The fence is set up off the ground at chest height and contains hives spaced every 10 metres.
[3] The approach has been largely successful, reducing conflict between humans and elephants by up to 85%.
[8] Criticisms of beehive fences include difficulties and costs involved in maintaining large colonies of bees, as well as the potential for ineffectiveness if there are too few bees or if the elephants knock over beehives while advancing.
[8] The species of bee used is also important, with one honeybee subspecies commonly kept in Asia believed to be less aggressive to elephants.
Work continues to refine approaches to optimize the design of the beehive fences for different regions.