Be a "bee" at the "bee garden" at BSU nature park

Issue Date

10-2008

Abstract

One of the ways to let people, especially school children, understand and appreciate the importance of honeybees is to let them be a "bee" through participatory ecotourism or apitourism. Honeybees were selected to showcase the world of insects. In interviews made, the children rated honeybees second to butterflies in terms of popularity. The reason is that honeybees visit flowers like butterflies but they are not colorful (less attractive) so they do not get the same attention as the butterflies. However, honeybees are popular because of the honey that they produce and their role as pollinators. Nevertheless, honeybees are feared of because of the common stigma that they sting and cause skin irritation. Even wild honey hunters who benefit form honey and farmers who benefit from pollination, kill bees out of unfounded fear and inadequate knowledge on the importance of bees. At the Nature Park of Benguet State University an artificial "Bee Garden" was established for ecotourism. School children are invited to experience the "world" of the honeybees. They are taught why honeybees like to visit flowers, how they gather their food (nectar and pollen) from flowers and what they do to the flowers during their visit, how they bring the honey and pollen to the hive, and where and how theses are stored in the hive. They also learn why and how the honeybees make combs. This is supplemented by showing live bee colonies including nests / combs of wild honeybees. The colorful honey collected from different flowers and places are also shown to them at the Natural Museum. At the "Bee Garden" the children act as bees. They are given "bee attire" (wings and antennae), they prepare the honeycombs by overlaying clay on drawn hexagons, they gather "nectar" from artificial flowers using a straw, and they carry the "honey" and unload to store it in the comb cells.

Source or Periodical Title

Philippine Entomologist

ISSN

0048-3753

Volume

22

Issue

2

Page

212

Document Type

Article

Frequency

semi-annually

Language

English

En – AGROVOC descriptors

APIDAE; HONEY; APICULTURE; ECOTOURISM; ACTIVITIES; PHILIPPINES

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