Thought of the day…"A bee in my bonnet!"

We found this little visitor in our house the other day… a nice big Bumble Bee… all Apiphobics look away now!

I think the poor guy woke a bit too early and was taking refuge in the warmth of our house!

There are about 20 different species of Bumble Bees in Ireland.  Although they do not build the large hives like their relatives, the honey bee, they do still live in colonies (usually with about 50 bees per colony) and are important pollinators of crops and cultivated and wild plants.  Due to the increased use of pesticides within gardens and agriculture, bee populations are declining at an alarming rate.  This is leading to a call in some countries for legislation to ban certain pesticides know to be detrimental to bee populations.

We can also make small changes within our own gardens: as well as the obvious switch to organic gardening we can choose to grow bee friendly plants and even prepare simple structures to encourage bees to come live in our gardens!

A great eco-friendly project to get your children involved with, don’t you think?

……just a thought!