Bumblebee Conservation Trust – Enviro-Mentalist

Three bees are better than two bees

I decided to do this month’s bee walk on Saturday even though it was a bit breezy and not very warm. I checked the weather forecast and saw cold and potentially rain for the next week or so and figured that the sunshine and a warmer week running up to Saturday might have been enough to tempt the bees out. Unfortunately I was wrong.

During the bee survey (which lasted over an hour) we saw a grand total of three bumblebees (one unidentified, one carder bee and one red-tailed). There was plenty out there for them to eat and we saw plenty of hoverflies and solitary bees, but virtually no bumbles. After we had finished the survey and were walking home we found another two bees, but still five was a bit unexpected.

However, I don’t think the colder weather was to blame, after all, bumbles are furry little creatures and can manage the cold better than a lot of other insects. I think this was a matter of timing. Early in the year bumble queens, the only bumbles to overwinter, emerge from their winter quarters looking for food and somewhere to nest for the year. Once they have enough nutrition they lay create a wax cup that they fill with nectar and create a pollen ball in which they lay their eggs. After a few days these hatch into larvae which then remain in the nest for a few weeks until they metamorphose into a bee. During this time the queen has to brood the eggs and larvae to keep them warm (hence the nectar) and she can only go out foraging for short periods of time. Hence, I think most of the queens were in their nests and the first lot of workers have probably not emerged yet so there is a paucity of bumblebees at the moment.

My first bumblebee walk

This year I signed up to do my first proper wildlife survey (one step up from the annual Big Garden Birdwatch or Big Butterfly Count, both of which I do most years). I have developed an interest in Bumblebees, I’m not sure why, I think it is through a combination of watching them through my macro lens and also because of all the information that is now out there due to the worry over the disappearance of pollinators.

The Bumblebee Conservation Trust launched it’s BeeWalk last year. It is asking volunteers to choose a 1-2km walk (as compared to a lot of surveys where the walks are in randomly allocated squares) and to walk it once a month between March and October, preferably in warm, dry and still conditions, and recording any bees spotted along the way.

I chose my route in an area where I knew I would have no trouble getting to once a month (in fact I tend to visit most parts of it every week) and then refined it to take in as many different habitats as I could. It starts in an industrial estate, heads past some fields, some new houses with some scrubby bits, more fields and more grasslands and houses. Not overly inspirational, but I am hopeful for some bumbles this summer.

What I wasn’t too hopeful about was my chances of seeing some bumbles this weekend. The weather has not been exactly warm, but with the forecast for today looking better than the rest of the week, and March rapidly vanishing into the realms of memory, I thought I’d better get my bum in gear and get out there looking for bees. This is actually a good time of year to start learning about bees because there are only the queens of true bumblebees generally about. There are no males, very few workers and none of those pesky cuckoo bees to confuse an amateur.

However, I was pleasantly surprised as there were actually some bees out. Due to a lack of flowers to be seen on the ground, I had to look up into the trees to find them, and it took a while to get my eye in. However, during the 1 hour walk I managed to spot 8 bees of three different species (and two butterflies, one hoverfly and a lacewing).

Most of the bees, with the exception of two queens which were quartering the ground under some hedgerows, were feeding on willow catkins (I have no idea if these were from goat willow, crack willow or grey willow as I didn’t even realise that there were as many different types until I looked online). When most people think of bees, they think of flowers, and if they think of trees at all they think of cherry blossom. However, at this time of year, the catkins of willow trees are an important source of nectar and pollen for bees and other insects. This became evident when we stood under one of the willows watching the honeybees in the tree. It sounded as though we were stood near to a hive. We spotted more than a dozen and they were so covered in willow pollen that they were glinting in the sunlight, looking as golden as the catkins themselves.

The next time I’m out and about I’ll definitely make a bee-line for the willows and see what’s buzzing.

Bumblebee Identification

I joined the Bumblebee Conservation Trust last year following a Summer trying to photograph them which made me realise how interesting and different they all were. Couple that with all of the coverage regarding the plight of the honeybee which also extends, although for different reasons, to other pollinators, and I decided that it was time I discovered more about the bees in my garden.

Fast forward a year and with my new found interest in invertebrates I started to discover there were more bees about than I had realised, including my favourite, the red-tailed bumblebee, and others such as the wonderfully named hairy footed flower bee. Despite many attempts and lots of photos, I still felt at a loss when it came to positively identifying them. When I saw an advert for a bumblebee identification session at Leicester University on a Sunday afternoon then I signed up straight away.

I arrived early and thought I would go and try and find some bees to photograph – as you would (and, amazingly, got some photos I was really pleased with). They had some lavender beds in their herb garden which we literally buzzing as well as some other plant such as echinops which also seemed pretty popular.

Anyway, back to the course. It was run by a lovely lady called Maggie, who is obviously obsessed by bees. She went through the lifecycle of bees, some of the differences between them and included a list of plants that she had created and which she had subsequently grouped according to how many species of bee visited them. I came away realising that I had to be a little more choosy about the plants that I am putting in the garden and with some ideas for research that I could also undertake. First, however, I need to be able to identify them.

I was hoping to come away from a couple of hours amongst the flowers with the ability to recognise the common bumbles, the big six. But, there are queens, workers and males – so the big six became 18, and then there are the cuckoo bumble bees – another 4 types with males and females so we are now at 26! Suddenly it was not as easy as I had hoped. (Cuckoo bumbles don’t need workers as they parasitise the nests of particular bumbles so use their workers to care for their offspring.) Then, as the bees get older, just like us they fade and get greyer, well, paler – so then all the descriptions seem to go out of the window!

Did I come away knowing many of the 26? Well, we did find four of the big six – but they are mainly males and workers at this time of year, the queens are in the nests. So, I can recognise a carder bee (a little fluffy, ginger bee), and the red-tailed bumble bee, I will also have a go at the buff and white tailed bees (the male white-tailed bumble bees are particularly lovely – see photo above), but we didn’t see the early or garden bumblebees, so I will carry on looking. However, we did find three or four species of cuckoo bee, which I may have seen before and just not realised what they were (such as the one in the photo on the right)! So, although I am not fully convinced that I can get the big six yet, I have now a better idea, and think I can have a go at finding cuckoo bees. I will also be planning some winter research and some more bee-friendly plants for next year.