Keeping honey bees is often assumed to help "the bees" in general — but honey bee colonies are managed livestock that can forage in numbers no wild bee population can match. A single hive can hold tens of thousands of workers drawing from the same limited pool of nectar and pollen that the UK's ~270 native bee species — solitary bees, bumblebees and more — depend on for survival. This meadow shows that shared resource in miniature: watch how honey bee traffic and wild bee foraging success change as hive density and floral abundance shift.
Research from Ireland, France and the UK has repeatedly found that honey bee density near nature reserves correlates with reduced flower visitation and pollen collection by wild bees — competition is strongest when floral resources are scarce, which is exactly when wild pollinators need them most.
A 3D meadow where managed honey bee colonies and wild bumblebees and solitary bees forage on a shared, limited pool of flowers — adjust hive density and floral abundance to see forage competition unfold in real time.
Honey bee colonies can field far more foragers than any wild bee population, drawing down shared nectar quickly. Wild bee foraging success — and simulated population health — responds to how much floral resource is left after honey bee traffic.
Increase hive count to add honey bee pressure, or floral abundance to ease it. Switch seasons to see bloom scarcity bite harder, and toggle a native wildflower patch to watch wild bees recover.
The UK is home to roughly 270 species of bee, and only one — the honey bee — is typically kept and managed by beekeepers. The other 269 rely entirely on wild forage.