Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Doing all I can to help the honey bees

Since learning about Honey Bee Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) I have been doing everything I can to try to help. I immediately thought of getting a hive here in the yard. The Town of Sidney requires a lot size of 750 square meters. I am trying to get that changed. Our lot is a good sized lot for Sidney at 603 square meters so the 750 square meter minimum needs to be reduced.

Albert Einstein said "If the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would only have four years of life left. No more bees, no more pollination, no more plants, no more animals, no more man."

So, I am doing all I can to get bee hives into people's yards including mine, and personally growing more and more bee friendly plants. I garden organically. No pesticides or herbicides. Since planting my vegetable garden, I have a lot more bees, dragonflies, hummingbirds and butterflies. And it's just a little garden. I have really paid attention to what is attracting bees. They love my chives. See the bee on the chives above...yup that's mine. They also love my English Lavender. I found a huge display of lavender at Elk Lake Garden Centre about a month ago. There must have been twelve different varieties. I stood back and watched every type. After about ten minutes of research, I found that the light purple English Lavender attracted a LOT more bees than the other varieties. I am going to take seed and maybe try cuttings and spread the plants around the yard. Yayyy bees!

I don't want to get preachy, so if you want more information about the loss of honey bees, here is a brief article with a lot of information.
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/3545166/

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