Give Bees and Butterflies a Chance

[Anna Billings]

Here's an article featured in the San Francisco Chronicle on Sunday, June 14, 2009 in the Home and Garden section called Give Bees a Chance. It gives suggestions for what we can do to support these beautiful and essential creatures. Essential not only for their beauty, but also for their crucial role as "pollinators."

"It's estimated that pollinators are needed for reproduction of 75 percent of the Earth's flowering plants, and in North America, honeybees enable production of more than 9 commericially grown crops, according to the National Academy of Science."

Here are some ways we can help:

" -- identify common pollinators and the plants they feed on.

-- Plant small stands of these native flowers where possible. Try to plant flowers that bloom at different times of the year so pollinators will have food throughout the year.

-- Consider planting host plants to provide food and habitats for common Bay Area butterflies.

-- Where possible have fresh water sources available. Don't forget to provide places of shelter for ground and twig dwelling bees. To continue to survive, bumblebees need habitats such as abandoned rodent burrows for their nests and queen hibernation sites.

-- Avoid use of pesticides and herbicides. They can be harmful to beneficial insects such as pollinators, the wildlife that depend on the plants they pollinate, not to mention the health and safety of humans. Consider using an integrated pest management system to control pests."

In the San Francisco Bay Area here are some plants that bees love:

"-- Common sunflower (Helianthus annuus)

-- Cosmos (cosmos spp.)

-- Mountain mint (Pycnanthemum incanum/montanum)

-- Cyrilla racemiflora (a good container plant)

-- Woolly blue curls (Trichostema lanatum"

How about your area? What plants attract and help sustain bees? And butterflies? And hummingbirds?

[Connie Weber]

Hi Anna,

Just yesterday April, my neighbor, showed me a breakoff swarm of honeybees from her beehives. They ornamented a tree branch, just hanging there as a glob of bustling activity, of huge and powerful potential. She and I stood underneath, sensing the swirl of energy, celebrating the hope that bees are doing better in Michigan now. (Not sure if they are.)

You know my garden, filled with flowers... You know I'm an organic gardener. I'm trying to do my part for nature. Also, I talk a lot in school about the importance of bees. I frequently report on the status and importance of bees as my current event. And I bite my tongue when kids say "I hate bees; they sting." Figure if they get plenty of opportunity to find out how fascinating bees are, the students will transform in their thinking... Almost always find that to be true. "Just observe. Tell me what you see." What student hasn't been swept away in the wonder of bees, if only someone they know is over-the-top with insect-fascination, and that someone is their teacher, who give students an opportunity to watch?

Here is a powerful nature-observing activity, from Project Zero: "I see, I think, I wonder." Just try that on bees some day. Let's try it together.

Thank you for posting the reference and your thoughts; great forum.

[Anna Billings]

Hi Connie,

How thrilling to see (and hear!) a swarm of honeybees. I can imagine the sensation and yes, the "huge and powerful potential," and "the swirl of energy" along with the hope for the return of the honeybees. I'm always so delighted when I see one buzzing around my garden here in California. And also the hummingbirds that seem to be in more abundance this year. Yay.

You are, indeed, doing your part with your garden. That's what I keep reading about and today, another article in our local paper emphasized the benefits of planting native (and organic) plants as a way to invite back the bees. (article: Natural Attraction by Barbara J. Euser, UC Marin Master Gardeners)

This article quoted John Muir from a chapter of his book, The Mountains of California, written in 1894. The chapter is entitled, "The Bee Pastures." He described California as "one sweet bee-garden throughout its entire length, north and south, and all the way across from the snowy Sierras to the ocean." Wow.

He also foresaw the threats soon to come as he complained that "plows and sheep have made sad havoc in these glorious pastures." and he criticized large-scale cultivation of crops such as alfalfa and citrus that replaced the rich diversity of native plant life. And, of course, over the next 125 years things got worse.

