Doug Purdey Sydney’ Botanical Gardens Beekeeper
It was 2012 in the background of my busy life, I first heard bees were disappearing in the US and other places around the world. Quite honestly, I didn’t actually give it much notice at the time. I got married early that year and moved to Australia. However, each year, I would see more and more Facebook posts about ‘Bee Collapse’, and the loud booming voice from Biotech companies denying their chemicals have anything to do with it and could not be proved.
In 2014, I began recording a new album of music called, It’s All a Beautiful Noise. In 2015, I was moved to start developing a 3D mapping show of the same name to celebrate the bee and our pollinators. Realising one night’s performance would not be enough to inspire action, and seeing this as an incredibly important issue for our world, I began to consider ways to create spectacle and more audience engagement to inspire actionable-care for the bee.
In 2016, this led me to start to develop an eco-friendly installation that would launch three months of bee centric activities in regional farming communities where the bee is employed. This is the start of what would become ‘Bee Friendly’.
As I embarked on my journey, I needed to understand more about what was actually happening to the bee. The US organisation ‘Bee Informed’ lists beekeepers loss at 44 percent of bees in 2015/16. As I dug deeper into the cause of collapsing bee colonies in the US, Canada and Europe, I learned more about the cascading effects. In an article written by Morgan Erickson-Davis 27 October 2017, Morgan brings to our attention some sobering facts. Needs must, I can see it is time to meet this head on and do whatever it takes to create a ‘Bee Friendly’ world! Click on here to read Morgan’s article.
75% of insects have disappeared in Germany over the past 27 years, with new
collections from midsummer showing an even bigger reduction –- 82 percent.
This drop has affected Germany’s bird population – 15% of the birds are dying
because their food supply is disappearing.
Morgan’s article and many others, galvanises the focus of my new musical production into a deeper level of action. I realised we needed to unite the beekeepers – the protector of the bee.
At the end of 2017, I began to reach out to Australian Beekeeper Associations to learn more about what Beekeepers are concerned about in Australia. I wondered, do they have the same worries and concerns beekeepers do in the US, Canada and Europe? I had a long, warm and very informative chat with Secretary of Brisbane Beekeepers Association – Elise Whittaker, daughter of former Biosecurity Officer and President of Brisbane Beekeepers Association, and author of ‘The Bee Book’, a book I’m told is considered ‘The Bible’ for beekeepers in Australia.
After meeting up several times with Elise, I learned the ins and outs of Beekeeper Associations in Australia and the challenges they face going forward: like the lack of funding to up-date important historical records into a modern nation database; the hermit like tendencies that can prevent old school beekeepers engaging with each other, and the new crop, of backyard beekeepers; the countless new backyard beekeepers who are not connected with local beekeeper associations and are out of the loop in terms of understanding how to identify pests and disease, and most importantly the lack of biosecurity officers in each state.
When asking Elise how she thought we could bring beekeepers together, she suggested a survey. As Secretary of the Brisbane’s Beekeeper Assoc, she could see for sometime the value a beekeepers survey could bring to her association and the other beekeeping associations across Australia. This was Elise’s secret passion waiting to be pollinated at the time.
At the end of 2017, Elise Whittaker, Laree Thorsby (BM Tour Coordinator), and myself began creating a ‘Year of the Bee’ Beekeepers Survey. Our aim is to give beekeepers the opportunity to add to the survey, whilst bringing backyard beekeepers and commercial beekeepers together to unite the beekeepers of Australia, and start a Big Bee Friendly Conversation. If your a beekeeper in Australia click and the link, participate and share with beekeepers you know. horturl.at/rEGLQ
Our survey gave me a platform to begin reaching out to Australian Beekeepers for interviews – to learn what their thoughts and concerns are regarding bee health and their thoughts about uniting beekeepers with a survey. I am excited to introduce you to a few beekeepers and honey producers here in Australia who would like to share their concerns with you and their personal thoughts on the need for a national beekeepers survey!
Little did I know these initial series of interviews would seed a full-blown beekeeper breakfast tour of Australia, which reached full steam in 2019.
I am presently reaching out to beekeepers in Australia and asking them to answer and contribute questions to a Beekeepers Survey to us help understand what the biggest concerns are for their community. The Year of the Bee Interviews aim to bring Beekeepers around the world together to mobilize efforts to protect and improve the health of the bees and pollinators across all borders! I plan to tour across Australia meeting with beekeepers and beekeepers California in 2019.
If your a beekeeper in Australia, please click out link and participate. shorturl.at/rEGLQ FYI: We are not attached to any corporation who has invested self interests in controlling outcomes of this survey.
I want to make this the year of the Bee! I am on a mission to gather 10,000 Beekeepers to join my effort to make a big beautiful noise for our pollinators!! Send us an email to learn more at theyearofthebee@tonichilds.com
Europe Insect Decline UpDate March 18, 2018
‘Catastrophe’ as France’s bird population collapses due to pesticides
Bird populations across the French countryside have fallen by a third over the last decade and a half, researchers have said. Dozens of species have seen their numbers decline, in some cases by two-thirds, the scientists said in a pair of studies – one national in scope and the other covering a large agricultural region in central France.
“The situation is catastrophic,” said Benoit Fontaine, a conservation biologist at France’s National Museum of Natural History and co-author of one of the studies “Our countryside is in the process of becoming a veritable desert,” he said in a communique released by the National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), which also contributed to the findings.
The common white throat, the ortolan bunting, the Eurasian skylark and other once-ubiquitous species have all fallen off by at least a third, according a detailed, annual census initiated at the start of the century. A migratory song bird, the meadow pipit, has declined by nearly 70%. The museum described the pace and extent of the wipe-out as “a level approaching an ecological catastrophe”
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