org

Comments: Dicamba is an herbicide, not exactly a pesticide. BTW, I am not implying that any of these sources has adequately addressed the issue, which is not black and white. For example, I question whether native bees are better pollinators of native plants and whether honey bees necessarily have a negative effect on native pollinators. In some cases, they have been shown to improve ecosystems for all present species. 

Peter 🐝
-- wondering, why is it always Us against Them?

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