Picture this. It’s my birthday. I’m at a fancy schmantzy spa swimming in a big blue pool filled with natural mineral springs. Back and forth. It’s nice. But I’ve chosen to spend this birthday alone, and at that moment I’m revisiting that decision, possibly regretting it just a teeny bit. And that’s when I see the bee.
You know how it happens. Bees and flies and moths and bugs end up on the surface of pools with chlorine in them and that’s really the end of their lives. You know it’s true. So it was suddenly a bit of a bright spot to be able redirect my teeny naggy feeling into helping this little stuck bee. I slipped off my paddleboard (yes, I was paddleboarding; it was my birthday), and slipped it underneath the stranded creature and left her safely on the side of the pool to dry.* I hoped. I also hoped it wasn’t too late. She was stunned, but I figured she could recuperate. She was just weighted down. So I continued my swim back and forth across the pool in laps, now, and each time checked in on her to see how she was doing. Hard to tell. After a few laps I began to worry that perhaps I should move her more into the sun and less in harm’s way. What if someone stepped on her? Prepared to do this I arrived once again at pool’s edge, and at that very moment, happily, she lifted off and flew off into the air, to continue her way. I want to say merry way, but given the state of the bee these days, I’m no longer sure it’s that merry.

Probably a lot of you watched the CBS piece on the plight of bees. If not, you’ve by now surely been exposed to a variety of theories about what is happening to them, as in, they are disappearing, or dying or both. And first it was the Cellphone Theory (they are disoriented by the waves and can’t find their way back to their hives); now it’s the Virus Theory (and I guess there might be something to that). But how about this. (Duh.) They are stressed out of their little bee minds because commercial beekeepers working for agribusiness are dragging them around the country on flatbed trucks carting them here and there and wherever they are “needed” to keep these conglomerate megafarms in business with no regard whatsoever for what that might actually be DOING to them, poor things. Like compromising their immune systems?? Or throwing them into unfamiliar environments, far from home where they don’t even know where to find water??? Combined with the ongoing use of pesticides and insecticides perhaps the poor little creatures are saying to us, in their disappearance, “I can’t do this anymore.” So the concept of saving one little stranded bee in a pool is about as far from their unconsciousness minds as one could get. And it’s nothing “personal”; it’s “just business.” As if the fate of the honeybee had nothing to do with us and our lives. Or that we should even care.

Which brings up the obvious. We have to start growing our own food. As in, in our back yards. And, we have to, have to, have to be planting flowers and trees and herbs that attract bees and that nurture them. And we have to LEAVE THEM ALONE and let them do their marvelous bee thing. And let them swarm where and when they want to. And protect them. We have to stop using pesticides and all the garbage we put into the environment that is making them sick and probably mutating the heck out of billions of years of natural programming and let them be. Let bees be is my basic message. Maybe someone would like to come up with a bumper sticker. Be my guest.

My friend Jack keeps bees. He’s been keeping bees for 32 years.

He and his wife sell wonderful local honey at the Saturday morning farmers market. I have bought a lot of honey from Jack. I don’t know why. He finally asked me one Saturday, “Uh, how much honey do you HAVE?” I’m not sure. But a bunch of very large jars. It is the only food which keeps. As in forever. Fancy that.

So I asked Jack, “What about the bees? Are you noticing colonies collapsing?”
He’s not. (And this is apparently a common response among organic beekeepers.) Jack does not cart his bees all over creation. They stay right around here. He did notice that some hives were swarming a little late in the season, but he caught them and fed them and they did fine. Jack says that strong colonies going into winter make strong colonies in spring. Weak colonies going into winter “probably won’t make it.” I asked him about my stand on backyard gardening. He says, “You won’t get rid of agribusiness, because there would not be enough food. But, yes, if people started growing and buying locally it would allow bees to stay in the area, not be moved around, and it would not only be better for the bees, it’s better for the economy.” It’s also better for the environment because we wouldn’t have as many large trucks on our highways trucking food in, using up fuel and spewing fumes on our roads and into our air. The list goes on. Jack says if more people would buy from local growers (either at farmers markets or by asking their local stores to supply fresh local produce, which, thankfully, is a growing trend) more people would grow food locally because they would see there is a market for it. And all these minor shifts would support the honeybee populations. Your choices make a difference.

