Bees. I began gardening in 2013. During the course of researching plants I wanted to grow, I learned about the plight of bees and butterflies. The Monarch butterflies. This research opened my eyes to a great many things missing or at least not as abundant as I remember from childhood. I haven’t seen as many bumble bees as I used to. Course, I don’t live at the top of the hill anymore where there are lilac bushes planted way back when I was a child. Perhaps even before then. I wasn’t terribly interested in knowing exactly when they were planted.
And there was more clover and other flowers growing around the village. There were plum trees, hazelnut bushes, chokecherries. There were one or two gardens with fences around them. Most of these were filled with food plants.
I came up with a list of plants I wanted in the garden and proceeded to plant them. And wouldn’t you know it, no Bees. Least not the kind I was expecting.
First time I noticed that bees had mutated over the course of 40+ years. A cousin was walking past and I asked him if that was a bumble bee. He looked, “yeah” and we stared at each other. Reaffirmed what our eyes were telling us. These bees looked more like wasps than bumble bees.
So I determined that I’d keep up with my garden just to make sure of the sight I’d seen, that changed bee.
#AtoZChallenge
*edit I'd inadvertently put 1200 noon for publishing. So much for double checking.
brilliant post, Irish bees (native) are small and black, shaped very much like a wasp. We have unfortunately a hive in our facia, and may need to contact someone to dispose of them, they have stung our little dog (drunk on honey) last year and this year, so it's kinda not good. Would rather keep them safe than destroy them, but they seem determined to remain in the roof facia.
ReplyDeleteI'm so happy to hear you're keeping up with the garden.
ReplyDeleteBarbara Kingsolver has written a lovely book about the Monarch butterflies called Flight Behaviour.
This made me smile. Bee evolution in progress. And an excellent reason to keep gardening.
ReplyDeleteBees matter! So do butterflies.
ReplyDeleteIt's hard to believe the alphabet part of the blogging challenge is over for 2021. Down to the after survey, reflections, and the "road trip" sign-up.
Plus, I'm taking part in the Bout of Books read-a-thon in May. So much excitement!
J Lenni Dorner (he/him 👨🏽 or 🧑🏽 they/them) ~ Co-host of the #AtoZchallenge, OperationAwesome6 Debut Author Interviewer, Reference& Speculative Fiction Author