Elephants and Bees, Sri Lanka by Kylie Butler (PhD Candidate)

I have been working on the Elephants and Bees, Sri Lanka project for almost 3 years now and am pleased to report that our pilot study is going well.

Our first year, back in 2014, was a very busy year of planning – visiting villages, learning from farmers about the many challenges they face living alongside elephants including the damage to crops and property inflicted during crop-raids, and determining which village and farms were most suitable for our pilot study. This lengthy period enabled me to form a strong local team, headed by my field assistant and translator Supun Herath, to begin to know the local farmers and let them get to know us, and to begin to learn about the many complicated and conflicting interactions between humans and elephants.

Our research site is located in Dewagiriya Village, Matale District, Central Sri Lanka. Located near to Wasgamuwa National Park and the Mahaweli River, Dewagiriya Village experiences almost year-round crop-raiding. Farmers rely on their crops – primarily rice – to feed their families and to sell at markets to generate income. From preparing fields, to planting, to harvesting, to storing harvests in their homes, farmers are always at risk from crop-raids and need to vigilantly protect their farms and houses.

To paint a picture of their ongoing challenges, since late 2014, farmers have reported more than 300 elephant events in Dewagiriya village with damage occurring approximately 75% of the time. Some damage is relatively small – a few banana trees perhaps – but it is not uncommon for substantial sections of paddy fields to be damaged in a single crop-raid, or for sections of houses to be knocked down, sometimes while the family is sleeping inside.

Farmers from Dewagiriya Village receive only minimal outside assistance to protect their crops – a few firecrackers to scare the elephants away – and interest and enthusiasm for setting up a beehive fence trial was high. We selected 10 of the worst affected households, scattered about the village, and working with the local community, we built 10 beehive fences to protect homes and home gardens.

Bee colony delivery.

Bee colony delivery.

For the last year and a half, we have been monitoring elephant activity around the fences – collecting data on elephant sightings both inside and outside fence boundaries from farmers, and using camera traps to try and identify the sex and group size of crop-raiders. We also work continuously with farmers to keep fences well-maintained and to increase their beekeeping skills.

While it is still too early to determine the success rate of beehive fence as an elephant deterrent at our field site, we have seen some promising signs. Elephants have broken through the fences on a few occasions, however with the exception of one raid, only near unoccupied hives. Farmers have also taken small amounts of honey from their hives and are slowly beginning to experience additional benefits of beekeeping.

Right now, our main focus is on improving beekeeping skills, so farmers are able to manage their own hives. We have two experienced beekeepers visiting our field site next month to spend two weeks workshopping and training with the farmers. Additionally, increasing hive occupations, so that the deterrent effect of the fences is higher and we can predict the deterrent effect with confidence, is another priority.

I will be at our field site in Sri Lanka for the next three months and look forward to posting updates as we learn more about the potential of beehive fencing as an Asian elephant deterrent along the way! 

Welcoming our first bee colonies – elephants beware! By Kylie Butler (PhD Candidate)

With beehive fence construction almost complete for the first stage of our research site in Dewagiriya Village, Sri Lanka, the time has come for the event we’ve all been eagerly awaiting – introducing bees into their new homes. A bee has many tasks to fulfil as it is: protecting the queen, foraging and gathering pollen, making their delicious honey to name but a few… our bees can add defending homes and crops from elephants to their list of duties. Let’s hope it’s a task they excel at!

An elephant footprint in a home garden

An elephant footprint in a home garden

Our beehive fence farmers have been very keen for this day to arrive – most have been looking after their fence structure dutifully – making sure posts are straight, hives are clean and shade roofs are repaired after heavy rain or wind. Having bees to look after increases the incentive to look after the fence – plus, they can finally begin to learn some beekeeping skills, and as time goes on, learn to harvest honey for their own medicinal and culinary benefits, and to earn some additional income from selling the bees delicious wares.

 Teaching farmers how to transfer bees into the hives on their fences

 Teaching farmers how to transfer bees into the hives on their fences

And for everyone involved, and the prime motivation for constructing this research site, we will soon start to learn if the Asian elephants will indeed avoid the Asian honeybees, just as their African cousins do. Learning how the Asian elephants respond to the beehive fence will provide vital information as to how best to manage and develop this technique in Asia, and what role it could potentially play in alleviating human-elephant conflict here. Ideally, we would like to attract bees naturally from the wild, however to get the ball rolling, our lucky first farmers will each have 3 – 4 colonies transferred into the hives hanging on their fence. Our first delivery of colonies arrived from Colombo last week and it was a great learning experience for everyone involved in bee handling to transfer the buzzing families into their new hanging homes. We now have 3 fences with occupied hives, and another 5 fences to go in the next fortnight.

Teaching farmers how to transfer bees into the hives on their fences

Teaching farmers how to transfer bees into the hives on their fences

Elephant activity has been high in Dewagiriya in recent weeks – with the first crop season of the year over, most farmers have stacks of 50 kg rice bags stored in their homes, plus they are already planting for the next season. Elephants are coming up to the homes attracted by the rice they know is stored within. Several incidents have occurred, where elephants have entered gardens destroying banana and coconut plants before being scared away, posts of unoccupied beehive fences have been knocked down. Most devastating of all, the house of one young couple with a small baby was almost completely destroyed after elephants raided their property twice in one week. Unfortunately, this type of event is not an isolated occurrence, and emphasises strongly why it is so vital to help farmers devise means of protecting their homes and crops.

A bull elephant observed in Wasgamuwa National Park. The lumps evident on his side commonly occur as a result of gunshot or other wounds inflicted by farmers trying to defend their crops.

A bull elephant observed in Wasgamuwa National Park. The lumps evident on his side commonly occur as a result of gunshot or other wounds inflicted by farmers trying to defend their crops.

Let’s hope the beehive fences, full of our little guardians of nature, can also become the guardians these farmers need to keep their families and livelihoods safer at nights.

Twice in one week, an elephant visited this home at night while the family were sleeping inside - breaking down the entire wall to try and access rice harvest stored inside

Twice in one week, an elephant visited this home at night while the family were sleeping inside - breaking down the entire wall to try and access rice harvest stored inside

I extend a huge thankyou to the Rufford Small Grants for Nature Foundation, Chester Zoo Conservation Grant, Elephant Action League and Phoenix Zoo Conservation and Science Grant for their financial support, without which this project would not be possible. Sincerest thanks also go to collaborating partners The Sri Lanka Wildlife Conservation Society, Save the Elephants and Professor M. Wijayagunawardane (University of Peradeniya) for all of their valuable input and assistance.