Dead bees on a truck. Travelling long distances for several days is exhausting for the bees. Because of the lack of water and high temperatures some colonies die during the transportation. Beekeeping in the USA is done on an industrial way with bees being transported for thousands of miles all year round. After a winter in warm Texas, beekeepers take their bees to California in February and March. Here they stay for at least six weeks. From the almond orchards they take them to the orange orchards in the same state. Next are the apples and cherry pollinations in Washington State, followed by the blueberry honey harvest in Maine and the cranberry harvest in Massachusetts. By then winter has returned and the beekeepers travel back south where the bees can make an early start the following year. Each year in February, beekeepers from all over the USA move their honey bees to feed on the nectar from California's blooming almond orchards. A total of 1.5 million bee colonies or nearly 70 billion bees are needed for the pollination of the almond trees. That is about one third of the continent's bees. The bee hives are loaded hundreds at a time onto trucks and transported to their assigned orchards. For the pollination services of their bees the beekeepers receive a fee of about 180 USD per hive. That means more money than the mere selling of honey. But since 2006 bees have been dying in large numbers due to pests like the varroa mite, the use of insecticides such as neonicotinoids and the lack of pastures to feed on. In the winter of 2015, according to the American agricultural ministry, 42 percent of US honey bees perished and beekeepers are having a hard time to provide enough bee colonies for the annual pollination of the almond orchards.