Introduction

Our Bumblebee nesting project started in 2011 as a bit of conservation to help the declining bumblebee population by encouraging one (or more) to nest in boxes in our garden. We discovered it's not easy, and our project quickly evolved into an ongoing and intimate study of these amazing creatures, which we are sharing here for the benefit of all.

Amongst our unexpected successes are:

A short clip in the film "Britain in a Day" by Ridley Scott (Broadcast by the BBC in 2012)

Featured in Wired Magazine for creating the World's first tweeting bumblebees

Winner of the Internet of Things award 2012 - Environmental Category

Oldest recorded age we can find of a worker Bufftailed Bumblebee - at 103 days

We've discovered, observed and collected a sizeable amount of real-world data, still being analysed and written up (Overview here). Additionally,

We've sourced several live colonies from commercial providers and have been looking after numerous disabled bees indoors.

We've learnt to recognise individual bees, spot specific/individual behaviour patterns

We measured efficiency and can predict some of their behaviour triggers.

We have some CCTV cameras pointing at the nestboxes and inside!

You can also follow BeeBoxALula on twitter where our bumblebees tweet live for themselves!

Insights

We're also using tech to monitor the lives of our bumblebees - visual, audio, temperature, sunlight, weather. We can see how the environment impacts their behaviour and understand, capture and share the marvels of their secret lives.

As a species under great threat, we've brought the critical study of Bumblebees into the Multimedia age and revealed intriguing and new insights based on direct observation.

This post is a day late because I didn't get chance yesterday - and is a quick update on the Queen (QB2012-06) we introduced to the nest on Saturday night (March 24th). We introduced her to the box around 4.15pm (GMT as it was then) and after 2 hours is what clear she was going to stay the night.

We placed the capture tube against the entrance of the nestbox and she was quick to enter, mooching about while we loosened the moss in the end of the tube; we left it in place up against the box.

I also set up the cameras so they would record her leaving in the morning.

On Sunday morning I got up (clocks went forward, so I was groggy!) and it looked like the moss had been dislodged so I assumed she had gone. I checked several hours of footage, nothing, so I was a bit baffled, but assumed she must have broken out before sunrise (which bothered me).

Anyway, later we decided to see what she'd done to the bedding, so had a look through the red filter about midday, and she was still in there! Now I was worried because this meant she probably hadn't been able to break out as I thought; and now she was scratching at the air vents.

So, as a test I changed the capture tube for the narrow, longer piping (about 50cm), but she still showed no interest, I think not enough light coming down it. So, in the end I changed it again for our short 'funnel' made from the head of a bottle and she soon emerged.

She walked out, probably a bit hungry! And spent nearly 30 minutes foraging on our heather and wandering about, preening on our gravel and generally getting back into shape. We may have stressed her a little more than we intended, so we figured we'd go a lot easier on the moss (consequently today two queens escaped before even going into the box, but that's ok, I'd rather it was that way). Always a learning process!

I'm convinced this queen flew back again twice, she actually seemed to have an interest in the same piece of garage wall on all three occasions and followed same flight path. But who knows?

It was a beautiful day, so I went out again today and caught a redtail (QB2012-07) and a bufftail (QB2012-08). Redtail got away by breaking out from the moss end of the tube before entering the box - this is fine; better that than undue stress. We placed the bufftail at about 4:50pm (remember, the clocks went forward so sunset has moved to 7:30pm) and observed for well over an hour and she stayed in the box. We made sure she could easily escape - just attaching 50cm tubing unhindered to the outside world - although it's quite dark, perhaps not obvious as an exit at first.

I actually didn't see many nest searching today, they were all resting in the warm late afternoon sun. Quite a lot of bumbles actually: carders, bufftailed, redtail... But mainly I saw them all foraging and resting, barely any nest searching.

I checked the cameras this morning from about 6.20am non-stop to about midday and saw nothing of our Queen. Eventually BCW had a look in the box and she was not there. I think therefore that she didn't stay the night, but actually snuck out about 6.30pm when we decided to eat. In a way it's good, because it meant she discovered and used the long thin tube. She didn't come back today though, so we just have to keep a lookout for any of the queens returning a later date if they liked the box.

BCW also made some adjustments to the box - to flatten the bedding a bit to improve the camera view and to provide some sugar water in the box. We're really happy with the setup now.

Nik Sargent

Nik Sargent

Bumblebee Project Home / Blog

Nik Sargent

Introduction

Insights

Blog:

Gone but not forgotten...

Nik Sargent