This year’s Hike for Nature tackles one of the greatest — and LEAST TALKED about — threats to biodiversity: human–elephant conflict. In some regions, it now kills more elephants than poaching!
The solution? Beehives that create a natural barrier, while generating sustainable income for local communities and protecting biodiversity. It’s brilliant in its simplicity (scroll down to see how it works).
I’m excited to invite our amazing community to sponsor these game-changing beehives as we take on our most challenging adventure yet – six days crossing Slovenia’s mountains door-to-door.
Credit: Wild Survivors, The beehive fence in action in Tanzania
What Are We Hiking 6-Days For?
Elephants are more than icons of the wild; they are ecosystem engineers. They shape forests, spread seeds, and attract travellers whose visits sustain entire communities.
As farms and elephant corridors overlap, desperate farmers often retaliate against crop-raiding elephants. It’s tragic for elephants — and devastating for the people who rely on their harvests.
What’s The Impact of Beehives?
So far, 50 beehives have been installed in Tanzania’s Ngorongoro-Serengeti ecosystem, creating a 1 km fence that’s home to two million wild bees. The results? Crop-raiding has dropped by more than 90%.
Ready to bring a HIVE to life? Click here.
Credit: Wild Survivors, Women harvesting honey & Elephants in Karatu District. Credit_ Fran Mahoney
How Does It Work?
Elephants are terrified of bees. With thin, sensitive skin around their eyes, trunks, and mouths, even one sting is painful. So when a fence strung with beehives buzzes to life, elephants quickly retreat — protecting the crops, the people, and the elephants themselves.
But the impact goes beyond safeguarding the future of elephant populations in Tanzania:
🐝 Bees pollinate crops, boosting food security.
🐝 Honey is harvested, processed, and sold by local women, creating income
🐝 Communities gain safety, stability, and resilience.
One hive transforms lives on multiple fronts.
Step by step. Hive by hive. Protecting elephants together alongside How Many Elephants.
Images: Holly Budge founder of how many elephants in Tanzania with the women-led initiatives.
What’s This Year’s Hike For Nature Challenge?
For six days, my partner and I will attempt a door-to-door journey — setting out on foot from Bled, climbing high into the Julian Alps, and returning on foot back to our doorstep. No shortcuts, no transfers, just human effort carrying us across nearly 100 km of wild ridges and valleys.
This isn’t a casual stroll. It’s over 7,000 metres of climbing, no showers, no luxuries along the way. We’ll sleep high on windswept ridges, carry everything we need, and wake each day to tackle another ascent. The huts we’ll stay in perch above the tree line, where few tourists ever set foot — between stone and sky.
The Route
- Day 1: Bled → Prešernova koča na Stolu
- Day 2: Prešernova koča → Koča na Golici
- Day 3: Koča na Golici → Mojstrana
- Day 4: Mojstrana → Koča na Doliču
- Day 5: Koča na Doliču → Mt. Kanjavec → Kosijev dom na Vogarju
- Day 6: Kosijev dom → Goreljek (Pokljuka village) → back to Bled — door to door
Ready To Back Biodiversity? Click here.
Images from our Hike For Nature 2024. Read more about it here.
Your Invitation
This year, our goal is to sponsor 10 more hives — and I’d love your travel business to be part of it.
💛 For £200, you can sponsor x1 fully functioning beehive. You’ll:
- Fund its installation and maintenance in Tanzania
- Receive a certificate, beautiful visuals, and impact updates
- Feature your business on The Tourism Reset Podcast with a global reach across 34 countries
- Gain visibility through Hike for Nature social media posts and daily updates from the 6-day hike
- Get a tax-deductible receipt (UK-registered charity)
- Share a powerful story that your clients and network will love
This is your chance to back a solution that’s simple, scalable, and proven.
As travel professionals, we are deeply connected to the future of elephants. Elephants aren’t just icons of the wild; they are ecosystem engineers, shaping forests, grasslands, and water sources that countless other species — and entire tourism economies — depend on. Protecting elephants is, in many ways, protecting the future of nature-based tourism itself — especially in places like Tanzania.
Why Not Go BIG? Sponsor five hives and your business name will be added to the hive itself — a lasting mark of your impact. Simply click here and add a donation for 5 hives.
Breaking The Conflict Cycle
“After spending time with the inspiring NARI Beekeeping Women and witnessing Wild Survivors’ hands-on impact last year, it’s clear the work is both effective and deeply needed. As farming and human settlements increasingly overlap with elephant territories across Africa, conflict is rising, and bees are proving to be an unexpectedly brilliant and natural deterrent.” Holly Budge, how many elephants.
‘When it comes to flipping the narrative, Neema (see below), once a victim of crop-raiding elephants, stands as a beacon of hope and innovation in Tanzania. Born in a remote village on the boundary of the Ngorongoro Crater, she grew up collecting firewood within the elephant corridor.
“If we found elephants in the corridor, we’d run away, returning home without any firewood,” she recalls. In Tanzania and wider Africa, the conflict between farmers and crop-raiding elephants is all too common. However, innovative strategies like beehive fences and the protection of wildlife corridors offer a way to break this cycle of conflict.” (Written by Holly Budge about Neema below)
Image_ Women collecting honey & Neema Stephene in Tanzania. Credit-Wild Survivors
4 Incredible Elephant Facts You Probably Didn’t Know
🐘 They communicate through their feet – Elephants pick up seismic vibrations and rumbles through the ground, allowing them to “talk” across vast distances. Up to 90% of their communication is infrasonic, at frequencies below what human ears can detect.
🐘 Matriarchs lead the way – Elephant society is led by the oldest, wisest female. She guides the herd with experience and memory, ensuring survival through droughts, migrations, and challenges.
🐘 They’re keystone species – Elephants are known as ecosystem engineers. By knocking down trees, dispersing seeds, and carving waterholes, they shape the very landscapes other species depend on.
🐘 Where elephants roam, ecosystems become healthier, more biodiverse, and are better at capturing carbon – making them one of the planet’s most powerful natural climate solutions.
👉 Will your business be one of the 10 to sponsor a hive this year? If so, click here.
Together, we can turn a six-day ridge walk into protection for elephants, bees, and people.