![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
athousanderrorsvia http://ift.tt/2FPvLcP
fireheartedkaratepup:
thebeeblogger:
foxthebeekeeper:
jumpingjacktrash:
libertarirynn:
bollytolly:
l0veyu:
viva-la-bees:
fat-gold-fish:
how do u actually save bees?
Plant bee-friendly flowers
Support your local beekeepers
Set up bee hotels for solitary bees
If you see a lethargic bee feed it sugar water
Spread awareness of the importance off bees
+Don’t eat honey✌🏻
NO.
That will not help save the bees at all. They need the excess honey removed from their hives. That’s the beekeepers entire livelihood.
Seriously refusing to eat honey is one of those well-meaning but ultimately terrible ideas. The bees make way too much honey and need it out in order to thrive (not being funny but that was literally a side effect in Bee Movie). Plus that’s the only way for the beekeepers to make the money they need to keep the bees healthy. Do not stop eating honey because somebody on Tumblr told you too.
excess honey, if not removed, can ferment and poison the bees. even if it doesn’t, it attracts animals and other insects which can hurt the bees or even damage the hive. why vegans think letting bees stew in their own drippings is ‘cruelty-free’ is beyond me. >:[
the fact that we find honey yummy and nutritious is part of why we keep bees, true, but the truth is we mostly keep them to pollinate our crops. the vegetable crops you seem to imagine would still magically sustain us if we stopped cultivating bees.
and when you get right down to it… domestic bees aren’t confined in any way. if they wanted to fly away, they could, and would. they come back to the wood frame hives humans build because those are nice places to nest.
so pretending domestic bees have it worse than wild bees is just the most childish kind of anthropomorphizing.
If anything, man-made hives are MORE suitable for bees to live in because we have mathematically determined their optimal living space and conditions, and can control them better in our hives. We also can treat them for diseases and pests much easier than we could if they were living in, say, a tree.
Tl;dr for all of this: eating honey saves the bees from themselves, and keeping them in man-made hives is good for them.
✌️✌️✌️
Plus, buying honey supports bee owners, which helps them maintain the hives, and if they get more money they can buy more hives, which means more bees!
And the reason there is excess honey which can be removed and processed for human consumption (and by processed I mean like, removed from the comb and put into jars, not neccessarily pasteurised) is absolutely because beekeepers are so good at looking after them. Like I cannot stress this enough. My dad has 5 or 6 hives now, and if one of the hives only has enough honey to sustain a colony through the winter? He won’t take any honey from them. Full stop. With the weather being so unrelentingly shit in Scotland the last couple of summers, there’s been some younger/smaller colonies that he hasn’t touched the honey; he’s given them sugar syrup and fondant to top them up, checked on them through the winter to make sure they have enough food, and that is IT.
No one cares more about the health and wellbeing of bees than beekeepers. NO. ONE.
(Your picture was not posted)
fireheartedkaratepup:
thebeeblogger:
foxthebeekeeper:
jumpingjacktrash:
libertarirynn:
bollytolly:
l0veyu:
viva-la-bees:
fat-gold-fish:
how do u actually save bees?
Plant bee-friendly flowers
Support your local beekeepers
Set up bee hotels for solitary bees
If you see a lethargic bee feed it sugar water
Spread awareness of the importance off bees
+Don’t eat honey✌🏻
NO.
That will not help save the bees at all. They need the excess honey removed from their hives. That’s the beekeepers entire livelihood.
Seriously refusing to eat honey is one of those well-meaning but ultimately terrible ideas. The bees make way too much honey and need it out in order to thrive (not being funny but that was literally a side effect in Bee Movie). Plus that’s the only way for the beekeepers to make the money they need to keep the bees healthy. Do not stop eating honey because somebody on Tumblr told you too.
excess honey, if not removed, can ferment and poison the bees. even if it doesn’t, it attracts animals and other insects which can hurt the bees or even damage the hive. why vegans think letting bees stew in their own drippings is ‘cruelty-free’ is beyond me. >:[
the fact that we find honey yummy and nutritious is part of why we keep bees, true, but the truth is we mostly keep them to pollinate our crops. the vegetable crops you seem to imagine would still magically sustain us if we stopped cultivating bees.
and when you get right down to it… domestic bees aren’t confined in any way. if they wanted to fly away, they could, and would. they come back to the wood frame hives humans build because those are nice places to nest.
so pretending domestic bees have it worse than wild bees is just the most childish kind of anthropomorphizing.
If anything, man-made hives are MORE suitable for bees to live in because we have mathematically determined their optimal living space and conditions, and can control them better in our hives. We also can treat them for diseases and pests much easier than we could if they were living in, say, a tree.
Tl;dr for all of this: eating honey saves the bees from themselves, and keeping them in man-made hives is good for them.
✌️✌️✌️
Plus, buying honey supports bee owners, which helps them maintain the hives, and if they get more money they can buy more hives, which means more bees!
And the reason there is excess honey which can be removed and processed for human consumption (and by processed I mean like, removed from the comb and put into jars, not neccessarily pasteurised) is absolutely because beekeepers are so good at looking after them. Like I cannot stress this enough. My dad has 5 or 6 hives now, and if one of the hives only has enough honey to sustain a colony through the winter? He won’t take any honey from them. Full stop. With the weather being so unrelentingly shit in Scotland the last couple of summers, there’s been some younger/smaller colonies that he hasn’t touched the honey; he’s given them sugar syrup and fondant to top them up, checked on them through the winter to make sure they have enough food, and that is IT.
No one cares more about the health and wellbeing of bees than beekeepers. NO. ONE.
(Your picture was not posted)
