BEES are having a tough time with with pesticides. Beekeepers are reporting losses of whole hives and wild bees are being hit too.

Neonicotinoids are partly to blame though there are many other pesticides. Rather than lie on the leaves or the seeds, they are absorbed by the plants.

This offers longer lasting protection to the plant, but makes the crops, flowers, nectar and pollen toxic not just to pests but many other insects.

This becomes a major problem for bees which store the pollen to be eaten over winter.

Pesticides are designed to kill unwanted pests, but their toxic properties and widespread use are also harming beneficial insects such as bees.

Neonicotinoids are a particularly harmful group of bee-harming pesticides. When a bee feeds on pollen or nectar containing them, their central nervous system can be affected.

This affects tasks that bees depend on to survive such as feeding, homing, foraging and reproducing.

New research has also begun to show an increase in pesticides being found beyond the farms where the seeds are sown.

Many of the food and medicinal crops we live on are pollinated by domestic and wild bees. In case you didn’t know, most fruits and nuts, like apples, tomatoes and almonds are pollinated by insects.

If not pollinated, then the plant doesn’t grow any fruit. Apples and pears are kind of important to Worcestershire.

One way to help is by planting early and late flowers so that bees will be able to find more food when they need it. Sunflowers, echinacea and heather are particularly good, as are foxgloves, borage, thyme and marjoram but even better are wildflowers.