And get this! Jack says that if we grew more of our own food it would not only help the honeybees, it would support the native bees (there are native bees??) who also help pollinate our food. And I love this part. They are solitary bees (which might be why we never hear about them). They don’t build big colonies like the honeybee (who were brought to this land from Europe on a ship, you know). So it is much more difficult to collect and manipulate this other class of bee. Jack says that, worst case scenario, if the honeybee did get wiped out (God forbid) due to our ignorant and abusive treatment of them, and we were dependent on the native bees, they would have to set aside tracts of land for them, a safe habitat that would attract them, and plant things they liked and we’d be eating that. Because, again, these bees can’t be roped in like the immigrant honeybees from Europe. Wouldn’t that be an amazing trick of nature?

So back to simple practicalities, here’s what you can do:

1. Buy locally grown veges and fruits. (This is no “sacrifice.” This is a delicious treat that your body will thank you for.)

2. Grow your own. At very very least, start an herb garden. And isn’t this
convenient? Jack says bees LOVE all the herbs. They love rosemary, sage, thyme, lavender, mint and basil! Again, by doing this, you not only get good karma by helping out the happy bees; you benefit enormously for having fresh herbs at your fingertips a good part of the year. There’s no comparison. Once you start this practice you will wonder why you never did this before. [Thanks to my lovely friend Amy in Arizona who taught me to expand my herb repertoire.]

3. Plant flowers and fruit trees that the bees love. (And here is a special secret. Plant something like Texas sage, or bottlebrush, and when the purple (or red) flowers come into bloom go out early in the morning, pre-traffic, if you know what I mean, and just stand very quietly next to the bush and LISTEN. You will be completely enchanted. Really.)

4. Do NOT use pesticides. Just don’t. It’s bad bad bad for the environment–your environment. Don’t soil your nest.

5. Teach your children to love and respect bees. For the most part, if you don’t
bother them, they won’t bother you. Jack the beekeeper says that bees working the garden are not going to sting you or be aggressive if you leave them alone. It’s getting near their hives that might make them cranky or defensive.

*All honeybees in the garden are girls. The boys do one thing and one thing
only: they mate with the queen. That’s it, folks.

Posted on November 6th, 2007 by Kathryn
Filed under: Animals | 11 Comments »

Welcome to my back door. That’s Ruby looking back over her shoulder and Conner anticipating going inside. That grey door is now covered with MUD.
As in muddy pawprints. As in, “Hey, it’s raining! Let us in!” And in they come and immediately they jump into the tub in the extra loo and have their feet rinsed off and then they jump on towels. It’s a messy affair, I must admit. Thank goodness they are Border Collies with large vocabularies, so it’s not as bad as it sounds. Oh, what am I talking about? Of course it’s as bad as it sounds! It’s a bloody mess!

What to do?

Traditionally I have turned to the virtues of rice straw. Bought bales. Spread it out. Let the dogs run over the big backyard to their hearts content. No problem. But this week I spotted the following story making its way around the Net and it brought to the fore a nagging question that had been trying to worm its way through to my conscious mind for some time now, articulated in the following: Why am I raking up all these leaves and having them carted away, even if it’s in the recycling bin? Wouldn’t they serve as a good mulch and perhaps even end the Mud Problem??

