World Honey Bee Day
We can often take nature for granted. The food we eat, the flowers we enjoy and honey we drink in our tea! Today is the perfect opportunity to pay our respects to the Honey Bee and celebrate the crucial role they play in our lives.
Together with our friends at Tommie and Lottie we decided to join forces and share some of the information we have learnt so far on our bee journey. We want to raise awareness and talk about the different steps that we can take in order to protect this vital species - whose numbers are dramatically declining.
World Honey Bee Day, formerly known as Honey Bee Awareness Day was organised by a group of beekeepers in the USA as an official day to celebrate honey bees. The organizers of the event, on the concept of the World Honey Bee Day, have said:
Bring together beekeepers, bee associations, as well as other interested groups to connect with the communities to advance beekeeping. By working together and harnessing the efforts that so many already accomplish, and [by] using a united effort one day a year, the rewards and message is magnified many times over. We encourage bee associations, individuals, and other groups to get involved.
The fact is bees are disappearing worldwide. Almost 90% of wild plants and 75% of global crops rely on animal pollination - bees are thought to be the most efficient pollinators, as they rely on nectar and pollen to feed their young. Since the 1930's, we have lost a devastating 97% of our wildflower meadows across the UK and one of the most critical habitats for bees are wildflower meadows.
Honey bees depend on the nectar of different plants in order to survive. We also need to recognise that we depend on honey bees for our own survival. After all, if they did not pollinate, a lot of the nutritious crops that we need to survive would not reproduce.
St Albans based sustainable clothing brand Tommy and Lottie have recently launched a save the bees collection alongside Abigails Flower Truck who grows her own sustainable bee friendly flowers in her flower patch in Hertfordshire. Together they have partnered with the Hertfordshire and Middlesex Wildlife Trust in an effort to help raise awareness and donate £'’'s to charity who work closely with wildlife including the bees and their natural habitat. For every product in the bee collection sold £1 is paid to Herts & Middlesex Wildlife Trust, a registered charity no. 239863.
Other threats to our honey bees are intensive farming and the use of toxic pesticides which are sprayed on plants to help deter critters but are fatal to our bees and can wipe out entire colonies. As a rule of thumb the foraging area around a beehive extends for two miles and sometimes a honey bee is too tired or exhausted to return back home.
This is why we came up with the idea of Beevive - a bee revival keyring readily accessible for the next time you meet a bee in need.
We recommend that you take the time to learn more about the honey bee on this day and how we can all do our bit in order to provide them with a supportive environment. When we plant orchards, wildflowers and other types of flowering plants, we are supporting the most important pollinators, bees! You can read more about the seven simple things you can do to save the bees on National Honeybee Day here at CNN. "Saving the bees" seems like a huge goal, but you certainly don't have to be a beekeeper to make an impact.
We would love you to share the bee love with your friends and family to help spread the word, not just today but everyday.
Happy World Bee Day honeys! #savethebees
