Climate change is forcing bees to develop shorter tongues
DOI: 10.1063/PT.5.029237
New Scientist : The tongues of bumblebees are 25% shorter than they were 40 years ago. That observation was made by Candace Galen of the University of Missouri–Columbia and colleagues, who compared current bees with specimens collected between 1966 and 1980. The modification does not indicate that either the bees themselves or the flowers have grown smaller, however. The researchers say that bumblebees originally evolved to have longer tongues in order to specialize in flowers with deep corolla tubes. But those with shorter tongues can feed on a wider variety of flower sizes. Because global warming has caused a 60% drop in the number of flowers since the 1970s, bumblebees with shorter tongues are better equipped to forage among the remaining floral resources.
