Don’t Step On A Bee Day!
In honour of Don’t Step On A Bee Day (10th of July), and from noticing a lot of people choosing to rewild their gardens, I’ve been inspired to look into how the bees have been doing lately. Bees are an essential part of our ecosystem. They pollinate plants - about 80% of all pollination is done by bees- and use nectar to make honey. By doing these jobs, bees are responsible for 1 in every 3 bites that we eat!
But bees are in danger. You might have noticed you don’t see as many flying around as you used to, or it’s been a while since you heard of anyone being stung by a bee. Beekeepers have noticed that their hives have been depleted by 30-50% and sometimes up to 90%. This trend has been continuing for over a decade.
It’s suspected that pesticides are responsible. Biologists have analysed bee pollen and found more than 150 toxic chemicals. This isn’t entirely accidental - chemical companies have been made aware of the effect of their products on the bee population and have shirked responsibility in order to save profits. The pollution of pesticides is kind of a similar problem to our concerns about microplastics: they get into the food chain and then into our bodies and cause all kinds of health problems.
Deforestation is also not helping our fuzzy friends. Bees and other insects thrive in wild grasslands and biodiverse forests. By converting these sites into mono-culture farms (covered in more pesticides) or developing them into buildings and roads, we are limiting opportunities for bees to find safe food, nectar, and pollen.
These aren’t the only factors. Other environmental issues such as global warming, drought, and air pollution are also causing bees to suffer. There’s also the chance that it could be a virus or a new parasite. It’s likely a combination of all of these factors, the sum of the negative impact that humans have had on the planet. Beekeepers like to call it the three p’s: parasites, pesticides and poor nutrition.
If bees die out humans as a species could survive, but we would lose most of the biodiversity in our foods. We would be restricted to wind pollinated foods like corn and rice. The massive drop in supply would also cause food to become a lot more expensive due to the scarcity. Many communities would lose their staple food source or income, which would result in a lot of human suffering and deaths.
The trend of bee deaths over the last ten years tells us that this problem isn’t going to be simple to fix. A large part of that is because it is profitable for companies to sell dangerous pesticides and they would lose money by making them safer. These companies aren’t concerned with the trillions of dollars that bees contribute to the worldwide economy, nor about the impact on the health of people all over the world. The industry downplays its effect on bees despite research proving the harmful effect of chemicals.
There are two schools of thought that can contribute to saving the bees. Number one is personal action. Rewilding your garden, meaning that you don’t mow, don’t spray pesticides, and encourage wildflowers and other forms of biodiversity. There’s advice about leaving out sugar water or a wet towel to help some tired bees to stay hydrated, and of course if you notice a hive somewhere it shouldn’t be, make sure you call a local beekeeper who will happily take it off your hands. It’s incredibly rewarding to look after the environment in this way from your own garden and beneficial for all kinds of local wildlife and plants. I encourage everyone to take part in making your garden as insect friendly as possible.
But this isn’t the end of the problem. In environmental issues like this, various industries benefit from putting the responsibility on personal choices when they play a much larger part in the problem. We saw this when oil companies invented the concept of the personal carbon footprint to avoid responsibility for carbon emissions, and we are seeing it again when people like Iain Kelly of Bayer CropScience blame “pests and pathogens” for bee colony decimation rather than acknowledging the role of pesticides. To fix this problem, we need strict regulations at the policy level to prevent companies from wiping out our pollinating pals. We need to hold these companies accountable for what they are doing to our bees.
But bees are in danger. You might have noticed you don’t see as many flying around as you used to, or it’s been a while since you heard of anyone being stung by a bee. Beekeepers have noticed that their hives have been depleted by 30-50% and sometimes up to 90%. This trend has been continuing for over a decade.
It’s suspected that pesticides are responsible. Biologists have analysed bee pollen and found more than 150 toxic chemicals. This isn’t entirely accidental - chemical companies have been made aware of the effect of their products on the bee population and have shirked responsibility in order to save profits. The pollution of pesticides is kind of a similar problem to our concerns about microplastics: they get into the food chain and then into our bodies and cause all kinds of health problems.
Deforestation is also not helping our fuzzy friends. Bees and other insects thrive in wild grasslands and biodiverse forests. By converting these sites into mono-culture farms (covered in more pesticides) or developing them into buildings and roads, we are limiting opportunities for bees to find safe food, nectar, and pollen.
These aren’t the only factors. Other environmental issues such as global warming, drought, and air pollution are also causing bees to suffer. There’s also the chance that it could be a virus or a new parasite. It’s likely a combination of all of these factors, the sum of the negative impact that humans have had on the planet. Beekeepers like to call it the three p’s: parasites, pesticides and poor nutrition.
If bees die out humans as a species could survive, but we would lose most of the biodiversity in our foods. We would be restricted to wind pollinated foods like corn and rice. The massive drop in supply would also cause food to become a lot more expensive due to the scarcity. Many communities would lose their staple food source or income, which would result in a lot of human suffering and deaths.
The trend of bee deaths over the last ten years tells us that this problem isn’t going to be simple to fix. A large part of that is because it is profitable for companies to sell dangerous pesticides and they would lose money by making them safer. These companies aren’t concerned with the trillions of dollars that bees contribute to the worldwide economy, nor about the impact on the health of people all over the world. The industry downplays its effect on bees despite research proving the harmful effect of chemicals.
There are two schools of thought that can contribute to saving the bees. Number one is personal action. Rewilding your garden, meaning that you don’t mow, don’t spray pesticides, and encourage wildflowers and other forms of biodiversity. There’s advice about leaving out sugar water or a wet towel to help some tired bees to stay hydrated, and of course if you notice a hive somewhere it shouldn’t be, make sure you call a local beekeeper who will happily take it off your hands. It’s incredibly rewarding to look after the environment in this way from your own garden and beneficial for all kinds of local wildlife and plants. I encourage everyone to take part in making your garden as insect friendly as possible.
But this isn’t the end of the problem. In environmental issues like this, various industries benefit from putting the responsibility on personal choices when they play a much larger part in the problem. We saw this when oil companies invented the concept of the personal carbon footprint to avoid responsibility for carbon emissions, and we are seeing it again when people like Iain Kelly of Bayer CropScience blame “pests and pathogens” for bee colony decimation rather than acknowledging the role of pesticides. To fix this problem, we need strict regulations at the policy level to prevent companies from wiping out our pollinating pals. We need to hold these companies accountable for what they are doing to our bees.
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