An old song from the 60’s painted a picture that many farmers and beekeepers are finding pretty ugly and frightening. This song’s lyric went “where have all the flowers gone, long time passing” and that is what many people fear for our future food and honey production. Honeybees are accountable for pollinating about 80 percent of all the fruit, vegetable and seed crops in the United States so gardening for them is very important to human survival. But there does exist other pollinators that are just important and need to be considered when gardening. These include mason bees, bumble bees, and moths.
All insects can be welcomed into a garden by providing 3 major necessities of life, that is food, water, and shelter. Honeybees, Orchard Mason bees, and Bumblebees all require bee friendly plants whose flowers are shaped so that bees can get into them. The easiest way of distinguishing this plant material is to use native plants for your area. These plants have evolved along with the bees in that area. Once the bees have found bee-friendly flowers they can drink up the nectar and address one of their basic needs of life. While eating at the “fast food flower restaurant” the bees also collect pollen and carry it from flower to flower. This is how they feed us along with the honey they produce. But remember when gardening, bees do not understand pesticide zones and what they get into they bring back to the hive. So keep the garden bee-friendly by going organic when possible.
Square foot gardening has been a mainstay for many years. The basic concept of this garden design is to mark off a garden space and divide it into square foot sections. These individual sections are then planted individually with one plant per square foot. These plants can then have their individual needs met such as water and fertilizer or precision farming. While precision farming is typically done with GPS systems, farming combines with programmable sprayers and the like, the urban farmer can take this one on one plant concept to their own garden.
A Christmas tradition for hundreds of years, the Nativity Scene has a rich history that spans across cultures and involves its share of controversy. Also known as the “crèche,” this decoration commonly found in homes across North America began in a much different state and time.