Bees where have they gone?

I have an organic garden in Sydney Australia with an abundance of flowering plants everywhere. The sad thing is I can count the bees on one hand.....simply stop using herbicides & pesticides its not a difficult decision to make. Paul how can we start a global movement where people promise to never buy any of these products again. I was clearing out the cupboards from a house I bought and found a plug in pesticide for inside the home! Can you believe it you put in a sachet into the receptacle on a plug which you then plug into the wall and wafts of pesticides permeate through the room killing intermittently any insect that is flying by or any human that is breathing in the vicinity at the time. And the best one is advertising surface sprays for cockroaches with a baby crawling happily on hands and knees while Mummy happily sprays ad infinitum on every available sterile white surface. When are we going to wake up?

Louie, it's a good thing you showed up in time to save your place from pesticides Luckily for the planet there are thousands of pollinating insects like tiny wasps and bees, regular wasps and bees and hornets. But they all need food. So if you plant as many bee-friendly flowering plants that provide nectar for them as you can, they will come. Some of them you will want to know where they are so you won't run into them again, like the hornets and the wasps, but they all play an important role. The wild honey bees are actually not doing badly as long as they have food and can move their hives when threatened.


As for getting the planet to stop using pesticides? Well, maybe the most optimistic thing is that the more people who don't use them and create pockets of healthy land, we might be able to provide enough healthy habitats to offset the rest of it.

Louie, I hope your organic garden becomes an island of paradise so that pollinators will come from near and far to visit. How long have you had the garden? Are there any other neighbors in your area who might have a organic garden too? This would shorten the trip any pollinator would have to make from a distant hive.

I live in a culture that is surrounded by -cides: About all I can manage to do about it is to not intentionally poison myself... It really only took one decision... Once the decision was made then I didn't have to be wishy washy about it and say things like, "I don't use poisons, except for XYZ on the ABC plants, when they are infected by KLM bug That's a really bad bug!!!". My policy is to not use poisons ever regardless of the bug or disease, and regardless of whether the poison is natural or synthetic. I am thrilled as can be about how successful it has been for me. And how much money I save!!! Then I took it one step further and applied it to fertilizers... That saved me gobs of money... Then I applied it to seeds. I can grow my own, so I might as well. I still haven't learned how to grow onions since I stopped buying sets, but I'm making steady progress.

I don't try to wake anyone up, other that once in a while I say to someone, "I think that one of the first rules of healthy living is to not poison myself". I apply it to all kinds of cleaning products, and hygiene products, and paints, and foods, and medicines, and herbs, and vitamins, and pets, and air fresheners, and etc...

And I put up a sign on my fields. It has no legal or ethical standing, but it expresses my opinion.