Hi Pollinate Minnesota Community!

So many joys to celebrate this year, so much to look forward to in 2023, and first, some context.

The week that Roe was overturned, I didn’t see any bumblebees. I was grieving the loss of half of the country’s personhood, include my daughters’ and my own, feeling my white guilt of having done too little too late, along with the temporary directionless-ness of the thing you knew would happen actually happening.  No visible bumble bees had me assuming we were/are too late with this issue too.

Bumble bees’ life cycle is remarkable. Some larva are fed more than others (!!) in the fall to become queens, who then mate and overwinter in the soil on their own, while the rest of their colony dies.  In the spring, they find a nice spot and build a new home, laying eggs and collecting pollen for their daughters to eat as they grow to take over almost all jobs in the nest. All except egg laying, which she’ll do for the rest of the summer. Check out their life cycle at the Xerces Society here. 

I’m learning more about bumblebees, but I *think* that, while I was grieving them and us, it was the small window of time when queen bumblebees are shivering on top of their babies in their nest, keeping them warm as they grow, eating the food she’s just gathered and stored for them and her, knowing she wouldn’t be able to leave for a few days.

I’ve been able to teach with the gorgeous new book from Liza Ketchum, Jacqueline Briggs Martin, and Phyllis Root, illustrated by Claudia McGehee: Begin with a Bee since U of M press published it last year. Check out these beautiful pictures of a Rusty Patched Bumblebee Queen! (and buy the book to find out what happens next!)

Phfffwww. The bumblebees weren’t gone, they were just living the secret, hard-to-know part of their lives! I’m eternally humbled by that: the joy that biologies are complex, and that in these complexities there is so much potential for our human misinterpretation.

There are unknown stories of survival in SO many places. Some of us who may appear hidden but are just inside, behind the scenes, underground, working to make the next thing happen, the next thing better.

These remarkable stories coexists at the same time as the hard. There are less bumblebees, less insects in general. In spite of incredible effort to save some species, like the monarch, they’re now considered endangered by the International Union of Conservation of Nature (though not on the US endangered species list.)   Honey bee losses continue to be unsustainable, in spite of months of additional beekeeper labor. 6 of our 23 bumble bee species are heading toward or on the endangered species list, including our federally endangered state bee the rusty patched bumble bee. 

I was asked recently if I have hope, how I have hope. There is hope in knowing that there are unknown stories of survival, that resistance has always happened and is STILL happening.   As we tell true stories, as we listen, our power grows.  There are so many human examples from BIPOC communities. Here are some I’ve been learning from: Resistance, Gord Hill’s The 500 Years of Indigenous Resistance Comic Book, Working Class History, UnCivil, The 1619 Project of course, Catalyst Project’s Anne Braden program.

Our power thrives on invisibility made clear.

Over 800 people put on beekeeping suits and worked the hive with us in 2022!

This spring, thanks to flexibility and support from the Hennepin County Green Partners environmental education program, we were able to work with ALL students at our partner schools Dowling and Loring Elementary! 

With the Minneapolis Public Schools’ vindictive response to the teachers strike, last spring’s school year was a month longer and had 42 additional mins every day.  Green Partner’s flexibility allowed me to bring our programming to a few schools, giving students and teachers a small break, the small joy of putting on something huge and holding a frame of bees. The delicious stickiness of eating honey directly from the comb.

We brought this experience to over 50 diverse partners this year, from MPS to homeschool groups, summer camps, and nature centers around the state.

And this week, the joy of potential, of possibility here in Minnesota after the election.

5 years ago, MN led the nation in pollinator protection, and in spite of significant state investment over the last ten years, by all metrics pollinators here are still struggling. Why? Because we continue to leave the pesticide exposure piece of the puzzle unaddressed.

We know pesticides are driving harm to insects, to humans, to our ecosystems, and we’re optimistic that our new legislature will make the change necessary to begin to mitigate these harms. The possibility is mobilizing- stay tuned for more soon!