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Bumblebees Dying in Pumpkin Flowers
Help please. I am distraught! My 5 year old son wanted to grow his own pumpkins this year. The plants have done really well and every flower has had 3 or 4 bumblebees at any one time inside feeding from the nectar. But now I have noticed that they are dying inside. They are dead in the bottom of open flowers and I opened some dead flowers and there were dead bees inside. We’d been so excited that the bees were loving the flowers but now I feel sick to think the plant might be killing them. Do pumpkin flowers kill bumblebees?
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https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/03/200311161908.htm#:~:text=Bumblebees do visit pumpkin and,up pollinating the next flower.
I wonder if anyone else on the forum has observed this?
They're going to die at some point so would be surprised if was anything other than their time to go.
This is about hornets: “They contract their abdominal muscles to exhale and relax the muscles to inhale. As the insects exhale, the plates of their exoskeleton gradually cover the spiracles, and hornets can only open the plates back up to uncover the holes when their abdomens are free to move.” But maybe the same for bumblebees?
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2007/09/honey-bee-defense-leaves-hornets-breathless