Everyone with extra outdoor space to spare, call your local beekeepers and see if they will put a colony on your property. It helps the local plants and wildlife, and they’ll do all the work in maintaining them. They just need volunteers to offer up space.
Also, talk to your local government about reducing the types of pesticides available for non-commercial purposes.
What’s actually needed in most places are the native furrow bees, sweat bees, carpenter bees, and the likes. With the exception of some bumble bee species, they’re not raised commercially
EXACTLY! That’s why I’m turning my yard into a native habitat for all sorts of critters. I’m planting mushrooms, wildflowers, native shrubs and trees, ferns, etc. I’ve already noticed an uptick in the year and a half I’ve been doing it and maintenance is a breeze. Way easier than keeping up with grass and I love having some clover in the yard and the bees go nuts for it!
We stopped mowing our farm a few years ago. The insects that returned are crazy. Lightning bugs, bees of all kinds, tons of butterflies and our bat population for the few tiny caves we have has increased tenfold. It’s been a crazy transformation by…not doing work lol
This will just exacerbate the collapse of native bees and pollinators. Honey bees are aggressive forrragers, and beat out native species. There are bee enthusiasts and conservationists who actually kill and remove honey bee nests for this reason.
Native Americans called them white man’s flies because they aren’t native and only were introduced by Europeans who wanted honey.
Is the space a ways from your normal paths? As long as you leave em be (heh) they’ll usually ignore you
This is the case for almost all wildlife in my experience of nearly 40 years (including a Boy Scout-focused childhood). There’s an energy you can summon through your attitude, body language, tone of voice, expressions, etc that makes you more palatable to animals. It’s “demonstrating you don’t want to hurt them and you won’t surprise them”. I think of it as “Buddha vibes”, as new agey as it sounds. (Im not a Buddhist, but Soto Zen in particular is a lifelong influence for me.) We are vectors of trauma for most animals and they respond accordingly.
I have a wild rabbit I’ve gotten to know over the past few years. She lives in the yard i own, so I make sure my yard is healthy for her. No pesticides, infrequent mowing, etc. Nowadays she lets me get close enough for these kinds of pictures (very little zoom, I was <10’ from her).
Honeybees generally stay away from human activity. If you have a lot of flowers in your area, and big open spaces, they’ll just stick to the flowers and away from your house. They’re also unlikely to sting you unless you go to the hive and start messing with it and they don’t recognize you.
Everyone with extra outdoor space to spare, call your local beekeepers and see if they will put a colony on your property. It helps the local plants and wildlife, and they’ll do all the work in maintaining them. They just need volunteers to offer up space.
Also, talk to your local government about reducing the types of pesticides available for non-commercial purposes.
What’s actually needed in most places are the native furrow bees, sweat bees, carpenter bees, and the likes. With the exception of some bumble bee species, they’re not raised commercially
EXACTLY! That’s why I’m turning my yard into a native habitat for all sorts of critters. I’m planting mushrooms, wildflowers, native shrubs and trees, ferns, etc. I’ve already noticed an uptick in the year and a half I’ve been doing it and maintenance is a breeze. Way easier than keeping up with grass and I love having some clover in the yard and the bees go nuts for it!
We stopped mowing our farm a few years ago. The insects that returned are crazy. Lightning bugs, bees of all kinds, tons of butterflies and our bat population for the few tiny caves we have has increased tenfold. It’s been a crazy transformation by…not doing work lol
Thanks for reminding me I’ve always wanted to have bees. I’d never considered just calling up beekeepers.
This will just exacerbate the collapse of native bees and pollinators. Honey bees are aggressive forrragers, and beat out native species. There are bee enthusiasts and conservationists who actually kill and remove honey bee nests for this reason.
Native Americans called them white man’s flies because they aren’t native and only were introduced by Europeans who wanted honey.
This won’t help native/wild bees or the specific ecosystems they are a part of though.
It’s actually a part of the collapse of native pollinators.
I have space, but I’m allergic :/
Is the space a ways from your normal paths? As long as you leave em be (heh) they’ll usually ignore you
This is the case for almost all wildlife in my experience of nearly 40 years (including a Boy Scout-focused childhood). There’s an energy you can summon through your attitude, body language, tone of voice, expressions, etc that makes you more palatable to animals. It’s “demonstrating you don’t want to hurt them and you won’t surprise them”. I think of it as “Buddha vibes”, as new agey as it sounds. (Im not a Buddhist, but Soto Zen in particular is a lifelong influence for me.) We are vectors of trauma for most animals and they respond accordingly.
I have a wild rabbit I’ve gotten to know over the past few years. She lives in the yard i own, so I make sure my yard is healthy for her. No pesticides, infrequent mowing, etc. Nowadays she lets me get close enough for these kinds of pictures (very little zoom, I was <10’ from her).
Honeybees generally stay away from human activity. If you have a lot of flowers in your area, and big open spaces, they’ll just stick to the flowers and away from your house. They’re also unlikely to sting you unless you go to the hive and start messing with it and they don’t recognize you.