Bees Key Indicator for Climate Change

If we had the time and knew how to listen, Nature could tell us thousands of stories about how climate change is affecting life on Earth. Every tree, every insect, every bird has something important to say on the subject. From every forest, every wetland, every ocean come more stories than there are scientists to listen. Several years ago, NASA oceanographer and amateur beekeeper Wayne Esaias realized he was overhearing one of those stories. The talk of climate change was coming from his bees. Much of the science we hear about�brought to us by schoolbooks or 10-second blurbs on the radio or TV news�are stories whose end is already known. Knowledge itself may be provisional, but the stories we hear about science often focus on what's finished: an experiment is complete, the data are in, a result is known. But when you're a scientist, you know that between the moment when you think "I wonder why...?" and the moment when you finally understand can lie a long stretch of time where the significance of your idea, your ability to collect the data you need to test it, and the ultimate outcome of your effort is uncertain. Biological oceanographer Wayne Esaias has been passing through one of those uncertain stretches.