The article affirms once again that "honeybees, butterflies, and hummingbirds are responsible for pollinating most fruit and vegetable crops. Bees pollinate 100 percent of California's valuable almond crop. But ... honeybees have recently been suffering from colony collapse disorder (CCD) .. by the use of pesticides and loss of habitat."

The good news is this — "As domestic gardeners, we can play a role in re-creating Muir's "sweet bee-garden" in our own small corners ... by planting the native species of flowers and shrubs that provide pollen and nectar for pollinators."

Here are some websites the article listed as resources for more information and complete lists of plants that attract pollinators:

www.xerces.org for Xerces Society and www.pollinator.org for Pollinator Partnership

To obtain a copy of Muir's "The Bee Pastures" (available as a booklet), contact the Partners for Sustainable Pollination at http://pfsp-bees.org

[Ian Carmichael]

It was John Lennon who wrote a song in this vein

'Give Bees a Chance' - very popular, as I recall.

[Connie Weber]

Anna,
Thank you for the lovely post, complete with references.
Ian, go sit in the corner; you get a "time out." ;-)

[Ian Carmichael]

How 20C learning!

[Anna Billings]

Thanks for the chuckles, Ian. :-D Yes, a very popular song, indeed. Maybe it can be adopted (and adapted) as a theme song for a save-the-bees campaign. :-D

[Anna Billings]

Bees continue to be features in the news! This time an uplifting article in my local paper tells the story of a contractor who is skilled in relocating honeybees from unwelcome dwellings. (Sorry I can't link the story as our newspaper only allows linking on the day of the story.)

The good news here is that it illustrates how people are becoming more aware of how to remove unwanted guests without harming them. An exterminator would simply kill them. NOT a good way to go in my opinion (and other's opinions as well, thank goodness). Instead, thanks to adaptable specialties such as those of this building contractor, we have healthy, environmentally sustainable alternatives.

The owner who initially called the exterminators until she realized these were honeybees, said, "Farmers need them and we need them." Right on! So she called in the specialist, the building contractor who for the past 12 years has supplemented his basic contracting work with helping business and home-owners (including filmmaker George Lucas and the California Academy of Sciences) relocate their bees.

Not only is relocation a better way to go for the bees sake, but it also is more effective since future bees will find their way to the old home by smelling the old comb left behind. So added to his skill in removing the bees unharmed by means of a lightweight vacuum, he knows how to close up the walls so the bees don't come back to that particular site.

The contractor, David Carlos of Woodacre, California, says the bees "must be relocated at least two miles away from where they were once established or else they will reorient themselves and go back, even if they can't get in."

After sucking the bees out (ever so gently), "he introduces them to one or more of his homemade hive boxes. Then he relocates them to 12 or more hives he cares for at four sites around the county."

Ah ha, maybe this is why I'm noticing more honeybees in my garden this year! More good people like Mr. Carlos doing their job for the benefit of the rest of us. And our good friends the honeybees!

Buzz, buzz — beautiful flowers and fruits getting their natural pollination and offering us tasty honey. Got to love those honeybees!

[Ian Carmichael]

Came across an interesting note on the net recently - (an RSS feed) Japanes researchers have observed that honeybees will envelop a hornet, and destroy it with heat and carbon dioxide. Can't recall the details - but there is google!

[Connie Weber]

Hi Anna,
I wanted to add in this PBS reference, "Silence of the Bees."
Also wanted to note that today while roasting marshmallows with summer campers in the field of clover on the farm, I kept hearing a hum, and finally attuned myself to it... looked around and noticed bees everywhere, busy at work. I'm hoping they're making a comeback in Michigan. That was the largest number of bees I've seen for a while.
My local bee tree is doing well, too. Will it last? Last year they overwintered just fine, then all died in spring. Shortly a new colony moved in, and since late spring the colony has been thriving. Wonder... will they succumb to the same problem as last year's bees, or do they have more resilience? Let's keep hoping.
For my part, I try to educate children about the importance of bees every chance I get. We spend a good deal of time just watching. I have yet to meet a child who is not fascinated by bees, once s/he's had a "proper introduction."