Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Bees pollinate plants so that plants can reproduce, and that really is the bottom line.
That is what bees are all about. That is why we need bees and that is why hundreds of
millions of dollars, pounds and euros are spent annually by governments around the
globe in protecting bees, in bee research and in beekeeping subsidies of one type or
another.
Because of their pollinating activities, honey-bees are the most economically important
insects on earth, and certainly the most studied. Honey production is essentially a side
issue. The honey-bee's role - and thus the beekeeper's role - in this becomes more
important and valuable by the day as our farming and other practices dramatically
eradicate the habitats of other types of bees and pollinating insects. Some insects can
exist only by eating the pollen of certain plants. If those plants were removed so that
more crops could be planted, bees and other pollinating insects would die out. What,
then, would pollinate our huge areas of mono-crops? The answer would be to truck in
honey-bees by the million.
Pollination can be achieved only by using large numbers of honey-bees. In this way, our
crops and wildflowers are pollinated, and the beekeeper can obtain a pollination fee
and honey for sale. As a reward for pollination, and as an enticement to the bee, most
plants offer food - nectar - in return. The bees take this, alter it through the addition of
enzymes, reduce its moisture content and store it as honey so that they and their colony
may survive winter periods or other periods of dearth. In this way they differ from
wasps, bumble-bees and other types of bee, whose colonies die out on the approach of
winter, with only the newly mated queens hibernating until the spring when they will
start new colonies.
Food for free?
If you look at fields full of flowering crops or wild flowers in the countryside, or at
garden and park flowers in the cities, you are not only looking at beauty but also at gold
- thousands of tons of valuable honey. Liquid gold sitting there, all for you! If you don't
