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Article: The weekend gardener The bees knees
- Article from:
- Belfast Telegraph
- Article date:
- May 24, 2003
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 2003 Belfast Telegraph. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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I'LL bet the weekend gardener didn't realise he or she was so
powerful.
First we are told of the hundreds of millions of pounds we spend
on garden equipment and plants each year, securing thousands of jobs.
And now, in the week of the Chelsea Flower Show, we are told that
the fate of the bumble-bee lies in our hands.
Conservationists are alarmed that the native bumble-bee population
has declined in some places by 95% in the last 40 years.
That's quite a dip in anyone's language and the scientists are
attributing it to one simple fact - the lack of plants producing
sufficient nectar.
They reckon that the eradication of wild flowers on farmland in
the last few decades accounts for part of the ...