Save The Bees

Loading the search catalogs…

Sign inAdopt a hive

Adopt a hive. It helps pay for wild bee habitat.

You support a community hive in your city. A partner beekeeper cares for it, and you can follow its verified updates in Hive Notes.

Adopt a hiveFind your city

Adopt a hive

Pick a community and a honey, tell us how many adoptions you want, and personalize it. You pay on the Stripe page.

Find your city

Search by city or state. A city page can go live before a hive is on the ground, so you can follow your area and ask for a hive where you live.

ZIP search is not available yet.

100 cities in the list

88 more cities
Request a cityStart a Hive

This list shows the 100 US metros in our catalog. The globe shows the 50 states. A pin marks a state, not a hive. Neither is a live map of operating hives.

Open campaigns

These are the live campaigns that are open for adoptions. Each card opens the Adopt flow.

Loading campaigns.

How a campaign moves

We assign each live campaign one stage at a time. These steps describe the process.

  1. Gathering Interest

    What you can do
    Follow, volunteer, propose host

  2. In Review

    What you can do
    Follow progress, supply details

  3. Ready to Fund

    What you can do
    Support through approved payment. The goal makes it Fully Funded

  4. Launching and Active

    What you can do
    Follow establishment progress and Hive Notes

The steps group the campaign statuses.

Pollinators help grow the food on your plate

Pollinators help the nine crops in color. Wheat, rice, and maize, in gray, need no pollinators.[1]
Food crops depend at least in part on pollinators[2]
3 in 4
Of global crop production, by volume, gets help from pollinators[2]
35%
Of 115 leading food crops yield more with pollinators[2]
87

More crops to pollinate. Fewer U.S. honey bee hives.

Since 1987, world production of fruit, vegetables, and tree nuts has grown 176%. World population has grown 62%. Reported U.S. honey bee hives have fallen 22%.

Change since 1987
  • World fruit, vegetables, and tree nuts[3]+176%
  • World population[4]+62%
  • U.S. honey bee hives[5]−22%

Context figures, not Adopt The Bees impact measures.

Sources, method, and every year from 1987 to 2024

Sources

  1. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Pollinators Benefit Economies; Klein and others, Importance of pollinators in changing landscapes for world crops.
  2. FAO, Global Action on Pollination Services for Sustainable Agriculture.
  3. FAOSTAT, world production of fruit, vegetables, and tree nuts. The figure leaves out cereals.
  4. World Bank, world population.
  5. USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service, U.S. honey-producing colonies. The count leaves out wild bees and the hives of other countries.

How we made the figures

The values are world production in tonnes, the sum of FAO Fruit Primary, Vegetables Primary, and Treenuts. The sum does not include cereals. The groups include some crops, such as bananas, that set fruit with little animal pollination. The figures are production, not a measure of unmet demand.

The values are the World Bank total population of the world, indicator SP.POP.TOTL. We round each value to a whole person.

The values are U.S. honey-producing colonies from the USDA NASS survey. They are not the world count of managed hives. FAO reports that world hive stocks rose. This figure is the U.S. count, which fell. It does not include wild bees, and it does not include colonies kept only for pollination. The page calls each colony a hive.

YearWorld fruit, vegetables, and tree nutsChange since 1987World populationChange since 1987U.S. honey bee hivesChange since 1987
1987781,685,1890%5,026,770,3850%3,316,0000%
1988792,539,992+1%5,116,898,810+2%3,370,000+2%
1989814,569,661+4%5,207,378,374+4%3,528,000+6%
1990825,880,233+6%5,298,962,018+5%3,220,000−3%
1991826,547,389+6%5,388,203,305+7%3,211,000−3%
1992865,850,884+11%5,476,822,930+9%3,045,000−8%
1993910,176,014+16%5,564,459,142+11%2,875,000−13%
1994934,776,861+20%5,650,534,421+12%2,783,000−16%
1995977,736,810+25%5,736,205,135+14%2,655,000−20%
19961,038,451,969+33%5,822,327,903+16%2,581,000−22%
19971,069,206,275+37%5,908,180,322+18%2,631,000−21%
19981,090,557,625+40%5,993,730,786+19%2,637,000−20%
19991,169,877,641+50%6,078,069,822+21%2,652,000−20%
20001,259,747,726+61%6,161,528,496+23%2,622,000−21%
20011,288,221,246+65%6,244,739,668+24%2,550,000−23%
20021,327,984,562+70%6,327,171,255+26%2,574,000−22%
20031,364,589,817+75%6,409,352,386+28%2,599,000−22%
20041,410,897,586+80%6,492,354,627+29%2,554,000−23%
20051,453,337,067+86%6,575,410,029+31%2,409,000−27%
20061,509,675,868+93%6,659,536,021+32%2,394,000−28%
20071,553,936,614+99%6,744,049,498+34%2,443,000−26%
20081,606,614,501+106%6,830,080,867+36%2,342,000−29%
20091,651,937,742+111%6,916,168,196+38%2,498,000−25%
20101,689,678,433+116%7,000,860,073+39%2,692,000−19%
20111,742,163,345+123%7,086,704,141+41%2,491,000−25%
20121,777,962,235+127%7,176,482,165+43%2,539,000−23%
20131,831,096,307+134%7,265,404,737+45%2,641,000−20%
20141,878,312,006+140%7,353,532,223+46%2,741,000−17%
20151,933,728,956+147%7,441,084,771+48%2,661,000−20%
20161,938,719,024+148%7,528,221,579+50%2,780,000−16%
20171,960,295,978+151%7,613,788,655+51%2,684,000−19%
20181,993,241,389+155%7,696,159,728+53%2,828,000−15%
20192,028,313,282+159%7,777,162,476+55%2,812,000−15%
20202,057,113,404+163%7,853,863,139+56%2,706,000−18%
20212,100,407,938+169%7,919,567,995+58%2,697,000−19%
20222,121,574,173+171%7,988,550,201+59%2,667,000−20%
20232,143,433,012+174%8,062,923,417+60%2,532,000−24%
20242,154,330,393+176%8,140,897,523+62%2,597,000−22%