Category Archives: Uncategorised
Evaluation report
Our funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund has officially come to an end, and it’s been great to look back over the project’s many successes and achievements while writing our Evaluation Report. During the two and a half year project, … Continue reading
Blooms for Bees quiz
We have developed a short quiz to test people’s bumblebee identification skills and familiarity with bumblebee-friendly garden plants. You can take part in this quiz whether you participated in the Blooms for Bees project or not. The quiz closes at … Continue reading
Our first journal paper
The first Blooms for Bees journal paper ‘Evaluating the ability of citizen scientists to identify bumblebee (Bombus) species’ has been published in PLOS One this week. You can read the full paper on the PLOS One website. In this paper, we use … Continue reading
Blooms for Bees featured in new wildlife gardening book
We are delighted that the Blooms for Bees project features in Kate Bradbury’s new book, Wildlife Gardening for everyone and everything, published by Bloomsbury in April 2019. The book is absolutely packed with gorgeous photographs and practical information, some of which … Continue reading
The results 2017
Thank you to everyone who submitted surveys in 2017 and 2018. We received records from 599 participants, from as far north as the Shetland Islands and as far south as the Isles of Scilly. In this blog post, we share … Continue reading
April flowers
The days are lengthening and queen bumblebees are stirring from hibernation. Here in Warwickshire, we have seen winter-active Buff-tailed Bumblebees for much of the winter, but the first emerging queen bumblebee we observed was a Tree Bumblebee about 4 weeks ago. This … Continue reading
Steven’s blog – bumblebee ID and farewell
It’s 11th January 2018 as I write this, sadly my last day of work for the Blooms for Bees project (though I will stay in touch with the project and continue to support Gemma and Judith in any way I … Continue reading
Winter-active bumblebees
Most bumblebee activity has now ceased for the year, with just the new queens waiting in hibernation, ready to start colonies in spring. However, in milder regions and urban areas, you may notice bumblebees feeding on winter-flowering plants. Over … Continue reading
Steven’s blog – Citizen science
In recent years, a growing number of projects and organisations have been engaging members of the public in research as ‘citizen scientists’. This often takes the form of activities such as, conducting experiments, completing surveys, or in the case of … Continue reading
Foliar feed trial results
This summer, we have been working in partnership with Hozelock to find out whether foliar feeding can increase your container plants’ provision for bees, by improving plant health and flowering, as well as the quantity and quality of pollen and … Continue reading
Dahlia trial results
In spring we sent out packets of seed to citizen scientists around the country, to explore the potential of ‘Mignon Series’ dahlias as insect friendly bedding plants and find out if bumblebees had a colour preference. Participants were asked to … Continue reading
Steven’s Blog – Autumn bumblebees and findings from our app so far
Well, it’s already mid-September, which means that the bulk of this year’s records have come in and we are able to see some of the emerging patterns (though more detailed number-crunching will take place over the winter). There is very … Continue reading