The hunt is on for a heartless vandal in Fife whose actions may have put the lives of hundreds of thousands of honey bees at risk.
Local businessman Steve Madley has taken to social media to try to find the man responsible for deliberately emptying a container containing almost 950 litres of artificial honey for feeding bees at his hives in an industrial estate in Kirkcaldy.
CCTV footage appears to show the person responsible trying various doors and windows to gain entry to the premises at the old Strand Lighting building in Mitchelston Industrial Estate on Monday evening before turning his attention to a large intermediate bulk container (IBC) inside a cage.
That was practically destroyed but, more importantly, its contents are now providing food for the ants and wasps in the building’s drive and car park – rather than the bees in the bee sanctuary Mr Madley is in the process of setting up.
The 10 hives at the Kirkcaldy site could potentially house just shy of a million bees, although a significant proportion of those are unlikely to survive unless replacement food can be sourced quickly.
“We’re just starting out,” Mr Madley explained.
“The land up there is wild and untouched for 12 or so years, so there’s a lot of wildflower growth up there and what we want to do is build a sanctuary for bees.
“We’ve got a number of hives up there and what we’re trying to do is increase the bee population if we can because we have a bee shortage global crisis.
“This IBC contains a bee food that we had imported from America – it’s basically a synthetic honey to keep them alive and we only got it a few weeks ago.
“It’s the next best thing to honey and this stuff costs around £1,000, so it’s not cheap to do.
“But this guy has decided to try and kick off the IBC tap and then pull it off fully, so all the liquid was running down the road.
“To be honest, if we can’t get it replaced quick enough then I reckon we’ll lose between 250,000 to 400,000 bees.
“A lot of people only think you can get 500 or so bees in each hive, but they easily reach up to 80,000 in a single hive.
“I can’t believe this guy has done this, but we just want him nailed.”
Mr Madley, who is managing director for Crossgates-based firm Airsoft World Ltd, stressed that this was a personal venture which he has ploughed his own money into.
Sadly, the company which supplied the honey container is no longer doing so, which means he is now having to look into urgent alternatives.
Mr Madley added that the CCTV footage shows the vandal stealing a large water bottle from a water cooler, and also shows him raking around in a nearby burger van.
“A lot of people put things up about lost pets and that sort of thing on Facebook, so we thought an appeal of our own might help,” he continued.
“We just hope the guy can be caught.”
Police Scotland confirmed they had received a report of the incident and were investigating.