Here’s the story, meant to be humorous, though, of course, when you think about it, it’s not. It’s just one more example of our poor stewardship of planet Earth, and our disconnect from the natural cycles of life. (Let me count the ways…)

GOD: St. Francis, you know all about gardens and nature. What in the World is going on down there in the USA? What happened to the dandelions, violets, thistle and stuff I started eons ago? I had a perfect, no-maintenance garden plan. Those plants grow in any type of soil, withstand drought and multiply with abandon. The nectar from the long lasting blossoms attracts butterflies, honeybees and flocks of songbirds. I expected to see a vast garden of colors by now. But all I see are these green rectangles.

ST. FRANCIS: It’s the tribes that settled there, Lord. The Suburbanites. They started calling your flowers weeds and went to great lengths to kill them and replace them with grass.

GOD: Grass? But it’s so boring. It’s not colorful. It doesn’t attract butterflies, birds and bees, only grubs and sod worms. It’s temperamental with temperatures. Do these Suburbanites really want all that grass growing there?

ST. FRANCIS: Apparently so, Lord. They go to great pains to grow it and keep it green. They begin each spring by fertilizing grass and poisoning any other plant that crops up in the lawn.

GOD: The spring rains and warm weather probably make grass grow really fast. That must make the Suburbanites happy.

ST. FRANCIS: Apparently not, Lord. As soon as it grows a little, they cut it, sometimes twice a week.

GOD: They cut it? Do they then bale it like hay?

ST. FRANCIS: Not exactly Lord. Most of them rake it up and put it in bags.

GOD: They bag it? Why? Is it a cash crop? Do they sell it?

ST. FRANCIS: No, sir — just the opposite. They pay to throw it away.

GOD: Now, let me get this straight. They fertilize grass so it will grow. And when it does grow, they cut it off and pay to throw it away?

ST. FRANCIS: Yes, sir.

GOD: These Suburbanites must be relieved in the summer when we cut back on the rain and turn up the heat. That surely slows the growth and saves them a lot of work.

ST. FRANCIS: You aren’t going to believe this, Lord. When the grass stops growing so fast, they drag out hoses and pay more money to water it so they can continue to mow it and pay to get rid of it.

GOD: What nonsense. At least they kept some of the trees. That was a sheer stoke of genius, if I do say so myself. The trees grow leaves in the spring to provide beauty and shade in the summer. In the autumn they fall to the ground and form a natural blanket to keep moisture in the soil and protect the trees and bushes. Plus, as they rot, the leaves form compost to enhance the soil. It’s a natural circle of life.

ST. FRANCIS: You’d better sit down, Lord. The Suburbanites have drawn a new circle. As soon as the leaves fall, they rake them into great piles and pay to have them hauled away.

GOD: No. What do they do to protect the shrub and tree roots in the winter and to keep the soil moist and loose?

ST. FRANCIS: After throwing away the leaves, they go out and buy something which they call mulch. They haul it home and spread it around in place of the leaves.

GOD: And where do they get this mulch?

ST. FRANCIS: They cut down trees and grind them up to make the mulch.

GOD: Enough! I don’t want to think about this anymore. St. Catherine, you’re in charge of the arts. What movie have you scheduled for us tonight?

ST. CATHERINE: Dumb and Dumber, Lord. It’s a real stupid movie about………….

GOD: Never mind, I think I just heard the whole story from St. Francis.

Anonymous

So. I want to take this parable to heart and use the leaves that drift into my yard on the wind from all sides here, in vast numbers at this time of year, naturally providing what I hope to be an organic, cost-free solution to our little winter mud problem. (Thanks, wind!) If there are any readers who have any experience with this sort of thing, I’d love to hear about it. Meanwhile, in my ideal dreamworld, I am looking forward to having a use for the many many leaves that fall on and about this property. Bay, oak, walnut, maple, magnolia, and mulberry, poplar, plum, quince, apple and fig. Quite a melange, don’t you think? It sounds quite lovely. Those of you who have begun reading my posts will know I’m a bit of an accidental gardener. If there is something you think I should know, those of you with more deliberate information, please advise! Thank you!

Posted on October 24th, 2007 by Kathryn
Filed under: People at Work | 5 Comments »