USDA Researchers Help Honeybees Keep Pollinating Our Food Crops
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Narrator: Honey bees contribute as much as seventeen billion dollars annually to the US economy by providing pollination services to dozens of fruit and vegetable crops. This typically starts on the West Coast. 

Steven Cook: Every year commercial beekeepers transport their bees to California for almond pollination. Afterwards the honeybee colonies can be transported to other locations in the U.S. to pollinate different crops. 

Narrator: So, keeping bee colonies healthy is a priority for the US Department of Agriculture's Agricultural Research Service. This ARS lab in Beltsville Maryland is literally buzzing with activity. 

Steven Cook: For bee researchers one of the starting points in understanding honeybee health and the stresses that they're exposed to is to conduct very controlled laboratory cage studies where honeybees are exposed to these different stressors. 

Narrator: The scientists study honeybee nutrition as well as other threats to bee colony health. 

Samuel Abban: Viruses, pests and disease can work in combination to affect colony health and so reducing those impacts can improve colony health and reduce colony collapse incidents. 

Narrator: ARS scientists are looking to the emerging science of genomics as part of an integrated bee health strategy. 

Steven Cook: Methodologies including genomics can play a large role in helping us to decipher in great detail the effects of stress on honeybees and alleviate the negative effects of these stressors on honeybees. 

Narrator: In addition to agriculture, honeybees and other pollinators contribute greatly to healthy ecosystems and biodiversity around the world. 

In Beltsville Maryland for the US Department of Agriculture I'm Pat O'Leary.