US Bee Loss 2014-2015 is a map created by  Andrew Hill based on data from the Bee Informed Partnership. I was drawn to this map for two main reasons. The first was the strange topic, the second was the hexagon/honeycomb tiling. I find this map amusing as well as pretty, but on closer inspection I don’t think that the hexagons are a good idea. They lead to a loss of geographic information. All states are the same size and are not positioned in relation to each other very accurately. The Bee Informed Partnership made a very similar map, but without the hexagons. I found their map rather dull to look at, but much more informative when it comes to state geography. My other gripe with this map is that it doesn’t provide very much meaningful context for the information it displays. For example, is this much bee loss normal? Is state law causing the differences between states? What is the take away?

Overall I really like how this map gets me thinking about a topic I had never thought about previously, I just wish it could go in to more detail an not let it’s fun aesthetic interfere with the key data.