….maybe I’m being overly optimistic
I can imagine that if you’re allergic to bee stings you may not be delighted with this statement. Bees, however, are critical to the survival of this planet. Without them our food production could disappear. They pollinate 70 out of 100 species of plants that feed 90% of the world’s population.
Unfortunately the honeybee population is decreasing at an alarming rate, mostly due to the use of pesticides and habitat loss. Longer and colder winters, in some areas, hasn’t help either. So what can we do about it?
At a local level you can advocate for the ban of dangerous pesticides in our parks and our own gardens, encourage city councillors to commit to returning some park lands back to natural states so that wild flowers can thrive and provide a food source for bees and plant flowers in your own garden or flower boxes that attract bees.
On my recent walks and in my own backyard I’ve been seeing an abundance of bees pollinating the wildflowers and my climbing hydrangea. I hope you’re seeing the return of bees in your neighbourhood. We can’t take them for granted.
Mama Cormier 
Interesting! Today seems to be “bee” day. Another blogger – Sue Slaght – also just posted about bees at http://traveltalesoflife.com/2015/08/28/beekeeping-adventures
I’ve been stung by bees (not pleasant), but in spite of that, I love the hum of bees busy buzzing around flowers. I’m fascinated watching them fly – their lack of aerodynamics really makes you wonder how on earth they actually do fly!
The bees never left our area, although admittedly it seems I’m seeing far more of them since Toronto stopped using herbicides in public green spaces a number of years ago. As much as we might curse the proliferation of dandelions, clover, etc … it is a key food source for bees.
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I was upset about the dandelions as well but no more. It seems that the grass eventually crowds them out. I think that I’m noticing more bees because my climbing hydrangea has gone crazy this summer. I’ve never seen so many flowers.
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Now I have a pouty face because my hydrangeas are toying with me and are miserly with their flowers.
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It funny how we can live in the same city and have such different results in our gardens. I think we all live in slightly different micro climates.
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I still see lots of bumblebees (the big fat ones) but sadly hardly any honey bees! And you’re right we definitely need them.
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Did you know that bumblebees make the best honey but they only make enough to survive. If we ate their honey they would die.
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Carol, you have been a buzy bee too with your camera …. hardly I manage to capture any bees or butterflies .. to slow in adjusting the focus. Great images. With the humble bees we have the same problems, but bees seams to do okay over here. The summer has been so cold this year .. and of course that makes the season works less too.
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From everything I’ve read about this I think you have stricter laws about pesticides in Europe.
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Yes, at least we try … we ar not allowed to use anything against dandelions anymore, because it cause the death for too many important insects. We need our small friends.
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We haven’t had many bees or wasps this year. There is worry over what the consequences of such a plummet in bee numbers might be. Pesticides are being blamed, but the EU seems set to reverse a ban. Also blames are the cutting of roadside verges, the destruction of hedgerows to make larger fields, and even the fact people are paving over their gardens to provide space for the car instead of growing flowers. Maybe they just drowned in our summer downpours this year!
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All those scenarios that you mentioned are factors in the decline of the bee population. Paving over gardens has also been attributed to the flooding of basements during rain storms. People don’t stop and think about the consequences of their actions. This week in the paper they did an article about people laying down artificial turf in their yards to eliminate weeds. Yikes!
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