Bzzz; naturally when one hears a bee a certain level of fear kicks in. The fear is usually followed by a swat or a sudden sprint in the opposite direction. However students who attended the film event, “Health and the Hive: A Beekeepers Journey” may now think twice before swatting the vital insects.
A look into the hive
The film, shown on Sept. 23 in the Hoehl Welcome Center, detailed the importance of bees to our lives. It followed Vermont beekeeper Todd Hardie whose business “Honey Gardens” uses every aspect of a bee to make a variety of products.
“One of the most important things a bee gives us is pollination,” Hardie says in the film. “Our food supply is dependent upon this pollination.”
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Raw honey is not like the honey bought in supermarkets, because it is not heated.
(Photo by Megan Davin)
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Bill Mares, the president of the Vermont Beekeepers Association says that bees pollinate $20 billion worth of crops per year in the United States.
“Everything [bees] do is beneficial to our society, our community, our culture,” Hardie says in the flim. “We work with raw honey right now, which is a medicine, a food, as well as a sweetener.”
The audience was able to sample two types of Hardie’s raw honey after the presentation.
The crisis at hand
The large scale die-off of bees living in hives has been referred to by scientists as the Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD).
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, "CCD became apparent as a problem beginning in the winter of 2006-2007 when some beekeepers began reporting losses of 30-90 percent of their hives. While colony losses are not unexpected during winter weather, the magnitude of loss suffered by some beekeepers was highly unusual."
Mares comments on the crisis at hand.
“I think you have to go back and understand that what’s happening with the bees is that they have become part of agriculture in a formal way,” Mares says.
Beekeepers who keep bees for pollination take these insects duri'ng winter months to pollinate crops around the country. These crops, such as blueberries and almonds, are located in California, Mares explains.
“This means, in effect, they’re making bees work year round,” Mares says.
Jan Cannon, a beekeeper and filmmaker of “Health and the Hive” agrees: “Bees are not machines they’re living organisms,” Cannon says.
Physical stress from traveling for pollination is one of the contributors to the crisis, Mares says.
“It’s diseases that the bees have; it’s stress from moving the bees around a lot; it’s pesticides outside the hive,” Mares says. “It’s pesticides inside the hive, and it’s new pests and stuff that are coming from globalization.”
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Bill Mares (right) helps another beekeeper put the bees to "bed."
(Photo by Cailey McDermott)
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Hardie’s hives are all organic. He uses no chemicals in or around the hives. The film showed Hardie burning hives on occasion because the bees had contracted diseases.
Putting chemicals in the hive merely masks the symptoms; it doesn’t cure the disease, Hardie says in the film.
Part of what beekeepers are trying to do now is find out ways to breed resistance into the bees to help protect them from pests and diseases, Mares says.
Hardie buys bees from Russia because, for reasons unknown, they are immune to some of the damaging diseases prevalent in the United States according to the film.
In most cases, Vermont beekeepers are not feeling the pressures of the pollination industry.
Most Vermont beekeepers do not use bees for pollination, Mares says. Vermont beekeepers let the bees recover over the winter months. This process is referred to as "putting the bees to bed.”
“So almost in contrast with the national situation, Vermont bees are in better shape than those in other parts of the country,” Mares says.
Think before you swat
The Department of Biology and the Department of Business Administration and Accounting brought the film “Health and the Hive” to St. Michael’s.
The Business Department was looking at the bee crisis as it affects small business owners in Vermont in addition to the bee crisis, says Paul Olsen, a professor of business.
Bee venom is now being used for medicinal purposes.
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Beekeeper Todd Hardie hopes to see St. Michael's get a bee hive.
(Photo by Megan Davin) |
“Getting stung by a bee is one of the best things that can happen to your body,” Hardie says in the film.
Bee venom therapy helps people get rid of rheumatoid arthritis and multiple sclerosis; among other things, Hardie says.
Ethan Bodin, resident director of Lyons Hall knew the importance of bees in agriculture from his father and grandfather who were beekeepers.
“I am going to look into what we have for a student beekeeping association,” Bodin says. The community garden is a possibility to host a hive, he adds.
A hive is something Hardie hopes to see on campus in the near future.
“Getting a beehive would be wonderful for teaching and training and helping people see how gentle bees are,” Hardie says.
Cutting the lawns less and letting the flowers grow will help the bees and air quality, Hardie says.
Becoming more socially conscious is exactly what Cannon was hoping people would take away from the film.
Try to live a little more softly, try to make a smaller footprint, and try to take care of nature, he says.
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