A Xylocopa cantabrita male weighing 194 milligrams. Individuals could weigh as much as double that 30 years ago
Carlos Herrera/Spanish National Research Council
A long-running study of wild bees in Spain has found the insects have been losing weight for the last three decades, most likely due to global warming.
Since 1990, Carlos Herrera at the Spanish National Research Council and his colleagues have hand-netted over 1700 individual bees belonging to 137 species in Sierras de Cazorla, Segura y Las Villas Natural Park, the largest protected wilderness area in Spain.
Weighing them in the lab, the …
