Singapore Local Bees and Honey by Nutrinest

SINGAPORE — The next time you walk along Orchard Road, you might notice a certain buzz in the air — and not from the crowd of shoppers, or the traffic.

Instead, it is quite likely a foraging bee returning with food in the form of pollen to an urban beehive found at the rooftop garden of the Temasek Shophouse, a co-working space opposite Dhoby Ghaut MRT and near MacDonald House. The hive houses a colony of stingless bees called the Trigona.
Read more at https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/urban-beehive-sets-orchard-road-abuzz

The hive is a collaboration between Temasek Trust, a philanthropic arm of Temasek Holdings, and local beekeeper Xavier Tan that started in July this year — part of a growing trend of urban beehives worldwide.

The four-storey heritage building, which is managed by Temasek Trust, recently hosted its first urban bee garden workshop for the public on Dec 8.

Mr Tan, who maintains the hive and led the workshop, told TODAY that he hopes that installing the hive in the heart of the city will benefit not only the surrounding gardens, but will also raise awareness of the plight bees are facing around the globe.

In 2006, scientists discovered the Colony Collapse Disorder, a disease that has decimated the bee population worldwide. As the pollinators are responsible for a third of the world’s food crops, the discovery sparked panic about a potential food shortage.

Read also: Local beekeeper wants to save pollinators from extermination

Researchers say the global bee population, which also has to contend with bee-harming neonicotinoid pesticides that can cause colony collapses, has yet to return to healthy levels.

Mr Tan said one way to help the bees is by educating the public that the flying insects are not the dangerous pests that people think they are.

“If you don’t disturb them (the bees), they will just leave you alone,” said the founder and owner of Nutrinest — a one-man operation in Singapore that conducts educational workshops, humane bee removal and beekeeping.

Read also: Honeybees are hurting. What else can pollinate our food?

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Read more at https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/urban-beehive-sets-orchard-road-abuzz

The 53-year-old has previously organised events at his apiary in Sembawang, where guests were invited to witness his point first hand.

Read also: New Temasek Shophouse promotes social impact, sustainability on Singapore’s premier shopping strip

Ms Yvonne Tay, the director of the Temasek Shophouse, said that bees are critical for the health of our biodiversity, as they are responsible for most pollination. “A drop in the population of bees will adversely affect our food supply,” she said.

The Trust wants to take an active role in protecting wild bees, said Ms Tay, and it also hopes to “connect city-dwellers with nature”.

At the workshop, apart from learning about the importance of bees, and ongoing conservation efforts, more than 100 attendees learnt how to make ice cream with raw honey and bees’ wax lip balm using ingredients from Mr Tan’s hives.

“Growing up in a concrete jungle, many of us are suffering from a lack of understanding and ease amongst nature and wildlife,” said Ms Tay. “We hope to demonstrate that these bees can thrive peacefully in the modern landscape, and serve as a great example for others to adopt or explore further.”

More bee-related workshops are in the pipeline, though no details are available yet.

Beyond the outreach programmes, Mr Tan hopes to create a “bee-friendly environment” by establishing more urban hives within the city — which could complement the many rooftop gardens around town by both pollinating the flowers and providing a source of ingredients for restaurants.

He also envisions a future where apiaries could be established in places like Choa Chu Kang, alongside vegetable farms that require pollinators.

“You’ll realise that plants with bees are healthier compared to plants without,” he said. “Scientific studies (also) said that with bees around, you will be able to increase the production yield (of vegetables and fruits) by around 30 to 40 per cent.”

“Bees benefit people,” said Mr Tan. And rather than spending money on technology to replicate what a bee can already do, it could be channelled towards conserving them instead.

“We are just borrowing resources from the Earth when we are still alive,” he explained. “If we care for our next generation, we should leave something that is good behind for them.”
Read more at https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/urban-beehive-sets-orchard-road-abuzz

Recently the principal from one of the well known international school located in Singapore Orchard road enquired about humanely relocating beehive service provided by Nutrinest.  He would like the bee colony to be removed for safety of the students in the school but at the same time conserving this important living thing on earth.  He asked me if I could help to relocate the bees as soon as I can.  I understood it was urgent and quickly took time to visit the school on that same day and this was what I saw.

