Ian’s keeping track of our indispensible bumble bees
REPORTER DAVID MEDCALF IMMERSED HIMSELF RECENTLY IN THE BUZZING LIFE OF A FLOWER BED IN GLENDALOUGH, WHERE NATURALIST IAN EDWARDS GOES HUNTING FOR THE BUMBLE BEES THAT HELP KEEP THE POPULATION OF THE WORLD FED
THE last time Ian Edwards was interviewed for this newspaper, his quarry were the deer which roam the hillsides close to his place of work at the education centre in Glendalough. On this latest occasion, however, the enthusiastic naturalist has his sights set on much smaller creatures – bumble bees. He is a well informed source of practical knowledge on all sorts of fauna, with moths one of his particular specialist subjects.
The education centre was installed by the Parks and Wildlife Service in a former forester’s cottage in the Wicklow Mountains National Park to provide practical nature studies to 8,000-plus school goers each year. The staff there take part in wildlife research projects, as well as mobilising the public to experience nature by hearing the dawn chorus or the deer rutting.
On the day he spoke to your reporter, Ian was freshly returned from a mountainside where he was counting merlin – the birds of prey, not the wizard. He is happy to field questions about bats and barn owls, about lizards and linnets. But the bees are the topic on which he is most likely to found dispensing wisdom at the moment, if only for one very good, and very worrying reason.
Scientists have firm reason to believe that the population of these furry, buzzy insects is on the decline. This is a sinister fact which should have alarm bells ringing, not only among biologists. Farmers, gardeners, policy makers and anyone who may occasionally eat a tomato should also be concerned.
It appears that numbers have been dropping at a rate close to four per cent per annum for the past number years. The statistics take no account of the sleek honey bees which live in colonies housing thousands of individuals. Honey beess have their own problems, such as the veroa mitee parasite which has been making swarm management increasingly difficult in recent times. But they have plenty of advocates rooting for them, iff only in the hope of sharing the sweet substancee which gives them their name.
Though the bumble bee does not producee honey, it is every bit as important as the domesticated hive dwellers as a pollinator of our crops and our gardens. It is needed to help keep, not only tomato plants but just about every other plant on which edible fruit grows, in good reproductive order. If mankind allows bees to slide into oblivion, then we could be next on the listt for extinction.
This was one headline part of the messagee which Ian Edwards imparted recently when hee hosted a bumble bee walk through the grounds in glorious Glendalough. At least 15 people turned up for the walk to take a close look at these hard working contributors to our well-being.
Ian has adopted a monthly routine of going for a lunch-time strolls to count bees, from March to October. He has one route here in Glendalough and another close to his home in Aughrim. Bee spotting is not confined to such set-pieces. He bounds into the interview with glad tidings: ‘I definitely saw a mountain bumble bee today – the orange tail is so distinctive.’
Apparently, this rare beast was feasting on the fraughan berry plants that are in full bloom on the Wicklow-Dublin border at the moment. The mountain bumble is one of 21 species which are known to reside in this country. A National Biodiversity Database has been established by a dedicated team of ecologists to keep track of how all 21 are faring, an exercise backed by the Heritage Council.
They have volunteers, such as Ian Edwards, recruited to carry out counts and log the results in the database via the internet. He reckons that most years he will do well if he spots eight of the 21 in his neck of the woods because many of the remainder find the West of Ireland more congenial than the East where commercial agriculture is more intense.
At least one-third of the 21 are in danger of extinction though the crisis on this island is not as bleak as in China. The People’s Republic has made impressive strides in providing food
for their people but only at huge cost to the environment. Similarly, in the United States, hives of bees are now transported around the countryside to fill in where nature is failing. Some environmentally minded economists have suggested that we owe Irish bumble bees around €53 million annually for their services.
Ian has been issued with a bee spotting swatch – a bit like one of the colour charts issued by paint manufacturers – which allows him identify the various species. Some strains have white tails, some have rusty red tails, while others sport blonde or ginger tails. The identification procedure also requires him to note bands of colour elsewhere on the body and to weigh up whether a head is round or long in shape.
‘BUMBLE bees do things differently to honey bees,’ he confirms. ‘ They collect nectar and pollen. The pollen is full of protein and it is like beef steak for them. ‘ They never have a big store of food put aside, so they are always only a few days from starvation.’ Like the honey bees, their lifestyle revolves around a queen but 400 insects is as many as are found in any one colony – contrast that with the thousands upon thousands in a hive.
‘Carder bee queens favour tussocks of grass as cover for their colonies while most of the rest opt for disused mouse burrows with plenty of leaf litter.
‘One outlaw species is the cuckoo bumble bee which deposits its larvae in colonies established bby othersth tto enjoyj ffree bboardd anddllodging. di
The scientific generic designation for all the various types of bumble bee is ‘ bombus’ from a Greek word that means booming. The best time to catch them booming (or buzzing) is in the full sunlight of a warm summer’s day. Ian first began feeding his observations into the bio-diversity database in 2012 and says he has never been stung in the eight years since. The males do not have a sting, though they may throw some aggressive shapes when under threat, while the females he rates as passive.
He brandishes a big net for capturing bees in order to identify individuals but it is more for show as it is quite possible to capture them in the little glass jars which he brings with him to allow close examination. He lives in hope of setting eyes on a real live tree bee, a species which has only been logged once in Ireland – at Stephen’s Green in Dublin. With its ginger thorax, black abdomen and white tail, it should be a cinch to identify if and when it comes his way.
In the meantime, ten minutes in the sensory garden developed by Ruth Stewart beside the information centre at Glendalough yields plenty of more commonplace sightings on a fine afternoon. The place is festooned with showy clematis flowers which are very cute and appealing to human eyes – though largely overlooked by the pollen gatherers. Bees are not the only ininsects which pollenate as wasps, hhover flies, moths and butterflies mmay also have a role to play.
But there is nothing else like tthe sound of them at work, transfforming the garden into the poet’s ‘ bee-loud glade’. Rather than seeking out the nectar of the clematis, they seem to favour tthe much smaller flowers of the modest cotoneaster. First into the jar today is a common carder bee which our guide tells us is capable of carting a load of pollen and nectar equivalent to 50 per cent of her body weight back to base.
Then we spot a red tailed varriety, Ireland’s smallest bumble, which has only been in this country since 1947, which is followed bby an early bumble bee (bombus pratorum)p is notable for a yellow bbandd aroundd ththe abdomen. All this in no more than ten busy, buzzy minutes, with a garden bumble bee to round off our random sample, distinguished by a face which has the shape of a horse’s head.
Ian Edwards feels that everyone would do well to foster and encourage these little creatures that have been making Ireland a better place for millions of years, with a break or two along the way for Ice Ages. He believes that gardeners in particular need to play their part and not only by easing back on the pesticides.
A resident of Aughrim, he loves his garden but has taken to easing off on the lawn mowing whenever the dandelions are in bloom. They may be counted as weeds by many but dandelions provide valuable fodder for his bees, while roses are generally useless – as are other favourites such as geraniums, begonias and petunias. Instead try wallflowers, night scented stock and herbs such as lavender, borage and thyme.
Our visit to the sensory garden over, Ian presents a copy of a brochure published by the National Bio-Diversity Data Centre, urging everyone to consider that a bumble bee queen needs to visit 6,000 flowers a day in spring to build herself up for the year ahead.
The message is that we can all do our bit for the bees.