My Garden of a Thousand Bees

Locked down during the coronavirus pandemic, ***My Garden of a Thousand Bees*** follows acclaimed wildlife filmmaker Martin Dohrn as he sets out to record all the bee species in his tiny urban garden in Bristol, England. Filming with one-of-a-kind lenses he forged at his kitchen table, he catalogues more than 60 different species, from Britain’s largest bumblebees to scissor bees the size of a mosquito. Over long months, Dohrn observes how differences in behavior set different species apart. He eventually gets so close to the bees he can identify individuals by sight, documenting life at their level as we have never seen it before.

Viewers will marvel at moments timely captured in ***My Garden of a Thousand Bees***, such as bees laying tiny eggs preparing for the next generation, green-fanged spiders feasting on male flower bees and a female yellow-faced bee attacking a Gasteruption wasp to protect her nest. Other fascinating behavior featured in the program includes two male bees fighting each other over a female, different species of bees competing over territory and one busy bee building a nest with a shell and hundreds of sticks. Intrigued by the intelligence of one particular wood-carving leafcutter bee, Dohrn dubs her “Nicky” and sees life at her level as she leaves a lasting legacy in the garden.

My Garden of a Thousand Bees follows acclaimed wildlife filmmaker Martin Dohrn, who, locked down by coronavirus, turns his lenses on the surprising and spectacular bees living in his own urban garden in Bristol, England. Watch My Garden of a Thousand Bees online for free at pbs.o rg/na ture and the PBS Video app.

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Meet Martin

Martin Dohrn is an award-winning filmmaker who has been producing specialist landmark natural history films for over 30 years. Martin’s roles extend to Director, Executive Producer, and writer, but today he is still focused on camerawork. During this time, he has devised game-changing techniques in low-light and macro filming, allowing audiences remarkable new insights into the natural world. Leading the field with his range of world-renowned tech, he developed his Colour Starlight Camera, delivering colour footage from some of the darkest locations on Earth, and Frankencam - micro-motion control for filming small things in the wild. Martin’s ground-breaking films include Mara Nights and Killer Ants for BBC, Night of the Lion for National Geographic and David Attenborough's Light on Earth for Terra Mater Factual Studios, CuriosityStream and BBC. The National Geographic film Great Migrations earned him an Emmy for craft cinematography, adding to the multiple awards earned for his innovative children’s series Smalltalk Diaries, as well as three BAFTA nominations.