Loretta Fritz | Contributed
It may seem a bit early in the year to be thinking about bees, but it isn’t. January is planning time for gardeners, and the enticement of plowing through garden catalogues to satiate a lust for all things planted … well, it’s just hard to resist. So when better to start thinking about bees and ways to help them thrive in your garden?
The decimation of bee populations is being felt by everyone from industrial producers to large and small farmers to the home gardener.
I’ve talked with many locals who, in the past year, experienced smaller yields and/or yields of poorer quality than normal. They often described conditions associated with incomplete pollination, e.g., brown spots in the centre of apples, zucchinis rotting from the blossom end. Many reported seeing very few bees.
While it’s clear that we need bees more than they need us, it behooves us to help them along as best we can. And how hard could this be? After all, bees need only the essentials of life: food, water, shelter, and love. Well, okay, I’m not so sure about the love, but they certainly need mating partners.
Different kinds of bees are drawn to different kinds of plants, so diversity in the garden is essential. This means having plants that bloom at different times throughout the year, as well as plants of different shapes, sizes and colours. Trees, shrubs, fruits, vegetables, herbs, annuals and perennials … all contribute to a bee-friendly environment. That said, some plants and varieties are veritable magnets for bees. January is an opportune time to figure out where to source such plants and how to incorporate them into the landscape.
This January also marks the start of the Sooke Garden Club’s 48th year, a year that will revolve around the notion of ‘Bee-ing Friendly.’ To this end, the Club will be introducing two new programs at this month’s meeting, the Mentorship Program and the Friendly Greeter Program.
The Mentorship Program, which will be discussed in depth at the meeting, is intended as a one-on-one learning tool. The idea is to link both novice and experienced gardeners with other members who are willing to share their expertise in a particular aspect of gardening, e.g., landscaping, growing/preserving food, attracting bees, building soil, and so forth. The Friendly Greeter Program is designed to make new members feel welcome and involved from the moment they walk into their first meeting. These initiatives, along with the year’s program of topics and speakers, will provide opportunities for all members to learn from each other, explore the critical interaction of bees, plants and humans, and simultaneously nurture newcomers.
Join us on Jan. 24, 7 p.m., at St. Rose of Lima Church on Townsend Road. It’s membership renewal month and the ideal time for new members to join. Questions? Visit our website at sookegardenclub.ca or email us at sookegc@gmail.com.
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Loretta Fritz writes for the Sooke Garden Club.