Please take your time to fill in the form as comprehensively as possible. The fields marked with a red asterisk must be completed before the form can be sent.  Any further details you can give helps us form a picture of the colony concerned  - the more detail the better!  When observing a wild living colony:

  1. Check the weather forecast:
    It‘s important to set out in good weather - sunny conditions and temperatures around 15 °C are perfect, 20 °C is even better as the bees will be flying even when situated in shade.
  2. Take your binoculars:
    A good quality pair of binoculars (even a spotting scope) is essential to determine whether pollen is brought in. Normally pollen is only brought in by foragers when the bees are rearing brood; if all you see is bees without loaded pollen baskets (over a reasonable span of time) it could well be that foragers from other nests in the area are robbing the winter stores of a failing colony. This video https://vimeo.com/328031518 will make things clearer.
  3. Recording of observations:
    Please record your observations back home at the computer or on-site using your smartphone, using the form below; photos are very welcome, especially of bees carrying pollen, if your equipment allows capture of this.

If you’d prefer not to state any personal data, we would be grateful to receive your info anonymously by mail/letter; please download the appropriate pdf form if it’s helpful (so far only available in German but soon to come in English as well).

Location of wild colony

It’s important to state the location of the find as precisely as possible. You can do this by clicking the map or inputting the information manually into the field below in form of a GPS-coordinate (for example 50.848034,0.23579836). Please zoom into the map as much as possible and choose the location of the find (the map allows for an accuracy of apps. 10m). Alternatively, use your smartphone or a GPS device to determine the co-ordinates as accurately as possible. The exact position (using a smartphone) can be found by clicking the compass symbol behind the field of coordinate in this form. Note: By clicking on the plus symbol at the top right of the map, you can switch to a different map view. For example, the "Google Hybrid" view offers more details in order to be able to specify the location more precisely.



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Please give the location an identifiable name in order to easily retrieve it for later additions, for example Sherwood Forest, Victoria Park, London, Emerson College, Sussex.

Please describe in a few sentences the location of the wild colony, the type of nest (tree, chimney, rock wall, masonry, church eaves, other), state how you became aware of it, and whether there are any problems with the bees you were able to identify.

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Please state the date when you first saw bees at this location. This needs to be an exact date. If you can't remember you might just estimate the time of year and put in 1st of March if it was Spring, 1st of July if it was Summer or 1st of October for Autumn.


If the type of cavity/nest site is not listed, please choose “other” and describe it in as much detail as possible in the comment field.

Girth/circumference of the tree at chest height (4.9 ft / 1.5 m), please state in metres (for example 2.8 m) - you can also use the arrows at the end of the field to increase or decrease the number stepwise.

Please state the approximate height of the entire tree in metres. You can use the so called Biltmore stick but a rough estimation is good enough too: 10 m, 15 m, 20 m, 30 m, 40 m...

Please state the approximate height of the flight hole from the ground in metres (for exmaple 7.5 m) - again you can also use the arrows to increase or decrease the number stepwise.

Please state the approximate size of the entrance hole in centimetres (for example 6 cm).

Please state the orientation of the flight entrance as South, SE, W, etc..

Please describe the form of the entrance, particularly any deviations from the round hole commonly found, e. g. slot-like, longitudinal slot, crevice in rock, oval etc.

Latest Observation
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Did you recognize bees fly in and out?

   Did you see pollen bearing bees flying into the nest? Binoculars will be helpful for seeing this!

Please share any other observations here, such as dead bees found on the ground below the entrance, or if you see other creatures/wasps/birds etc. at the entrance.

Personal data
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Important information:

To make sending the information as simple as possible and encourage continuous input of observations, a user account with an email address will be created when you send this form. This needs to be confirmed (so-called opt-in). To confirm you will receive an email with further instructions.


  I would like to be informed by email about important dates (monitoring in spring, summer and autumn) and new website publications, to keep up-to-date and contribute to further research (please note: we will not send you any advertising or unrelated communications).
  I hereby confirm that I have read the data protection statement of BEEtree-Monitor and that I am in agreement with these.*