Dave Goulson talk 'Saving our Bumblebees'

[@Bananhjerne]

Hello Dave! I've narrated your book "A sting in the tail" in Danish, and I so fell for your cause. I've since had bumblebees in a birdhouse, which was a pain to clean up, but no matter. Ive just today seen a very lethargic, very large bumblebee (queen?) sitting morosely on a vertical wall in my workshop. Eventually, I resisted the compulsion to just leave it alone, but had to check if it was alive, how much, and should i keep the door open for it? So I stroked a finger gingerly across its back hairs (around the flying muscles, i suspect, just one pass). It almost promptly, but slowly raised its left fore leg and held it aloft long enough for me to begin to wonder. Then I stroked its left fore foot with the same finger (more or less to see if it would latch on). Well, it didn't, but as I was putting my annoying index finger away, so it lowered its leg and resumed its grip on the wall. That's when I decided to give it a couple of days more, at least until the was no chance of nightly freezing.