THE HONEYBEE SANCTUARY"It all boils down to the question of whether we dare to
consider the bees' own needs or only our own." -- Gunther Hauk, Toward Saving the Honeybee  The honeybee is nature's
greatest benefactor. Just as our heart does, she radiates her
gifts of healing and nurturing into the entire organism of a
farm, invigorating all life. She enlivens plants with
homeopathic doses of formic acid, pollinates three-quarters of
the food we eat, stimulates the cow's digestion by pollinating
certain wild-flowers and, above and beyond all that, shares
with us the byproducts of her labors: honey, wax, propolis.
Even her formic acid "poison" has been shown to have
therapeutic applications. Yet the bee's very existence is threatened by our efforts to capitalize on her largesse. We have been overriding the honeybee's natural rhythms and instrinsic needs for the last century, breeding bees for profit and warehousing them like spare parts. We ship them cross-country to pollinate mono-cropped factory farms, and have learned to raise queens artificially, having lost our understanding that this indeed goes against nature. In the process we have badly weakened the bees' immune system resulting in the colony collapse disorder. Dying out at an alarming rate, forcing us to import hundreds of thousands of colonies from Australia each year to pollinate crops in California alone. Many blame viruses, mites, bacteria and beetles for the bees' failing vitality, but these are only symptoms of what ails them. Exploitive and mechanistic beekeeping methods like those described above are the real culprit. The varroa mite, for instance, came to this country aboard queens that had been imported to boost productivity. Our innovations have served our comfort and economy, but we have also sapped the honeybee's ability to resist her natural parasites.In the greater picture of our domesticated animals' declining health, the honeybee is the canary in the coal mine: it is not uncommon for beekeepers to losing 70 to 90 percent of their colonies. But because the honeybee hovers at a primary level in the chain of being that produces our food, her plight, if allowed to continue, will assuredly become ours.  The
Spikenard Farm Apiary will promote interest, joy and love for
these insects, as an educational center where people of all
ages can learn about the care our honeybees really need - where
30+ years of research, carried on in Germany and at the
Pfeiffer Center by Gunther Hauk (with very encouraging
results), will intensify. Our laboratory will serve this
research as well as create healing salves and ointments with
the bee's wax, honey, propolis, and formic acid. No royal
jelly products will be offered since these necessitate the
raising and killing of countless queens. Much of what we do,in
collaboration others around the world, will run contrary to
conventional beekeeping practices:
IN STEWARDSHIP OF THE EARTH
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