Maybe the author doesn't see insects as they are in a heavily populated city with exterminators everywhere. Down in Southern California I have seen more bees this past year than I have ever seen. A few things I do feel like I see alot less than I used to see is dragonflies and praying mantis. I remember as a kid I used to see so many of both, now I may see one or two a month(dragonflies), and praying mantis once or twice a year.
Do you mean honey bees because those would be more like looking to cows or sheep population as a metric of general wild animal population.
My area of SoCal is HOA/office park “landscaped” with near zero variety of plants for miles around. There are very few flying insects in my yard. I did attract some caterpillars this year, but they are very particular about plants. The caterpillar on the native gooseberry stays there, the tomatoes get hornworms and the other plant gets budworms. Bugs can be very specific and the grass and office park shrub monoculture around is not supportive of a diverse insect population.
I've had a different year, as well. Fewer bees seemed pretty obvious, but more wasps this year, including a swarm of wasps that I didn't even know swarmed--they normally have 3 or 4 wasps on a relatively small hive.
But I've got lots and lots of mantises this year. One evening, attracted by the lights of my workshop, I counted 6 mantises climbing around my windows at the same time. I've continued to see them elsewhere, though one at a time. I've never seen more than a few per season, previously.
I have a crap ton of bees visit my flowers and happened to get chatted up one day while outside garden gin by someone who keeps bees. If memory serves he’s about 10 blocks away, so I never would have solved that on my own just by walking around looking for hives.
Could be you have new neighbors.
Half of my bees are bumbles (at least one nest in my yard), maybe the odd mason, and hoverflies. But I’m on an edge of a garden district, less than a mile from a river, so I see lots of things. I’m pretty sure I’m part of a corridor between the two.
