Bee-lovers unite!

Our little Bee friends have become hot property. Otherwise known as pollinators, along with birds and bats, they are responsible for one third of all our food production globally. There’s been a decline in their population since the 1990’s, attributed to parasites, climate change and industrial agriculture using pesticides.

People are taking counter-measures to support their colonies and grow their numbers by planting native flowers and plants in their gardens. Plants and flowers for bee-lovers are: daisies, grevillea, bottlebrush, tea tree, lavender, honey myrtle, abelia and native gum trees.

We love bees here at Little Storytellers and have started to plant some of these plants in our garden! In the Byron Shire a family of generations of beekeepers created their very own beehive to avoid harming bees while collecting honey. You can check them out at Flow Hive and having tasted the honey from a friend’s flow hive it tastes incredible!

Honey offers health benefits that are immune-boosting and has been scientifically proven to support children’s growth and development if mixed in small amounts with warm milk. The old saying ‘The land of milk and honey’ being a place of abundance and health has substance!

So it’s not surprising that one of our first children’s books is called “My Little Bumble Bee”. It’s a story about two children who go on an adventure and attract the attention of a very friendly Bumble Bee. The hive is suffering from a deadly parasite and the children find ways to help them. Remy is creating the illustrations and thanks to my sister Nicky who illuminated research into bees and mushrooms. Doctor Rudolph Steiner gave a series of lectures on bees in 1923 which have also been a beautiful inspiration.

Photograph by Yves Roire