The Tocil Bee Habitat Meadow is an environmental art project set up by local artists, Wendy Campbell Briggs and Ann Loscombe. The project aims to create a bee friendly meadow in the grounds of Warwick University to raise awareness of the plight of the British honey bee.

The problem

Honey bees are vital pollinators of food crops, garden flowers and wild plants, their populations are in serious decline, not only in the UK but around the world. The reasons for this are complex and are not fully understood, what we do know is that this decline is partly due to new parasites and diseases coupled with the effects of increased intensification of agriculture.

There are now no colonies of wild honey bees left in Britain and the health of managed bee colonies has declined to a state where they are highly susceptible to viral diseases and the effects of poor weather. Bee keepers have tried to control the mites with pesticides but they have developed resistance to them.

A solution

Us!

With this project we can not only promote the importance of bees and their vital role in the eco-system, but help them!

We want to promote their importance on campus, educate children and actively help those bees close to us.

It is vitally important for us to explore ways in which we can encourage new populations of wild honey bees as well as helping our managed honey bees to flourish by providing food in all seasons.

What would we like from you?

This project has three parts.

Part 1: Educational outreach.

Visiting local schools and teaching children about bees and their importance.

Part 2: Campus awareness

Fundraising and promotion of the importance of bees in and around campus.

Part 3: Tocil Bee Meadow Up-keep

Weeding and planting around the bee hives on campus to encourage bee colonies.

The project as a whole would have a few people for each part, however there is always cross over if some people want to be involved in more than one aspect of the project.

What would this project offer you?

A fantastic opportunity for you to play a part in the protection, promotion and saving of honey bees!

Your commitment

One or two 2-hour sessions per week depending on what you would like to be involved in.

A CRB check is needed when working with children.

This project will commence this coming October.

Find out more

Contact me

Abi Probets A.Probets@warwick.ac.uk

Here is a link to a campaign in promotion of honey bees: PlanBEE

Some interesting facts

Bees pollinate a third of everything we consume.

If all the bees in the United Kingdom died out, it would take 30 million people per year to pollinate everything they pollinate!

Luckily every person in the World can help, simply by:

• Recycling
• Buying organic where possible
• Planting a few wild flowers

You would like to be involved? Fantastic. The bees look forward to your help.

• Follow this link to see the Location of the bee meadow
• Warwick Volunteers will be involved in creating and maintaining the meadow; view all partners

If you are interested in this project, please contact volunteers@warwick.ac.uk

Project Leader -

Abi Probets