Native Stingless Bees

Australian Native Stingless Bee (Tetragonula Carbonaria) Photo courtesy of honeyflow.com.au

When you hear the word ‘bee’, most people think of the European Honey Bee (Apis mellifera), the famous producer of our tasty honey.  However, Australia has nearly 2000 species of its own native bees.  11 species of our native bees are stingless and therefore completely harmless to those who have allergies to bees.  All our bees are critically important to the pollination of our native plants and trees and are an essential part of our fragile ecosystems.

Yeronga Preps are currently learning about native plants and animals and embarking on a journey to create their own native gardens to attract native species and grow native plants.  The Green Team have decided to spend the money raised from the Cash 4 Cans program on purchasing a Native Stingless Bee hive to enhance their native gardens. 

A Native Stingless Bee hive can provide learning from a number of different areas of the curriculum, including the needs of living things, lifecycles, pollination, classification, ecosystems, biodiversity, food chains and many others. A Native Stingless Bee hive will be a valuable asset to our school. 

For more information regarding Native Stingless Bees, see the following links.

https://www.aussiebee.com.au/australian-stingless-bees.html#question1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOfnGr_1ypM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2yOS6jTW0Y

The Native Stingless Bee hive, complete with security cage and roof to protect it, will cost a total of $540.  We have already earnt $153 from our Cash 4 Cans program, so only $387 to go!  Feel free to bring in your cans, plastic bottles or poppers from home to put into our Container Recycling bins to help us reach our goal. Or alternatively, if you are returning bottles and cans to a Container Refund Centre, quote our registration number: C10004300 and the money will automatically be assigned to Yeronga State School. Thank you for your support!