Nothing is sweeter, to me, than fresh and local honey. Every weekend, I find myself drawn to a vendor in union square that sells honey harvested from a farm in Ithaca. Tremblay Apiaries not only sells honey but also soaps, candles and gum made from bee’s wax. They even make their own mead!
Bees are magical insects and crucial to our environment. No bees, means no pollination, means no flowers.
Every year, honey is becoming a rarer and rarer commodity. Tremblay Apiaries’ website explains that “parasitic mites … antibiotic resistant foulbrood diseases, hungry bears, and the changing environment” pose a massive risk to bee populations, globally, and beekeepers with small businesses are struggling to turn a profit.
As a result, they “sell what we can produce. Occasionally [they] run out of items, especially when Mother Nature only provides limited quantities.”
For my documentary, I would like to track a piece of honeycomb from hive to vendor and use it as a backdrop to examine the future of beekeeping and how it is effected by climate change. It would capture how climate change is not only having an immediate effect on those with small businesses but also the very food we consume.
I got the business card of the owner and he seemed excited to potentially show me around his bee farm. Let’s hope I don’t get stung!