In Control of Nature.
Rewilding a kitchen garden is easy, but what to do about bees?
Hello Everyone.
Rewilding is about letting nature take care of itself; repairing damaged ecosystems, and restoring healthier landscapes with native plants. It can take the form of returning a lawn into a meadow, or in the case of a kitchen garden, layering plants, adding diversity, and allowing seed heads to form that create less tidy garden space yet is beneficial to insects.
I’m all for this method of gardening, yet attracting pollinators to your gardens comes with a big challenge: bees. Because bees are coming for nectar and pollen, just like butterflies and moths, it’s key that we allow all flying insects to simply exist when our own comfort is at stake.
If you love to eat outdoors, then talking about bees is most likely a common theme this month. Yellow jackets are either landing on the edge of your wine glass the moment you are taking it to your lips, or you are waving away a swarm from your salad. Often, they prefer the sweet nectar of your food over you, so we learn to live with them – or move away.
One morning last week, I was bringing my breakfast out to the deck, when I noticed a paper wasp nest hovering less than two feet from where I was sitting. I slowly backed away, taking my plate with me. This stealth nest appeared because the leaves were dropping from the lilac bush, exposing the neatly camouflaged papery football wedged between branches.
My first instinct was panic. Yet I turned my anxiety into curiosity. First I identified the type of wasp, a bald-faced hornet, then I read about how to respond rather than react.
Through binoculars, I watched the hornets enter through a small opening to determine how active it was, then watched a video on how they turned chewed wood fiber into spit to build their layered tubular form of nest. Inside the nest, cells are created with the same spit, designed to serve the queen and store food and larvae. There is a hierarchy as in most bee communities, and I felt a twinge of awe.
I realize this approach is not for everyone. Yet as we begin to allow our gardens to rewild in favor of supporting pollinators, and other forms of life, it also requires patience and comes with a responsibility. It is also an opportunity to learn more about things that cause us angst.
Recognizing that bees – the yellow jackets, wasps, and hornets – are not at the top of the pollinator chain and therefore not as useful as other flying insects which makes them less popular. In fact, hornets are carnivores and eat the larvae of moths and butterflies that we hold dear – is this reason enough to cause them harm?
In this column, I mostly write about kitchen garden design with recipes, yet this time of year I am thinking about bees. Maybe you are too? With fall garden chores to be done, it’s hard to go into the garden without a certain amount of trepidation about bees. You might be vigorously pruning and deadheading plants, then unexpectedly feel the burn of a sting on your face or hand. It’s enough to send you back inside.
The good news is that if you don’t suffer from anaphylactic shock, a few bee stings each year build up your immune system. Each bee packs its own powerful sting, and the bald-faced hornet is the worst. The Western honeybee ( Apis mellifere) is a completely different species than the yellow jacket, hornet, or wasp, with a sting that is more therapeutic than a direct assault.
When I first became a gardener, I also kept a bee hive yet eventually gave it up. It didn’t feel right. Sure, the productivity in my garden was noticeable and I loved watching the hive grow. But why was I keeping bees in a structured hive like a domestic pet, and taking half their honey away each fall?
For the better part of two centuries, beekeeping has become a trained exercise in keeping honeybees tame. Yet this is not their natural environment. Bees don’t need us, yet we need them. They are not dependent on us the same way domestic pets are, yet that is the theory behind keeping them in a nest box. I say free the bees.
Read more about natural beekeeping in The New Yorker.
Just as rewilding is entering into our gardening vocabulary our collective social consciousness is moving towards creating garden areas that are more relaxed, less tidy, and welcoming to pollinators and birds. It is important to also recognize our desire to control the insect population through our actions.
Read more about ARK + Acts of Restorative Kindess.
A spray can of wasp poison is cheap: only 3.99 in the hardware store – enough to bludgeon several nests. Instead, I’m hoping that a natural predator will swoop in and take care of this wasp nest for me, perhaps a savoir hawk or swarm of starlings. Meanwhile, I’ll keep my eye on the hive, knowing that when the cold weather sets in, the bees will die naturally. Only the queen will burrow under the soil, and if I leave a warm cover of leaves she’ll reappear next year. Then we’ll start again. Stay calm, and see what happens.
From my kitchen garden to yours,
Ellen O.
Ellen Ecker Ogden is a Vermont-based food and garden writer. She is the author of The New Heirloom Garden and The Complete Kitchen Garden among other books for cooks who love to garden. Follow her on Instagram and on her website: ellenogden.com
I’m trying to go this way too - I have so many beautiful spiders in the garden right now and I try not to disturb them, knowing they are naturally taking care of mosquitos and gnats!