A NEW study recommends a rethink of the type of special flowering crops grown to help save ailing bee populations.

The three-year study by Thomas Wood, from Sussex University, is investigating whether current pollinator-friendly management provided the right conditions for all pollinating insects, and whether it helped increase the diversity of all farmland bees and wasps.

It showed that although bumblebees and honeybees foraged widely within sown flower habitats that are recommended within flower-rich agri-environment schemes, the majority of bee species preferred naturally occurring wild plants such as hogweed, cat’s ear and scentless mayweed.

These plants are commonly found in uncultivated areas of farmland such as field margins, access tracks and hedgerows.

In addition the study, funded by the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust (GWCT) and the Natural Environment Research Council, also identified that bees and wasps require suitable nesting habitat to complete their lifecycle. Cavity nesting bees and wasps struggle to find nesting spaces and the availability of nesting sites for ground nesting species is also an issue that has not been assessed despite them playing a small but important role in pollinator survival.