Special Features - Kiwi bumblebees causing a buzz in Britain

Kiwi bumblebees causing a buzz in Britain

Specimens of a bumblebee species which survive in New Zealand despite having died out in its native Britain have been shipped to London Zoo for checks on whether they carry harmful viruses.

If the tiny short-haired bumblebees are given a clean bill of health, English researcher Nikki Gammans plans to return to the South Island in December to collect as many as 50 to 100 bees, to be used in a captive breeding programme to support multiple releases of the species back in England over several years, the Guardian newspaper reported.

Malcolm Ausden, an ecology adviser at the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB), said that the bees would be re-introduced at Dungeness on the Kent coast, in a reserve created where the last British short-haired bumblebee was seen – in 1988, before being declared extinct in 2000.

The first release is expected next year.

"The site is a haven for bumblebees and a huge amount of work has been done to improve the site for them and encourage the flowering plants they love," he said.

Small populations of the short-haired bumblebee were established in the South Island of New Zealand when four species of bumblebee were introduced between 1885 and 1906 to pollinate crops of red clover.

The short-haired species – known scientifically as Bombus subterraneus – survive at only a few sites here.

In a recent survey of 1984 bumblebees in Canterbury and Otago, only 38 were from the short-haired species, and they are thought to be facing similar pressures to the destruction of wildflower meadows which made them extinct in Britain.

New Zealand has 28 species of native bees and 13 introduced, but only two of the bumblebee species have spread widely.

Researchers at Canterbury University and Lincoln University have been developing a DNA test for the short-haired bees as part of a project to better understand why they are not thriving.

Ms Gammans, the re-population scheme's project officer, said the bumblebee was a "keystone species" which was key to pollinating around 80 percent of important crops in Britain.

"By creating the right habitat for these bumblebees, we are recreating wildflower habitat that has been lost, which will be good for butterflies, water voles and nesting birds."

Ms Gammans said the main reason for declines in bumblebee species in the UK, where many are under threat and several are "on the brink", was the destruction of habitat and wildflowers.

"Over the last 60 years, we've lost 98 percent of our wildflower meadows," she said.

"Since World War 2, grants were given to farmers to dig up the countryside and use more intensive methods such as pesticides, which has dramatically affected bumblebees."