>    It would be awful barren without our honeybees.  I spent about three
>hours at midday today just observing the Kiwi pollination. I saw only one
>solitary bee and one carpenter bee, besides our busy little helpers. I love wa
>tching the honeybees wallow around among the anthers.
>
>   Some of the growers tell me that bumblebees work them, but I think it's
>carpenter bees.  I haven't seen a bumblebee yet this season, but carpenter
>bees have been plentious.
 
That scenario would probably change if folks started trying to develop ways
to encourage and/or mass rear these native bees, don't you think? They'd
probably get better pollination services in the long run for many of their
crops, too. (I know, I know... *HERESY!*...but it *is* probably true)
 
Doug Yanega      Illinois Natural History Survey, 607 E. Peabody Dr.
Champaign, IL 61820 USA     phone (217) 244-6817, fax (217) 333-4949
  "There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness
        is the true method" - Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chap. 82