Have you noticed how this world is facing many serious problems?
We pollute our waterways and the air, we cut down native forests and not just in the Amazon! We use harsh chemicals when we grow our food and crops. There are serious oil spills in the Mexican Gulf. The planet is warming up, oil is running out. Whales regularly strand themselves on our beaches. Bees are having a tough life with exotic mites and imported diseases. Birds, lizards, plants and frogs are going extinct, one-by-one. Wetlands disappear and humans get more and more diseases. I reckon you can make the list much longer than I can!
What does all of this mean? What does it tell us?
You know, I reckon we’ve forgotten how to look after our planet; it’s just as if we’ve lost the operating manual for our Earth.
What’s probably just as important for us in New Zealand is that we have forgotten how to live with Nature and how to love Nature in Aotearoa.
September 12-19 is Conservation Week
Join me this Conservation Week here on the Conservation Blog
This is our chance to put our thinking caps on and come up with solutions to our problems. What can we do?
What can each-and-everyone-of-us do to make New Zealand (and the planet) a better place to live and to love?
During Conservation Week I’ll be blogging quite a bit with you folk, so let’s see if we can turn the tide. You can even blog with me live from school.
Look forward to chatting with all of you!
Ruud (the Bugman) Kleinpaste
wow ruud what is youre favourite bug and why
any bug that has a lot of stories around it: for instance a weta: snesitive antennae; spiky defence legs; ears in front knees, weather station in its bum
…. lots of interesting stuff to tell!
why do the bees make food.
what food do bees make.
honey can be made into medicine for you and people.
Bees make food for two reasons:
1) to feed their larvae (babies)
2) to store for winter when there are no flowers
Their food is honey, made from the flower’s nectar. and yes, honey is full of good preservatives and healthy substances: it can be used as a medicine.
Here’s a good word for the english language classes:
the word “Medicine” comes from the old word “Mead”. Now go and research that, will you?
Can a specific bee sting kill or be deadly to humans?
Maybe – I don’t know if there’s a bee species with a particularly nasty poison; what I DO know is that some types of bees (like killer bees) are much more AGGRESSIVE than ordinary honey bees an d sting much quicker. they also follow you around much further! But their poison is just as strong as that of their cousins, the honey bee
Does nectar only come from flowers ?
no – some plants have nectar glands on leaves or even on thorns and prickles
Why do bees die and wasps don’t ?
because wasps do not have those “barbs n their stingetr and therefore don’t get stuck, when they sting us. Wasps can take their stinger out of our flesh quite easily… and sting us again and again and again!
When a plant is pollinated by an insect, can it also pollinate another plant?
Depends on what you mean:
when an nsect is “working” one particular type of plant then only the pollen of that particualr type of plant will be transferred.
Those pollen ar no good to a different type of plant.
Some bugs can pollinate a range of different plant species, but they need to carry the pollen around that belongs to those species.
The way to understand it is: that pollen from one species of plant can not be used to pollinate a different species of plant
i like to eat cows
so – why the questions about cruelty to animals?
what is the most dangerets insect ever
what has this got to do wit the blog?
I prefer to keep to the topic, if possible, otherwise we get a total free-for-all whereby I am asked to answer questions for all sorts of school projects…
so – how about googling that question on the computer and see what you get!
I reckon it has to be the malaria mosquito.
boring answer?
perhaps… but don’t forget that these mosquitoes are doing a pretty important job in the world too. Apart from being our biological control “agent” their larvae or wrigglers clean up bacterial soup in water ways and all life stages are brilliant food for all sorts of other animals and birds, lizards etc
i meant to say why do people like to be mean TO animals
you tell me that too
why do people like to be mean animals
you tell ME
I think it would be great if we get responses from a range of people… even from those who feel that Conservation is not yet working at 100%;
The so-called “consensus” is always a tricky thing and we may need to be on the ball to ensure that biodiversity is indeed recognised as the most important “driver” for the survival of humanity. Argue it with grace and sensitivity! (yep – that came from a Dutchman! would you believe it?)
Is participation in the Conservation Week blog restricted to schools or may other interested people take part?
Thanks
Hey Lynne,
Anyone can take part. Hope to see you online during Conservation Week!
Melanie Charters
DOC Web Team
You sure have it right.
What infuriates me, is that we use meaningless words such as ‘protected’ for our native species, then authorities allow developments which will destroy habitat. Such is the ARC and DOC consent to build a marina at Sandspit, Warkworth, displacing many species of wading birds,some of which have a Nationally Vulnerable status,from their last high-tide roost in the estuary, and destroying rich foraging area.Thanks to Rodney District Council Commissioners, for denying consent. All NZers, who genuinely care for our environment, should express their objections to the ARC and DOC for their decision.