Beekeepers are asking gardeners to be on the lookout for Asian hornets, following another confirmed sighting in the UK An Asian hornet was found in early April by a member of the public in Bury in Lancashire, on a cauliflower which had been grown in Boston in Lincolnshire. The Asian hornet is a predator of various invertebrates, including honeybees, and…

Hozelock have a bee in their bonnet about helping Britain’s bees! With the help of Bizzi, their friendly mascot, Hozelock are running a campaign to encourage you to plant bee-friendly plants to help save Britain’s bees. Honey bees are disappearing at an alarming rate and Hozelock’s campaign is a call to action for gardeners nationwide to play their part –…

The most extensive study of neonicotinoid pesticides to date has concluded that they do harm both honeybees and wild bees. Exposure to the chemicals was found to leave honeybee hives less likely to survive over winter, while bumblebees and solitary bees produced fewer queens. The study, published in Science, spanned 2,000 hectares across the UK, Germany and Hungary and was…

Over 15,000 participants and over 280,000 bees recorded so far More than 15,000 people have so far taken part in Friends of the Earth’s Great British Bee Count [2,3], recording over 280,000 bees – and nature-lovers still have until 30 June to join the buzz, the environmental charity said today One of the bees spotted – and photographed – is…

The Blooms for Bees team wants to improve bedding plant recommendations to support pollinators. The new Blooms for Bees project is looking for citizen scientists to take part in an experiment to assess ‘Mignon’ dahlias, to determine their value for bumblebees and whether the various colours differ in their attractiveness. Many bedding plants have been bred for appearance, often to…

London bees with number-plates this summer. If you see a London bee with a number-plate this summer, don’t start questioning your sanity: biologists at Queen Mary University of London are tagging bees as part of The London Pollinator Project, which aims to locate bees’ preferred patches in the capital and identify their favourite flowers. Each bee is being fitted with…