The Bumblebee Conservation Trust and University of Cambridge are leading a £907,000, three-year effort to help the threatened Moss carder bumblebee. They will test habitat changes with landowners in Cornwall, Kent and the North Pennines.
Work will focus on Cornwall's coastal grasslands, dunes and heathland; Kent's grazing marshes and sea walls; and the North Pennines' upland fringe. The trust will work with landowners to test small-scale habitat interventions and study the bee's behaviour and needs.
The trust says Moss carders live in small, fragmented populations and forage closer to their nests than many other bumblebees, making habitat loss and fragmentation likely to have a greater impact on them. Natural England's Species Recovery Programme has provided more than £530,000 for the project.
