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While this season has many of us reaching for an antihistamine, it is prime time for the birds, bees and other pollinators to work their magic. The pollination process is vital to life as we know it, but climate change and the over use of insecticides is causing the gravely termed “insect apocolopyse”.
Protecting our pollinators is a keen example of how both personal and external climate action is necessary. In this three-part pollinator series, we examine how demanding better from corporations and governments is key, but how we can also have a significant impact from our own gardening and food purchasing practices. Our actions for you this week are quick, direct, and start at the source.
Pollination Power
The Role Pollination Plays in Our Livelihood
While creepy crawlies may not be a favorite of the masses, I grew up fascinated by the sheer diversity, community, and agility of insects. My mom, a retired high school biology teacher, would bring home bug collections that she was grading and teach us about the different insects and roles they play in our ecosystem, and, most importantly, the role of pollinators.
Pollinators include birds, bats, butterflies, moths, flies, beetles, wasps, small mammals, and most importantly, bees. They are responsible for assisting over 80% of the world's flowering plants to reproduce.
Why are pollinators important?
Pollination is an essential part of plant reproduction. 75 percent of the world’s crops producing fruits and seeds for human consumption depend on pollinators for sustained growth. Plus produce that requires pollination is exponentially more lucrative than those that don’t, making bees a form of livestock.
Additionally, insects are a fundamental piece of our ecosystem, the base of our overall food chain, and the means by which waste is broken down in soil. Life as we know it would crumble without insects and pollinators.
Biological Conservation reported that 40% of all insect species are declining globally and that a third of them are endangered.
Who are the pollination extermination culprits?
Because modern agriculture practices have narrowed in on specific crops, destroyed natural ecosystems by taking up exponential landmass and utilizing pesticides - the sources of food (nectar) for insects are more scarce and less diverse. Plus while pesticides may not be meant to harm the vitally important pollinator, it has been linked directly to the mass death of bees.
The culprits are all of us. This is unfortunately something that we all have most likely played into at one point or another. It starts with the companies that make pesticides and the big agriculture companies that use those pesticides, but it ends with us, as individuals, using products like Roundup on our own home lawns.
How does climate change affect pollinators?
After the use of the pesticides, climate change and habitat destruction are the leading causes of decline in insect population. Habitat destruction is a function of deforestation for timber and Amazon Rainforest fires, as well as urban sprawl, suburban lawns, highways, and agriculture. Insect populations are largely influenced by temperature and environment, so changing climate can and already has impacted insects.
What can we do?
Take Action: Approaching the use of pesticides from a systemic level is the most powerful approach to altering how our food is grown on a massive scale. The companies that make the pesticides, the companies that sell them, and then the grocers that peddle this chemical-laden produce are the three main targets for change. Addressing these concerns with the EPA, and demanding that they enforce stricter regulations around the use of more toxic pesticides, like Neonicotinoids, is another good call to action.
Personal Changes: Over the next two weeks we will address how to make your home garden a haven for pollinators and then how to shop to support organic farmers that are helping our pollinators.
Three Ways to Protect Pollinators
Take action to address three levels of the farming and foods industry that are harming pollinators: the source of the pesticides, the distributor of the pesticides, and grocery stores selling products grown with pesticides.
Stop Bayer-Monsanto from Selling Bee-Killing Pesticides
What? Tell Bayer-Monsanto to stop selling toxic pesticides before countless species of bees and other pollinators go extinct.
Why? Bees and other pollinators are essential for 180,000 species of plants and one out of three bites of food. But bees are dying from toxic pesticides like neonics produced by Bayer-Monsanto, putting our food system and ecosystems at risk.
How? Click link to send message (Estimated 1 minute).
Tell Lowe’s and Home Depot: Stop selling Roundup
What? Demand Lowe’s and Home Depot remove toxic Roundup from store shelves!
Why? Pesticides like Roundup are partly to blame, as a recent study found that 94% of bumblebees died when exposed to Bayer-Monsanto’s product. Yet, Home Depot and Lowe’s refuse to take this toxic pesticide off their shelves.
How? Click link to send message (Estimated 1 minute).
Demand Kroger eliminate toxic pesticide use in its food supply
What? Tell Kroger: Make a commitment to shift away from bee-killing pesticides!
Why? Kroger, one of the largest grocery store chains in America, still chooses to stock products grown with bee-killing pesticides.
How? Click link to send message (Estimated 1 minute).
Some Rays of Sunshine
The Headlines We’re Happy to See
The Birds and the Bees
Bird protections are restored, and key process advances to strengthen rules. - Read More
Bees have returned to Koko Head, Hawaii. - Read More
Monarch butterfly population increased by 100 fold in North America. - Read More
Houston-area cities ask businesses and residents to go 'Lights Out' for bird migration. - Read More
More On Saving Bees from Adetokunbo Sees
Watch Catalyst from the Couch
Last week, I spoke with Emma Bochner of Catalyst20 on their Instagram live series Catalyst from Couch about all things climate activism. Be sure to check it out below.
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The taking action part was inspiring. This is an example of a fighting newsletter.