Chile Unleashed a European Bee on Patagonia—and the Native Giant Is Vanishing
The Unwilding of Patagonia's Pollinators
Chile has imported more than 1.6 million colonies of the European buff-tailed bumblebee since 1997, and the bee has spread into Argentina at roughly 200 kilometers a year. Biologist Marina Arbetman, who has studied Patagonia's endemic giant bumblebee since 2005, now finds not a single one in a commercial raspberry field near Osorno. The invader outcompetes the native for nests and nectar and carries diseases it has never faced. A 2018 criminal complaint was dismissed on statute-of-limitations grounds.
Think of Spanish conquistadors bringing smallpox to South America and decimating human populations. B. terrestris is the conquistador of the pollinator world.