Literatüre dayalı olarak hazırlanan bu makalede, balarıları ve yaban arıları hakkında kısa bilgiler verilmiş, balarısının meydana getirdiği bal, balmumu, arısütü, arı zehiri ve propolis yanında genel olarak kültür ve yabani bitkilerin tozlaşmasındaki önemi üzerinde durulurken yaban arılarının da önemine değinilmiştir. Bal arısı ve yaban arılarının tarımsal zararlılara karşı kullanılan insektisitlerden etkilenmeleri açıklanmış ve alınacak önlemler üzerinde durulmuştur

Goal: The goal of this review to summarize honey bees and wild bees and the effects of insecticides. Discussion: Bees are a group of insects take place in the Apiformes group of the superfamily Apoidea of the order Hymenoprera. Bees have usually ro-bust a hairy body, they differ from nearly all hyme-nopters in their dependence on pollen collected from flowers as a protein source to feed their lar-vae. Thus nearly all bees are plant feeders (phyto-phag). Nearly 20 000 species of bees have been formally described, and as many as 30 000 are estimated worldwide. Most of them are solitary species in which females single-handedly make a nest and produce the next generation of fertile offspring. Honey bee, Apis mellifera L. is the most important social bee species occurs almost world-wide. Pollination is an essential ecosystem service that depends to a large extent on symbiosis between species, the pollinated and pollinator. There is a close association between flowering plant and bees. Diversity among species, including agricul-tural crops, depends on bee pollination. Bees polli-nate over 16% of the world‟s flowering plant spe-cies. Although honey bee produces honey, wax, royal jelly, and propolis it plays a dominant role, being the only managed pollinator available for field and outdoor fruit crops. Additionally, honey bee is active in late winter and early spring, therefore, honey bee colonies are able to muster large num-bers of pollinators when they are needed for late winter and early spring blooms, as well as through-out the rest of the growing season. Wild bees are also valuable pollinators of many cultivated and uncultivated plants. The potential for using wild bees as managed crop pollinators has long been known. Several wild bee species current-ly are being used commercially or have potential for use as agricultural pollinators in various countries. Among the wild commercial pollinators, Osmia cor-nuta Latreille, O. rufa L. (fruit pollinators) and Me-gachile rotundata Fabricius (alfalfa pollinator) occur in Turkey too. Osmia cerinthidis Morawitz and O. caerulescens (L.) have potential for use as fruit pollinators, those of Rophites (Rhophitoides) canus Eversmann, Melitturga clavicornis Latr. and Melitta leporina Pr. have potential for alfalfa pollinators. Bumble bees are also important pollinators. Ap-proximately 50 bumble bee species occur in Tur-key. Although rearing bumble bees, faces many serious problems they are highly efficient green-house crop pollinators: Bombus terrestris L. has been using for especially pollination of tomato in greenhouses since 1990‟s in some European coun-tries as well as in Turkey. In general, B. terrestris occurs up to 1200 m in Turkey. B. terrestris was once very common along the coastal region of the country, last 15-20 years it has become extinct in this natural range due to residential area occupied almost all these places. I have to emphasize that all bumble bee species decline dramatically in the country. In the USA and some other developed countries honey bee, A. mellifera has been used commercial-ly in the pollination of agricultural crops; even de-mand for agricultural pollination services is increas-ing, particularly for crops that depend completely on pollinators. Although agriculture in Turkey is highly dependent on insect pollination, in particular from the honey bee, using honey bee commercially on crop pollination is very rare. Most agricultural polli-nation is provided an unpaid service by feral A. mellifera and wild bees. Unfortunately, there has been conflict between beekeepers and agricultural growers since the beginning of application of pesti-cides in the field. Particularly, beekeepers have been against pesticide applications due to giving damage to the bees. On the other hand, plant growers do not know the importance of bees as pollinators and bee pollination is required to pro-duce good quality and quantity of crops. Recent years, some plant growers recognized the impor-tance of bees in agriculture; they realized that polli-nation increases the value of the crops through higher yields and improved the quality. Thus, occa-sionally some growers, particularly in the western part of the country, request from beekeepers to move their colonies to the vicinity of their crop lands. However, Agricultural Ministry, Universities and Research Institutes should prepare compre-hensive and extensive long-term programs for edu-cation of the plant growers and beekeepers on using honey bee and even wild bees in the pollina-tion of agricultural crops. Moreover, Agricultural Ministry could support the plant growers financially for using bees commercially in the pollination of agricultural crops. Many insecticides used to control harmful insects can be poisonous to bees and other beneficial in-sects. Most insecticides are especially injurious and even eliminate some pollinator populations in eco-systems. Toxicity of insecticides to honey bee and wild bees were indicated in Table 1 and 2. Conlusion: For protecting bees from harmful ef-fects of insecticides: first of all, beekeepers should select the apiary locations with low pesticide risk whenever possible. Colonies of bees can be af-fected severely by improper use of insecticides. To protect bees and other beneficial insects, always safest insecticides should be used. Before spray-ing, growers should alert beekeepers at least one to two days before spraying. Timing of insecticide application is important: when crop is in bloom nev-er spray, if it is absolutely necessary late evening or early morning hours should be preferred. Weeds in blooming in crop area should be eliminated. Less hazard insecticides formulations should be pre-ferred. Moreover, it is worthy to indicate that fortu-nately, pesticides and other agricultural chemicals are not incorporated into the honey bee. Bees that collect pesticide-contaminated nectar or pollen usually die away from the hive. Bees usually leave the hive if they become poisoned. It is obvious that contaminated pollens may kill the nurse bees and the brood