Bees are our bros. But they’re disappearing at an alarming rate. Read on and learn how you can help to save our lil’ winged pals. Plus knit your own fuzzy buzzy friend with our free Bee Geez pattern!
Why are bees important?
Well, three things…
Food
Bees pollinate around a third of all the the foods that we we eat. More than 80% of the crops grown for human consumption need bees to pollinate them – that’s most of out fruit and veg, nuts, cocoa, coffee and tea. Not only does a world without bees mean no morning cup of coffee, but as bees also pollinate the crops used to feed livestock, it’s also a world without meat.
Cotton
It’s not just food. Cotton crops also rely on bees for pollination. Think about the impact that a cotton crisis would have on your everyday life!
Nature
As if that’s not enough, bees also help to maintain the world’s ecosystems. The seeds eaten by birds and small animals are all from plants pollinated by our fuzzy buzzy friends, and the decline in bees has already been linked to falling biodiversity in the natural world.
Bees are responsible for one in three of every bite of food that we eat.
Why are bees dying?
A couple of reasons…
Urbanisation
In the last sixty years bees have lost much of their natural habitat. In the UK, 97% of wildflower meadows have vanished, and two species of bumblebee have become extinct. And it’s not just the wild bees. Since 2007, and average 30% of all honeybee colonies have died every winter in what’s become known as colony collapse disorder. And the culprit? Well, parasites and poor nutrition are contributing factors, but the main cause is very much of our own making…
Modern farming
As we strive to grow more food and increase our yields, we’re actually doing the very opposite. Bees pollinating crops which have been grown using agricultural pesticides return to their hives with contaminated pollen, which leaves their colony more susceptible to lethal parasites.
The bees need you (almost as much as you need them)
How can I help to save the bees?
Luckily there are some great organisations out there fighting to save the bees. Friends of the Earth are creating a buzz in the UK with their campaign, The Bee Cause, and in the US, Greenpeace are inviting you to Bee the Solution.
Here are three ways in which YOU can act to help our buzzy lil’ pals:
Give bees a home
Do your bit by planting a bee haven. Friends of the Earth are helping UK bee fans to create their own Bee World by providing practical advice and free wildflower seeds, and if you already have a own lil’ bee sanctuary that you’d like to invite other people into, you can register it here. Wherever you are in the world, you can register your pollinator paradise with SHARE. If you’re short on space, a Bee & Bee can be created in a window box!
Use your voice
Let your voice be heard by adding your name to a petition. If you’re in the US, Greenpeace are collecting signatures for a ban on bee-killing pesticides here. If you’re in the UK, Friends of the Earth are calling for a similar ban which you can support here and you can speak out here to defend nature laws which help to protect the places that bees depend on.
Show bees the money
You can donate money to bee charities. In the US, you can do this via The Honeybee Conservancy - you can even sponsor a hive! In the UK, Friends of the Earth will reward your donation with a Bee Saver Kit.
We hope we’ve helped to inspire some love for our fuzzy lil’ friends. Perhaps enough that you wanna knit up your very own? Well, look no further. You can download our free Bee Geez pattern , as knitted up by our Gang for Knit in Public Day.
