Roadkill

[gavin]

Evenin' all. Here's a question. If you site bees in a position where they have to cross the road (to get to the other side, must be a joke in there somewhere) will you have a lot of casualties and lose colony strength?

I'm considering a site near (not right beside) a major trunk road where there is likely to be a lot of forage in land the other side of this road (and not so much their side). The constant stream of traffic (of various sizes), at speed, worries me. At least some of the time (when windy) bees seem to travel fairly close to the ground, at other times they are up and away. Any experience, or informed opinion, folks?

G.

[Greengage]

Mine are on a National primary road four lanes of traffic to cross to get to forage plus loads of dandelion in centre between carriageways. At the moment I have huge amount of bees and last season no Problems I was also concerned about casualties but everything seems ok. That is my experience wonder how it works with everyone else also know of 40 hives near main road same problem 4 lanes to cross to get to OSR and he is more experienced and has no problems.

[mbc]

I've been to an apiary called "bat fence", named after the twenty foot high black mesh fence erected either side of the nearest bit of road, put there to deflect the bats above the late night lorry traffic coming off the ferry.

[prakel]

One of the Wiltshire sites which we used to have was close to a busy road but shielded from view by quite a thick band of trees, even so, the bees still seemed to funnel through the access track and fly straight across the road. We did hear stories locally of large vans and trucks sometimes being splattered as they drove past but it never seemed to harm the colonies in any noticeable way.

These days we have a local site very close to a relatively busy road, but the problem now appears to be camera wielding hikers rather than bee flight lines. Oddly, one beekeeper never creates much interest but if two are present then everyone seems to want a photo.

[prakel]

I've been to an apiary called "bat fence", named after the twenty foot high black mesh fence erected either side of the nearest bit of road, put there to deflect the bats above the late night lorry traffic coming off the ferry.

Interesting. I spent several interesting years as a young caver helping our nextdoor neighbour (who remains a major authority on the subject) record the local bat population. Fascinating creatures.

[gavin]

I'll bet there are interesting bats at the site I have in mind :). Must recover the detector from the relative who borrowed it. Or buy another - they used to be under a tenner from Toys R Us. Argos also sold it at under a tenner. The only source I can find now is >2.5x the price: http://www.fishpond.co.uk/Toys/Discovery-Channel-Ultrasonic-Detector-Discovery-Channel/5060062142563

Thanks GG and R, I feel reassured about the site. There was another conspicuous apiary in a rape field alongside a major trunk road last spring, one of Murray's I think. However in that case the best forage was likely to be on the same side of the road.

[fatshark]

Scottish Natural Heritage have commissioned a bat survey this year (http://www.batsurvey.org/scotland/), with detectors available to borrow to survey particular sites ... it's being organised via the British Trust for Ornithology and a bunch of other conservation bodies.

[greengumbo]

I flew through a swarm once in Australia with the windows down and my 6 week old in the back seat. Very panic inducing to suddenly find yourself covered in bees. No stings but they did make a mess of the ute.

[Bumble]

No experience of roadside hives, but I have driven through a swarm or two and didn't end up with any dead bees on the front of the car.