RE-INTRODUCTION OF THE SHORT-HAIRED BUMBLEBEE

I was very lucky to be invited along to the reintroduction of this extinct British bumblebee. The bee was last recorded in the UK in 1988 and officially declared extinct in 2000. Its demise is the result of farming, the use of pesticides etc and the destruction of hedgerows to make way for vast fields of crops. Scientists have been working for the last three years on reintroducing this species into the UK and the day finally arrived for the reintroduction on 28 May 2012 at the RSPB Dungeness nature reserve! The project has been a collaberation of Hymettus, Natural England and the RSPB. There has also been a lot of liaison with local farmers on Romney Marsh and the sowing of swathes of marshland with the wildflower species that the bee needs in order to survive.

Dr Nikki Gammans has been key to the whole project and she and colleagues went over to Skane in Sweden earlier this year to collect Short-haired bumblebee queens to release in the UK. Sweden has a large Short-haired bumblebee population and after negotiations with the Swedish scientists etc it was agreed that the team could collect some bees to release in the UK. The bees were caught in nets, placed in vials and housed in fridges at 5 degrees to calm them and they were fed for 5 days on a nectar solution. Once in the UK, strict quarantine was observed for two weeks to make sure no parasites had been brought back with the bees. Some bees sadly died from parasite infestation but 51 survived.

Dungeness (2 photos above) was chosen as the release site as the bee had previously been recorded there and its climatic conditions and native flora were ideal and similar to those in Skane. Dungeness is a fascinating place, a shingle habitat. Shingle habitats are rare worldwide and Dungeness has 40% of the UKs shingle reserve. Dungeness has three distinct habitats - young shingle, lichen heath and wild grassland. This results in a rich biodiversity in the area, with over 500 species of wildlife recorded there. It is a national nature reserve and a site of special scientific interest.

On the release day, the British media did a stirling job in keeping the event in the public eye all day via radio and TV news bulletins. The RSPB centre in Dungeness was a hive of activity with film crews and people invited along to witness the event. After all the media interviews, the process of releasing the bees could then get underway. Nikki went off to her campervan to get the bees out of the fridge and they were handed out in cool bags to four group leaders to be released at four different sites.

The group I was in went off across the shingle to a patch of Yellow Flag Irises and the queens were taken out of the cool bag in their plastic boxes and vials. We had 8 of the 51. As they warmed up they started to get a bit feisty and were keen to be off!

One by one the boxes and vials were opened and the bees started to clamber out. Once they realised freedom was to be had, they were off! Some still needed to warm up a bit so were happy to sit on someone's hands to absorb the heat. It was a splendid moment and one I won't forget, watching them fly off to freedom and a new life, and hopefully to multiply in numbers across the surrounding area.

It was a lovely sight watching the bees fly off into the flowers and we could occasionally spot them as they went from flower to flower. It was quite an idyllic scene - warm weather, clear blue skies, reed warblers singing their hearts out and a couple of cuckoos flying around!







The story doesn't end there. The bee's progress will be closely monitored and more queens are planned for collection and release over the next two or three years. Truly a conservation success so far.