Bee Inspired By Nature To Nourish Us All: World Bee Day, 20 May 2025

This year’s World Bee Day message is a call to action for sustainable practices that support bees, improve food security, and protect biodiversity in the face of mounting climate pressures.

New Zealand has a flourishing population of honey bees cared for by 8,190 registered beekeepers who manage 520,000 hives across the country. At this time of year, with the hard work of producing honey done, honey bees are focused on storing up food to keep their hives fed and healthy through the winter.

While some countries have been struggling with dramatic colony losses over winter, colony loss rates in New Zealand over the cold winter months have been declining.

Results from the New Zealand Colony Loss Survey 2024 show that loss rates caused by varroa mites, the number one threat to bees over winter for the previous three years, fell to 4.6% during winter 2024, compared to 6.4% during winter 2023. This continues a general downward trajectory since the 2021–2022 surveys.

“The story of the 2024 NZ Colony Loss Survey is about varroa. And it’s a good story because losses to varroa showed a national decline for the first time since we started systematically measuring them,” says survey director Pike Stahlmann-Brown.

Stahlmann-Brown reports that beekeepers are doing more monitoring for varroa, and this is useful in determining when and how to treat the pest.

New Zealand beekeepers work hard to support their hard-working bees, and Kiwis can help local bee populations by planting some foraging favourites to help bees stock up on food for winter.

Good things to plant for bees this month include herbs such as lavender, salvia, rosemary and oregano, and shrubs such as michelia yunnanensis and the native koromiko. Those with larger properties might like to consider yellow gum trees, lacebark or puriri.

For more on how to help bees see the Apiculture NZ website: https://apinz.org.nz/how-can-i-help-bees/

Autumn planting ideas

Gardens – autumn flowering shrubs: 
Camellia species – simple flowers only
Gordonia yunnanensis – fried egg plant
Hebe stricta – koromiko (native)
Herbs – lavender, salvia, rosemary, oregano
Michelia yunnanensis – michelia

Gardens – spring flowering shrubs:

Ceanothus species – California lilac
Choisya ternata – Mexican orange blossom
Corokia cotoneaster – korokio (native)
Rosmarinus officinalis – rosemary
Thymus vulgaris – thyme

Gardens/farm – autumn flowering trees:

Eriobotrya japonica – locquat
Eucalypyus leucolxylon ‘Rosea’ – yellow gum
Hoheria species – lacebark (native)
Olearia species - native
Vitex lucens – puriri (native)

Gardens/farms – spring flowering trees:

Acer species - maples
Malus/Prunus/Pyrus species – pip and stone fruit.
Pittosporum species – native
Pennantia corymbose – kaikomako (native)
Pseudopanax arboreus – five finger (native)

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