Edit: interestingly, I see a lot of honeybees and some wasps foraging, both on the leaves and flowers of the tilia, but it’s only the bumblebees that lie dead on the ground.
Every summer, there are dozens of bumblebees either dead or dying beneath tilia trees (linden/lime/basswood).
Why?
My father once told me (some 20 years ago?) that they die from “overeating”. With all due respect to his linden tea (thanks dad🩷🩵🤍), this sounds like folklore…
There was once a thought that the linden tree had a sap that was toxic to bees. A paper that I found claims that the more likely cause of bee death is actually starvation. The flowers of fhe linden tree have little or no nectar late in their flowering stage, but the presence of small amounts of caffeine may mislead bees into believing they are finding a food source. This paper recommends planting alternate late summer flowering plants nearby.
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/rsbl/article/13/9/20170484/50480/Do-linden-trees-kill-bees-Reviewing-the-causes-of
Huh, I’m more similar to bumblebees than I thought!
First day off the coffee, and sitting around confused and hungry, and now this bit of information. Well I guess I need to feed myself with real food now. Okay.
Thank you for this link.