Today, Saturday August 21, is National Honey Bee Awareness Day. I read somewhere that the goal of this day is to “promote and advance beekeeping, to educate the public about honey bees and beekeeping, and to engage the public in related environmental concerns.”
It’s these “related environmental concerns” that are most troubling, and it will take more than a day or two of engaging the public to do anything about them. Although there is a lot of talk about environmental problems, there is very little action. We continue to burn fossil fuels, use pesticides, grow untested genetically modified foods, and dump garbage in our oceans while we talk about how terrible the whole thing is. We each think that we are entitled to do these things even though “they” shouldn’t be.
So if you really care about the bees—honey bees or any other type—you can start by doing something for the environment. There are limitless ways to help and you don’t have to go anywhere near a bee if you don’t want to. Furthermore, you can start anywhere you like because anything we can do to preserve the resources and biodiversity of the planet will help the bees—and ultimately the human race.
Rusty
