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# Australia just met its own pollinators
- URL: https://www.earthtoseanews.com/native-bees/
- Published: 2026-08-11T20:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-08-21T08:05:31.000Z
- Description: The first national picture of who actually pollinates Australia has been drawn, and the native bees come out of it looking like heroes in waiting.
- Author: Nicole McMahon
- Tags: Global Good News, All stories, Rewilding

For the first time, Australia has a complete national picture of its pollination system: the Pollination Security Status Report 2026, assembled for the Australian Pollination Strategy with the Wheen Bee Foundation, maps who pollinates what across our farms, gardens and bush, from commercial honey bee hives to the two thousand or so native bee species that do quiet unpaid work everywhere flowers grow. A map like this is a gift, because it shows exactly where help will matter most in the years ahead. And one of its brightest findings concerns the locals: of the crops that will most need extra pollination in future, seven, including avocados, blueberries, macadamias, mangoes, melons and strawberries, can also be pollinated by Australia's own native stingless bees.

We are still being introduced to those locals, one small marvel at a time. A Curtin University survey in the WA Goldfields recently turned up a tiny bee with little horns on her face, found living around one rare wildflower and named Megachile lucifer, the light bringer, by researcher Dr Kit Prendergast. Museum scientists led by Dr Remko Leijs have lately lifted the known tally of resin pot bees, which build tiny nurseries of plant resin on twigs, from seven species to seventy eight. By the best estimates about five hundred Australian native bees are still waiting for names. Spring is close: the report's authors would tell you the kindest thing a gardener can do is plant local flowers and let the unnamed workforce get on with it.

Our short take: the Pollination Security Status Report 2026 is published by the **Australian Pollination Strategy** with the **Wheen Bee Foundation**. The horned bee was described by **Dr Kit Prendergast** of **Curtin University**; the resin pot bees by **Dr Remko Leijs** of the **South Australian Museum** with **Dr Judith King** of the Queensland Museum. Cover photograph: blue banded bees by Mark Kineth Casindac, [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0?ref=earthtoseanews.com), via Wikimedia Commons.