This was an Apis Cerana hive built under the roof corner which was 3 stories high.  The roof tiles were cemented, underneath the roof tiles a sheet of Aluminium was shielding off a narrow gap between the wall and the roof.  Looking at the gap the chance of accessing the beehive through the gap was very slim as there was not much room.  Once my hand was inside the gap the sight of the beehive would be totally blocked.  The last option was to cut away part of the false ceiling under the  the roof to access the beehive.

On the day of bee removal, the school already gotten the scaffolding setup. I climbed up  to have a closer examine the structure before coming up with a final plan.  To do that I had to remove the Aluminium sheet.  It was well tightened with screws and long nails.  Upon the sheet was removed I realised that to access from under the false ceiling was not possible as there was a layer of wire mesh covering on top of the false ceiling.  Finally, I decided to try removing the beehive through that tiny gap.  The problem was my sight of the beehive would be block by my hand that tried to catch the queen bee without hurting her!  It was very challenging!

I setup my box and get ready to have the queen.  After a fair bit of time and effort finally the queen was captured and placed into the box. Very soon all the bees had realised that the queen bee was inside the box and started to enter through the two holes on the box to reunite with the queen. Within one hour most of the bees had already entered into the 2 tiny entrance holes of the box, you can see their action from the video below.

The 2 pictures on top shown the condition of the location before and after the beehive was removed.

Now the bee colony are  relocated to a ECO garden located in Sembawang.  I hope someday the school can organise a trip for the students to come and visit the bees originated from the school and have some close interaction with them.  Watching them foraging nectar in the garden and making honey in their new hive. Learn how the bees help to balance our eco system and keep all living things on earth to lives on. For us and our next generation to come.

It was good to let people know more about what Nutrinest does to conserve the local bee.  With the help from the Media and words of mouth from people whom I have help to relocate their beehive in the humane way.   Thought it is good to share with you some of the produces from Private Channel, Mediacrop Channel 5, Channel 8 FM97.2 and YiJia channel

Nutrinest had started providing Humane Bee Removal and Relocation service in Singapore in 2014. This is to help to conserve our native bees.  At the start my good friend Bjorn from Edible Garden City, Elric and Carl from PollenNation as well as people from ACRES helped in promoting this special service to people lives in Singapore.  Without their help, many people were still calling pest control to kill bees colony after colony.

Since the service started picking up in 2015,  Nutrinest has helped many people to truthfully resolving their Bee Problems.  Not only the whole bee colony are removed from the location but also help the bee colony to find a suitable location that they can settled down to carry on their job as pollinators.

Beside helping to relocating bee colony, I also took the opportunity to share the information as to why we should conserve local bees.  Most of the people already know the important of conserving the bees but as the current location of the beehives has affected their daily activities hence preferred to have the hive relocated.

You might be wondering why conserving local honey bees in Singapore is important as there is not many farms in Singapore.  It is true that we do not have fruits farm but many plants in Singapore are still relying on the bees to do pollination.  These plants will then help to cleanse the polluted air and also keeping the carbon content in the air low.  If all the bees in this world disappeared, all living things will not be able to survive within 5 years.  That is how important the bees are to all living things.

We do not need to have commercial bee farm to keep up the bee population in Singapore, but we do need everyone to understand the important of the bees and help to conserve them. To help conserve the bees there are a few things we can do.

First, learn to recognise which are the local honey bees.
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Second, stop calling pest control to exterminate the bees
Third, planting a lot of flower plants and fruit trees.
Fourth, stop using chemical and pesticide for the plants.
Fifth, start doing hobby beekeeping.

I hope everyone in Singapore will help to conserve our local bees and if you need any help you can call my number at +65 91474065 or send me an email at [email protected]  for enquiries.