Members recently enjoyed a fascinating talk by Gill
Perkins, Chief Executive Officer of Bumblebee Conservation Trust. This organisation, established 12 years ago
is dedicated to protecting the UKs bumblebees which have suffered a rapid
decline (including the loss of two species).
The reason is quite straight forward - in the last 75 years Britain has
lost 97% of its’ wildflower meadows which the bumblebees have relied upon for
food in the form of nectar produced by the flowers. In so feeding the bees do the vital job of
pollination. Most importantly they do the same for the country’s fruit and veg
crops and indeed because of the structure of the flowers it is only bumblebees
that can pollinate tomato plants. Due to
the drastic decline in the number of our bumblebees we import a staggering
65000 boxes of commercially reared bumblebees from abroad each year to make up
the shortfall in pollinators. This is by
no means ideal as they could bring various pests and diseases with them,
exposing our native bumblebees to them.
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An Early Bumblebee found during our outing to Ham Wall last May
©
Richard Coomber
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At first glance one might wonder how a bumblebee can
remain airborne with its large body and small wings: the secret is in the
strength of the chest muscles coupled with a fast rate of wing beats. We have six species of common bumblebee: White-tailed, Buff-tailed, Garden, Early, Red-tailed and Common Carder. To these may
be added the Tree Bumblebee - a species which arrived more recently from
France. It tends to nest higher up than
our native species and does not in any event conflict with them. The bumblebee has a four stage life
cycle. Only the Queens survive the
winter having mated and when they emerge they immediately look for a nesting
place -an old mouse or vole burrow is ideal.
She will then construct a wax bowl in which to store the nectar she
collects (the flowers of goat willow are particularly valuable at this time of
year ) and lays eggs which hatch in five days; the larvae are dependent upon
the collected nectar and are ready to pupate in three weeks. These are all females and when they hatch
their function will be to look after the Queen and to collect food. In June/July unfertilised eggs are laid which
will become male bumblebees. These have
a relatively easy life, their only function to mate which they will do with a
Queen from a different nest from the one in which they were born. The new Queen will then look for a cool
secure place in which to hibernate and in the Spring the cycle begins
again.
It was explained that everyone can help in giving
bumblebees a chance to recover their numbers by introducing to their garden
flowers with high nectar content: examples are lavenders, alliums, mahonia and
hellebores. Unfortunately bedding plants
are not much use for this purpose. The
other useful thing to do is of course to join Bumblebee Conservation Trust
which is a science based evidence led charity.
It has worked with all four of the regional governments in the UK and in
each case the result has been the establishment of a pollination strategy. Apart from this high level work Bumblebee
Conservation Trusts main areas of activity are creating and restoring wild
flower habitats in the most needed areas, encouraging bee friendly gardening,
advice to landowners, farmers and local councils as to how they can help, working with schools to inspire the next
generation and survey work to collect data.
Their website is www.bumblebeeconservation.org
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| Tree Bumblebees using a bird's nest box
©
Richard Coomber
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