Who thinks bumblebees are important?
The frightening prospect of a world without bumblebees could become a reality.
We have already lost two of our precious bumblebee species in the UK, and several others are seriously threatened.
They are declining mainly because of the change in habitat and since the 1940’s we have lost over 98% of our flower rich grasslands.
There has been changes in agriculture to produce more food but this has also made the countryside less useful for wildlife.
We have seen the landscape, once covered in wildflowers, transformed to vast monocultures of grassy field with little food for bumblebees.
Bumblebees pollinate 84% of our crops. Some of the crops pollinated by them include raspberries, strawberries and many more soft fruit, tomatoes, peas, beans, apples, even almonds, courgettes, pumpkins and aubergines.
What bumblebees need is habitat. Therefore it is essential to plant bumblebee friendly flowers to feed them during their life cycle through early spring to late summer.
Planting bumblebee friendly flowers is not a competition for the best garden or the best community park, yet there is a prize at the end. That prize is the survival of the bumblebee, and when the new queen emerges from her hibernation she can find the nectar needed to give her energy with which she can create a new nest, lay her eggs and produce the next generation.
As each nest will comprise of 50 – 400 new bumblebees, the death of one single bumblebee queen (the mother) in the spring through lack of food constitutes already a great loss to their species.
The frightening prospect of a world without bumblebees could become a reality.
We have already lost two of our precious bumblebee species in the UK, and several others are seriously threatened.
They are declining mainly because of the change in habitat and since the 1940’s we have lost over 98% of our flower rich grasslands.
There has been changes in agriculture to produce more food but this has also made the countryside less useful for wildlife.
We have seen the landscape, once covered in wildflowers, transformed to vast monocultures of grassy field with little food for bumblebees.
Bumblebees pollinate 84% of our crops. Some of the crops pollinated by them include raspberries, strawberries and many more soft fruit, tomatoes, peas, beans, apples, even almonds, courgettes, pumpkins and aubergines.
What bumblebees need is habitat. Therefore it is essential to plant bumblebee friendly flowers to feed them during their life cycle through early spring to late summer.
Planting bumblebee friendly flowers is not a competition for the best garden or the best community park, yet there is a prize at the end. That prize is the survival of the bumblebee, and when the new queen emerges from her hibernation she can find the nectar needed to give her energy with which she can create a new nest, lay her eggs and produce the next generation.
As each nest will comprise of 50 – 400 new bumblebees, the death of one single bumblebee queen (the mother) in the spring through lack of food constitutes already a great loss to their species.