Bee Hotel

By Sage K. Naidoo PhD Candidate | School of Animal, Plant, and Environmental Sciences | University of the Witwatersrand Rapid urbanisation across the globe continues to reshape natural environments, affecting both the biodiversity that exists within these spaces and the way in which we occupy and interact with nature 1,2,3 . As cities expand, opportunities to engage with nature can become increasingly limited 2,3 , which be increasingly prevalent when it comes to the smaller, and...

UrbanBEE South Africa is already over a month into data collection and the results are already looking amazing! Take a look at the animated heat maps below for the cities of Johannesburg and Cape Town to see how our cities, and your hotels, are becoming populated with residents over the past five weeks! From the looks of it, Johannesburg is soaring with plenty of new visitors every week, while Cape Town is slowly starting to take root. Fret not though if you still do not have visitors,...

Hello UrbanBEE community, On the 1st of October 2025, the citizen science component of UrbanBEE South Africa officially launched and we have already completed Week 1 of data collection! See the maps attached to see how bee hotels across the cities of Johannesburg and Cape Town are slowly becoming populated with solitary bees. While Cape Town does appear to have slow occupancy rates, Johannesburg is already seeing numerous hotels with one, or even multiple, little residents. But fret not if...