Teach Your Kids How to Save Our Bees

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For almost a decade, Williams Honey Farm has produced award winning raw honey of which we can be proud. In late 2014, we came to the realization that we could go beyond making great honey and strive to do more to help our bees. The truth is, we should all be doing more. The repeated messages we received at schools, events, and farmers markets was “I hear bees are in trouble. I want to help, but I don’t know how.” People wanted straight answers with no fluff. WHAT DO I DO RIGHT NOW? They wanted hope, and we wanted to give it to them.

save the bees stingless NMB

Hope can be infectious. It was with that in mind that we started the PolleNation in Nashville. The #PolleNation is a group of people empowered to take action and help backyard bees and butterflies in new and interesting ways. The movement has been embraced beyond our wildest dreams and continues to grow. It is open to people of all ages—from little kids to retirees. The only requirement for joining is that you want to make a difference in your own hometown. We’ve tried to come up with a movement that has many ways to join and all excuses answered—this is that movement.

Here’s how you can jump on board:

Take control of your yard.

Stop using chemicals around your house and in your gardens. Treat your backyard like your pet. Take care of it, love it, and let it flourish for years to come. Get the whole family involved, and use this opportunity to teach your kids that dumping chemicals into your backyard is not the answer. There is no substitute for natural beauty. Get rid of some of that time consuming lawn mowing and replace the “beautiful wasteland” (i.e. the perfectly manicured green grass), with clusters of self-sustaining plants.

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Use the current bee crisis as an opportunity to teach your kids about nature and stewardship.

Raise Solitary Bees! These are fascinating creatures also called Mason Bees or Leaf Cutter Bees. They are incredible pollinators that can help double or even triple the yield from your vegetable gardens! They take little to no work to keep, very rarely will sting (males don’t even have stingers), and most of the time you won’t even know they are there. (If you were to get stung, it would feel about the same as a mosquito bite!) The nests are the size of a birdhouse and are safe around kids and pets and in high traffic areas. Best of all, they are immune to the majority of pests and diseases that are killing our honeybees. We have kits that provide everything you need (including bees) to get started with your kids.

frame of bees

Take your family outside and pick a spot to plant a wide variety of pollinator friendly perennial flowers native to Tennessee.

Juggling four kids and don’t have any time? You can hire us to come and build one for you. We’ll install a “Bloom Box” with everything you’ll need to have flowers blooming from March until November every year. Want to help on a small scale? Grab a bag or two of our Seed Bombs. They are perennial flower seeds encased in clay and compost and take all the work out of planting. Check out this video to learn more: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3J6ClOEtoI. Some of our customers gather their friends together and have Seed Bomb tossing parties while others simply dump them in a flower pot on the back porch.

sample garden 2

Learn where your honey comes from.

Most honey you’ll find at your local grocery store is not actually honey. It’s basically honey flavored syrup—from another country. It has been pasteurized and ultra-filtered, rendering it void of all nutrients and valuable enzymes. Your kids deserve better. If we start demanding pure, raw honey (the kind that actually crystalizes), maybe the fake stuff will no longer be sold…

honey hands

Spread this message.

No matter who you are, we all have the ability to make a difference starting today. Bees are our modern day “canaries in the coal mine.” They are talking to us, and it’s time we started listening. Together, we can bring back our bee populations in middle Tennessee—one back yard at a time.

For more information about Williams Honey Farm please visit www.williamshoneyfarm.com

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1 COMMENT

  1. Excellent points here. I think teaching kids about endangered species, especially ones that can be as frightening to children as bees often are, is incredibly important. It can really help kids understand bees and thus be able to handle the fear often associated with them.

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