I have found queens and worker bumblebees on the ground many times knowing that all they needed was a little sugar water ‘pick me up. Unfortunately, it is not something I carry around with me. Until now. This was not only a lovely idea but handy to have and nice to look at. I thought this was a great idea and wanted to give it a wider audience. Handing over to Faye Whitley now from Beevive.
Beevive on a keyring
About Beevive:
Inspired by a spontaneous encounter with a tired bee, partners Jake and Faye founded Beevive, a Devon based small business with a big ambition to make the World a more bee-friendly place to live.
Supported by a community of bee-lovers Beevive launched The Original Bee Revival Kit as a mission to raise people’s awareness of the importance of bees in a fun, adventurous and interactive way. By providing solution-based activities they aim to empower and encourage individuals of all ages to make a positive difference, welcoming all individuals to join the team and celebrate each other’s small individual steps to help bees thrive.
How it all started:
Our bee saving story began in the summer of 2018. During a short break in Cornwall, we were out exploring when we discovered a slow-moving bumblebee in the middle of the pavement. After monitoring her movements for a while seeing no improvement, we began our search for flowers nearby which unfortunately we couldn’t find. We carefully picked up our new friend and started our search for sugar and water (a remedy once recommended by Jake’s grandma). We soon found a café keen to help and mixed a small amount of sugar water solution onto a spoon. We gathered outside, waited patiently and after a few sips, our new companion started to wiggle, had a little clean and then buzzed away!
It was on this day the idea of Beevive was born. We were so captivated by the experience we looked for something that we could carry around with us in an emergency but couldn’t find anything. It did not exist.
Fuelled by this encounter we started researching about bees and discovered a bookshelf of interesting facts, accompanied by the hardship that pollinators are facing Worldwide. There are around 20,000 known bee species in the World, and they are an important part of our ecosystem, carrying out the vital role of pollinating our crops, flowers and trees. Without bees, we would lose 1 in every 3 mouthfuls of our food, including berries almonds, vegetables, and coffee!
A handy bee ‘pick me up’
Species and wildflower decline
In the UK alone we have already lost 13 species since the 1990s and a further 35 bee species are currently under threat. Without bees, it would cost UK farmers around 1.8 billion pounds per year to pollinate crops, which would have a direct impact on the cost of our food. According to one of our stockists, The Royal Botanic Gardens Kew; the UK has lost 97% of its wildflower meadows since the 1930s once home to many wild species, including our precious bees.
In some parts of China pollination is already being undertaken by hand using paintbrushes because there are not enough bees left to do it naturally. We used to think that honeybees were the main contributor to pollination but that simply isn’t the case. Nowadays we realise that all species of bees are important.
After learning about how important bees are and how dangerously they are in decline, we wanted to do something to help. This is when we began designing the Bee Revival Kit for the next time you met a bee in need.
We wanted to create something that was portable and provoked conversation about bees, empowering the individual who was carrying it. We encapsulated a small bottle pre-filled with bee food syrup inside an aluminium shell, providing an emergency solution to revive an exhausted bee. Each keyring arrives with guidelines for use and is assembled by hand, packed and shipped with love from our studio in Exeter, Devon.
Product Range
Since then, our product range and community have grown tremendously and we couldn’t be prouder. We developed and introduced a bee hotel to our range made from FSC certified wood to provide a safe space for our solitary bees to nest and also launched a bamboo version of our keyring, made from sustainably sourced materials. This is a dual-use keyring for sowing seeds, planting trees and saving bees. It contains a selection of our UK’s bee’s favourite flowers in the form of seed balls which are a simple way to grow from seed.
I needed that. Thank you!
Our social media is buzzing with photos and videos of ‘Beevivers’ helping bees all over the world, creating a buzz in their own outdoor spaces by planting bee-friendly seeds, installing bee hotels and creating wildflower patches. Soon after launching, we coined the phrase VIB – Very Important Beevivers, to describe the awesome individuals who put so much effort into helping us spread the bee saving message and take action to help our precious pollinators. The VIB badges are awarded to both adults and children who have shown us their stories or example of how they have helped the bees. The reward – A hexagonal badge of awesomeness!
We have visited schools, hosted workshops and worked alongside businesses, sharing our knowledge (and passion!) for the importance of pollinators and what we can do to help.
Collaborating with other organisations in the broader community has been really important to us and it is empowering to work together with individuals like George Pilkington, from Nurturing Nature, on this mission. So thank you for allowing this space on your Nurturing Nature blog for us!
We welcome everyone to join our buzzing community online, where we hope it is a place for you to gain inspiration, download free activities and learn more about bees.
You can find us on Instagram @beevive_uk and Facebook or explore our website at www.beevive.com
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