tomas mozer wrote:
>>>>>>>snip>>>>>>>

> especially their foraging populations, were low during
> the harsh dry-to-normal years. In the xeric areas, we
> often could not detect even a single forager at flowers,
> or even at water sources (unpublished observations).

We try. Sometimes I think most of our observations are unpublished. Some
desert mountain ranges are so remote - across dry valleys - that the
bees never seem to get a foothold. When they do, they can hang on in
rock holes through astonishing droughts. The Air Force and the Wildlife
Refuge system ensure that no beekeepers have been there for maybe fifty
years. Maybe you can understand how this isolation attracted me to study
bees in the "despoblado" (uninhabited area).
-----------------------------------------------------------
John F. Edwards
Biological Lab. Technician
"Feral Bee Tracker and AHB Identifier"
Carl Hayden Bee Research Center
Tucson, Arizona
http://198.22.133.109/    -use no-frames option on first page for better
viewing.