Bee colonies also use hollow electricity poles as nest sites (here a photo from Belgium). Credit: Dimi Dumortier |
In northern Spain, wild honeybees use hollow electricity poles as nesting cavities. Natural areas in the surroundings promote the colonies’ chances to survive the winter.
Until recently, experts considered it unlikely that the honeybee had survived as a wild animal in Europe. In a current study, biologists Benjamin Rutschmann and Patrick Kohl from Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg (JMU) in Bavaria, Germany, show that wild honeybees still exist in the region of Galicia in the northwest of Spain.
The researchers describe where to find the bees’ nests and under which conditions they can survive in Biological Conservation, a journal for conservation biology.
136 square kilometers searched for power poles
Rutschmann and Kohl are doctoral students at the JMU Chair of Animal Ecology and Tropical Biology in the group of Professor Ingolf Steffan-Dewenter.