Bumble bee populations are crashing across the Northern Hemisphere due to habitat loss, pesticides, disease and climate change, creating both conservation and welfare crises.
Individual bumble bee workers exposed to sublethal pesticide doses suffer impaired navigation that prevents them from returning to the nest — they die from exposure and starvation alone. Chronic exposure to landscape-level pesticides affects bee cognitive ability to learn and remember flower locations. The social nature of bumble bee colonies means individual welfare harms aggregate to colony health impacts. Bumble bee welfare is inseparable from the biodiversity and ecosystem service values their populations provide.