How can honeybees reduce human/elephant conflict?

It turns out elephants really hate bees, even to the point of having a specific vocalization to warn other elephants that bees are nearby. Conservationists were able to take advantage of this natural reaction with the use of “bee fences”.

A bee fence is made up of many small honeybee hives surrounding a village or farm. These hives are connected by rope in such a way that, if an elephant tries to walk between the hives and pushes on the rope, the hives will swing and irritate the bees.

Bee fences have proven to be extremely useful at deterring elephants from entering human settlements or crop-raiding. This project also has the added bonus of providing local people with an additional source of food and income in the form of “elephant-friendly” honey.

The bee fence method has since been put to use in several other African countries, as well as countries with Asian elephants like Nepal and India.

Sometimes all it takes is a creative solution for humans and animals to share space more easily.