You should BEE alarmed

My son and I recently returned from a service trip to Greece.  One afternoon we had some free time between our more service project and evening teaching.  We drove up to the village Fodele, also known as the Orange Village.  The town is surrounded by orange trees.  After lunch we headed up the hill from the town to look a tiny church nestled in the middle of the orange trees.  The fragrant perfume of orange blossoms floated in the air as we circled the tiny church.  My son turned to me and asked “Mom, what is that sound?”  There was a humming sound coming from all directions.  I knew immediately that is was the BEES pollinating the trees.  I got very excited and walked over closer to the fencing to get a peak at the trees.  There were bees everywhere – on every blossom!  Wow.  I couldn’t remember seeing that many bees in a long time.  I thought to myself, sadly, at least I know where there will be bees when all the bees are gone from America.

I’ve been back in Denver for a week now and spring is in the air.  The flowering trees are in blossom everywhere but there are NO bees!  NONE.  I was eating outside in Boulder yesterday surrounded by beautiful, fragrant, flowering trees and bushes.  These should be attracting bees.  There were no bees.  This morning I was out walking around our new house which has a number of flowering trees and guess what?  NO BEES.

There have been many articles in the news over the last few years about colony collapse disorder and disappearing bees.  But the vast majority of people haven’t taken notice?  If people really noticed, they would think about providing food for the bees.  They would plant open pollenated flowers, let clover grow in their lawns, plant fruit trees and not spray pesticides and herbicides at the first sign of a weed.

As spring begins to take blossom in your area I ask you to Take Notice.  Look for bees?  Do you notice them or not?  Ask yourself what you can do?  Support a local bee keeper!  Ask your community to put hives in open spaces.  Plant food for the bees and let clover grow.  Without bees there are many food crops that won’t be available anymore.  If you start to observe I think you will notice the same thing I have.  The situation is dire.