When James Smith’s phone rings he never quite knows what question awaits on the other end of the line. He’s heard some odd ones: What’s the best course of action when you discover a bobcat in a wellhouse? And what about rattlesnake dens on or around equipment?

Managing wildlife-related challenges in the field is nothing new for Smith and his team. As the health, safety and environment (HSE) supervisor for the drilling and completions team in the Permian Basin, he works closely with Environmental and Regulatory staff to ensure that ConocoPhillips adheres to best practices when encountering animals in the field.

ConocoPhillips operations in the Permian span approximately 1.5 million net acres, land that is home to countless animals – including species found only in the region. Interactions between humans and animals occur daily. Most involve peaceful coexistence; others require more attention. A recent rendezvous with a swarming hive of honeybees on a workover rig prompted a wells and intervention supervisor to reach out to Smith and his team, seeking advice on how to best relocate the hive without harming them. Since bees are an important pollinator species, the decision was made to enlist help from a local organization, Bee for Life in Midland.

Knowing that the bee population is in decline in West Texas and globally, and that the use of pesticides also imperils bees, the team was determined to preserve the hive through relocation. Of the more than 20,000 species of bees around the world, approximately one fifth of them pollinate plants across North America. Additionally, more than half of North America’s 4,000 native bee species are in decline, with one in four species at risk of extinction. Bees have a direct tie to human food security, serving as an essential part of our agriculture by pollinating many fruits, vegetables and nuts.

“Though relocating the honeybees was more costly than calling an exterminator, it was the right thing to do. We have adopted relocation as an alternative when beehives are encountered at well sites or other facilities in the field, so if our people encounter a colony at a site they know how to reach out. It’s just one example of how we are taking a sustainable approach to managing field hazards and keeping the potential impact of our operations front of mind,” Smith said.

Each honeybee colony consists of a laying queen, a few hundred “worker bees” and a handful of male bees, known as drones. The “comb” is where the bees store food and raise their young. Relocating the colony involves:

• Locating the nest and exposing the cavity where it is located.
• Searching the comb for the queen.
• Caging the queen.
• Capturing and caging most of the workers and removing all the comb.
• Relocating the queen, workers and comb.

“The process itself is pretty interesting – once you move the queen the rest follow,” noted Mike Hauser, a Senior Regulatory Coordinator, who Smith consulted on the hive relocation.

The Lower 48 Biodiversity Strategy aims to spread awareness and encourage focus on assessing potential impacts associated with the direct and indirect footprint of our operations. The strategy also supports identifying, assessing, characterizing and managing biodiversity risks. This includes a focus on non-interference in many cases, including when a bobcat decides to take a nap in a wellhouse.

“From my perspective it’s about raising awareness, so people think about things with a different lens – with sustainability in mind,” said Smith.