15/08/2025
Writing history here with my favourite berry farmer 🧑🌾 by attempting something that was never done in Scotland before (to our knowledge) 😳
How to raise native Scottish bumblebees?
Step 1 🐝 catch bumble queens
Step 2 🐝 put them in suitable nest and supply with bedding materials and food
Step 3 🐝 give them shelter and let them do the rest
That’s it 🤷🏻♀️
now we observe and wait to see if they’ll settle and overwinter well enough to establish their nests and start colonies in the spring 🤞🏻
Stay tuned to find out how they do and if it would work at all or our bumbles will buzz off to pastures greener 💭
Next year we can improve the system and put few more steps in place 🤭 and who knows - might even develop a bumblebee rearing operation unit to help support the local berry farmers and supply them with native Scottish local bumbles and save them having to import bumble boxes from abroad 🤷🏻♀️
To give you some background as to why we’re even attempting such a thing 🤔 all Scottish berry farmers are buying bumble boxes from Spain or the continent every year, to a great expense to them and their farms, to help boost pollination and get that extra help their berries are needing. Yes from Spain as no one in Scotland or even in the UK is offering bumble boxes on commercial scale. Even the farmers, that are lucky enough to have honeybees at their disposal at the farms to lend a helping hand / or wing 🪽 to their berries, are still needing the bumbles as they’re hardier and buzzing out and about even at lower temperatures than the honey bees. So this happens every year. Farmers import bumble boxes (made out of durable plastic to withstand the travel and months of use in all weather conditions) and once the nests finish their cycle and the bumbles are gone - then all those hundreds of boxes are just disposed off to be recycled and then it all starts again next year and not just that but also the bumble boxes are attracting unwanted vermin attention 🦡 which cause all sorts of trouble and damage but don’t let me drift from the main point 🤭
So my question was - why nobody in scotland is doing this? 🤦🏻♀️- to minimise the environmental impact, travel, carbon footprint, transmission of diseases and over-riding native acclimatised species by flooding the habitat with bumbles from different climate? Ok I’m not a bumblebee expert but if we can manage to raise honeybees here successfully, why not try cultivate some bumblebees and in doing so help the farmers, help the local species and preserve them?
So that’s why we tried to do just that - re-using some spent boxes 📦 we just gutted them out and refilled with food (inverted syrup for honeybees) and bedding (hay) and provided shelter, so Here’s hoping this simple method would help them re-use the boxes again and build a nest inside🤞🏻
No idea if we’re wasting our breaths or just grasping straws in desperate attempts to make a difference, but certainly it’s worth the try, me thinks. 💪
We’ll have more time in the winter to research the matter while our bumble queens are hibernating (hopefully) and we’ll know what to do for next year, but until then - saying our prayers and hoping for the BEEst
If you can offer insights to our wee conservation attempt of a project, or got any useful feedback - please do give us a buzz
And most of all - Wish us luck 🍀
Wonder 🐝 Buzz 🐝 Repeat 🐝
