There was a viral affirmation that suggested that the Black Bear Solar in Virginia recruited 180.000 bees to form a living barrier against the black bears, but reports show that the real story is actually the other way around.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Following that version (that is not the one spread in social media), it was the security fence of the solar farm, the one that protects the bees from the bears. The pilot project, managed by Dominion Energy, wants to promote agrivoltaics by combining clean energy generation with pollination and sustainable agriculture<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Black Bear Solar<\/a>, a huge solar farm, near Dillwyn began operating in September 2023. For you to have an idea why it is described as huge, let me tell you that it has around 4,4000 panels that cover 13 acres. This system is amazing and can produce electricity for 400 family homes when the sunlight is at its highest point.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At the same time, Chuck Burden of Mountain House Apiaries prepared the beekeeping project as a pilot. They decided to include four hives with 45,000 bees with their dearest queen in each of them. Dominion project manager, Adam Fillius<\/a>, says that the idea is to bring back agriculture to the site and so to have there a dual use<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The bears are part of the local picture, but that is not what the viral claim says. In the area it is actually known that the beekeepers that are around had really suffered much more damage because of the bears<\/a>. They even say that these animals tend to be attracted to the larvae that the bees produce. So actually the Black Bear Solar fence helps to protect the hives, and it was not designed as something against the bears.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To support that idea, we can think about the official Dominion Energy post, which insists that the locations of the colonies are not for the protection of solar equipment\u2026 Actually, the fence is the best barrier for their protection, since they are the ones that need it. They even discuss not having enough evidence to prove that the apiary was designed strictly as a control system of wild life. The only thing that that story does is to distort a pollinator project into a story that documented facts do not support.<\/p>\n\n\n\nRead More: Black Bear Solar added 180,000 honeybees in Virginia, but the fence protects the hives, not the other way around<\/a><\/h4>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
Why the bear story falls apart<\/h2>\n\n\n\n