I’m not embarrassed to admit that I watched High School Musical more than your typical human as I was exiting my adolescent years.  Had I not watched it, ‘Down to Earth’ on Netflix may have not caught my eye as quickly or at all. 

Zac Efron, lead character in High School Musical teamed up with a superfood junkie and traveled the world to film a documentary on sustainable living options.  Boy, was it educating AND entertaining.  We have a lot to learn here in a American, its heart breaking to see how wasteful we are in comparison.  Anyways, that’s not where I’m going with this. . . In episode 7, they travel to NYC to build a pollinator garden and learn about bee keeping.

Heres what I learned-

Pesticides vary in their effects on bees.  Contact pesticides are usually sprayed on plants and will likely die after crawling over sprayed surface of the plant.  Systemic pesticides, on the other hand are usually absorbed into the soil or plant and move up into the stem, leaves, nectar, and pollen of the plant.  Of the contact pesticides, the dust and wettable varieties are most hazardous to bees than the concentrates.  When a bee comes into contact with a pestiside that doesn’t kill it immediately, it then carries that toxin back to the hive where it risks kill the entire colony.  This issue is linked to Colony Collage Disorder.  As actions are being taken to eliminate this problem, it is up to us as the gardeners to use these chemicals as little as possible. 

Awareness of the issue is a solid start to solving the problem.  Being such an agriculture-based state, it’s impossible to not use these chemicals at all.  It would take an unrealistic amount of man hours to prevent the bugs, weeds, and fungus’ attacking our crops.  We can however seek alternatives in smaller areas such as our personal gardens.  Pinterest, gardening social media groups, and your local garden center are all great places to look for alternative resources.