Statistics show that over the last decade the honeybee population has been dropping. Last year, the U.S. lost around 33% of honeybee colonies from April 2016 to April 2017.
Beekeepers in Knoxville are now worried and confused as to why this is happening. Some blame it on pesticides, weather changes, lack of food or their habitats being destroyed.
There's even a petition online with nearly 130,000 signatures against the mass spraying of bee killing pesticides.
"It's a frustrating problem worldwide because we don't really know what's doing it," Phil Colclough, The Director of Animal Care at Zoo Knoxville.
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Colclough is a beekeeper outside of work and said he lost both of his honeybee colonies last year.
"You open the hive in the spring and many times they're all dead," he said.
The Tennessee Department of Agriculture said this could be due to several things including incorrect use of Pesticides.
A University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture study found that the honey bee hive actually improves around more agricultural production. According to this specific study, the bees closer to the production, where pesticides were being used, strived while the others farther away ended up starving to death.
The latest report on honeybee colonies will be released on May 12, 2018.