farmers maintain valuable beehives billboards beehive innovators contributed to a community in Kenya to protect crops from elephants, according to the investigation successfully.The scientists found the hive a very effective barrier; elephants made of them in 97% of his attempts to raids.
Environmentalists suggest that natural fear of bees elephants could resolve conflicts underway.
Honey from the hives had additional benefits for farmers.
Elephants and farmers compete for limited resourcesIn the past 20 years, number of elephants in Kenya has grown to approximately 7,500 and the increase of the population is widely heralded as a conservation success story.
However, the conflict between elephants and humans, especially farmers, is a constant problem.
Elephants frequently "raid" farms in search of food such as tomatoes, potatoes and corn.
To protect its means of subsistence, some farmers have resorted to extreme measures including poisoning and shooting the elephants.
Continue reading the main storythe income from production and consequent honey farmers has really motivated to keep the fences "end quote Dr Lucy King save defending elephants previous buzz natural deterrence research showed that the elephants prevented African bees."
In 2009, experts from the University of Oxford, United Kingdom and charity save the elephants created a pilot project to test whether hives could prevent conflicts by limits of farmland.
After two years of observations, the full results of the trial have now been published in the African Journal of ecology.
"Find a way to use live hive was the next logical step in the search for a socially and environmentally sensitive way of utilization of natural avoidance of elephant behavior in bees to protect the crops of farmers," said Dr. Lucy King, the biologist at Oxford University, who led the study.
"It was very exciting to see that our theoretical work has become a practical implementation," he said.
Continue reading the main story
bees can not hide sting by elephant, but can and itching around the eyes of the elephants and trunksThe in Kenya bees (Apis mellifera scutellata) are small with short tongues and swarm frequentlyAfrican bees crossed with European bees in South America and are known as "Killer bees" due to their raids of greater aggressionIn 32 Treaty of more than three seasons of crops, elephant only a bull managed to penetrate the defenses of the novels.Beehives were suspended on wires between the posts with a thatched roof top level to protect from the Sun in the traditional style of Kenyan.
The team created an limits for 17 farms, incorporating 170 hives to 1,700 m of fencing.
"Beehive fences interrelated not only ceased to elephants of assaulting our study farms, but farmers benefiting from the sale of honey to supplement their low income," explains Dr. King.
"The income from the production and the consequent of honey has really motivated farmers to keep the fences."
They now hope to conservationists to implement the plan to other communities.
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