Okay, I Give on the Honey

at 7:00 pm on January 30, 2009 under Jan: Vegan/Refined Sugar/Corn Syrup Free | Be the First to Comment

I complained earlier this month about the fact that honey was considered on the naughty list for vegans.

Kottke posted this week an environmental reason for laying off the honey, and again, it has to do with monocultures.

CCD (Colony Collapse Disorder, not Charged Coupled Device, AV geeks) is annihilating millions of bees across the country, and threatening the built-in ecological services our little pollinating friends offer.

Among the possible culprits are a virus, increased vulnerability to disease due to breeding, overwork (hives of bees are trucked around the country for months to pollinate crops), increased exposure to all kinds of insecticides, and perhaps even all of the above.

The fact is, using one or two kinds of bees for all of our pollination and honey-producing needs makes all of these dangers more likely.

In an amazing guest column for the NYTimes Aaron Hirsh suggests using feral bees of many types to pollinate regionally. AND we could still harvest the honey.

So, avoiding honey as a monoculture: It meets the “political” and “environmental” vegan definitions, though not quite the “ethical” vegan definition, since there is nothing suggesting that we shouldn’t go for the honey.

But nonetheless, this is just a good enough reason to Bee good to the Bees! Heh heh… eh…. Too soon?

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