Thursday, March 8, 2012

Benefits Of Bee Pollen Make The News

Did you know that the White House Garden and the Chicago City Hall have beehives? This is part of a growing urban beehive movement to help the bees survive in a cleaner and safer environment. That is passed on to the consumer because the benefits of bee pollen and raw honey will be so much greater when they are produced in a cleaner ambience.



Now, you may not think that Washington and Chicago are the cleanest cities in the USA but they are much healthier than many of the countryside areas which are full of pesticides, GMOs, industrial pollutants and contamination from a whole range of toxins.

So, the benefits of bee pollen and bee products in general are now gaining more exposure as people become more knowledgeable.  Actually beekeeping in an urban setting is strictly illegal but local authorities are now relaxing their laws and already in New York and Denver it is legal while Los Angeles is campaigning hard to get the ban lifted there.

But the benefits of honey itself may well be exaggerated by the fact that a lot of honey is actually pasteurized and once it is heated, it loses a lot of its nutritional value. Actually this happens in the USA much more than in Europe.

The problem is that, as with many pasteurization techniques, there is a downside and here it is that the enzymes which are so important for the antibacterial function, get destroyed and the honey is practically useless for healing. Raw honey has always been the best option in healing wounds.

The Food Safety News also found that they honey now sold in supermarkets (up to 70% of the samples tested) does not contain any pollen, thereby making it just a highly processed syrup. This is why the bee pollen is far superior but you still have to be careful about what you are buying.

The benefits of bee pollen are now well known and also there is some research to show that they are indeed beneficial for the whole human organism. Theses benefits range from:
·        boosting  libido in both men and women
·        assisting with weight loss because it contains the full range of nutrients
·        helping to relieve prostate disorders in men
·        relieving symptoms of the menopause in women
·        providing great boost in energy (due to Vitamin B enhancement)
·        relieving some of the side effects of chemotherapy




Now if you really want to get the benefits of bee pollen, a much better option is to choose the bee pollen capsules because if the pollen is sourced from a safe area and properly processed, then you are well on the way to taking your wellbeing to a whole new level.

Monday, March 5, 2012

Bee Pollen Benefits –Learn About How Food Production Is At Risk


Did you know that 13% of the income from UK farm crops depends on pollination?  Bees play a vital role in this process and they also help the wider ecosystems to flourish. Bee pollen benefits are not just limited to providing us with a complete superfood but are vital to keep the whole pollination and food production chain going. That is why everybody is worried. These figures were released by the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology in the UK.

The fact that many bee colonies have been decimated over the last fifteen years and have not yet managed to recover is a constant worry and even the UN has sat up and taken notice. The phenomenon is known as the CCD (Colony Collapse Disorder) and nobody is quite sure what exactly the causes are.  Pesticides, GMO farming, industrial pollution, diseases and other climatic factors are all implicated in one way or another. If this goes on,  food as we know it will be just a folk memory!

The idea in the UK is now to encourage farmers to grow more arable crops such as OSR, oilseed rape. Its potential for providing a wider variety of human food should be investigated. The fact that it flowers in June when the bees have fewer sources of nectar and pollen could be one way of building up the bee colonies again. There is also a suggestion that the planting period could be staggered which would lengthen the flowering window.

OILSEED RAPE PLANT IN FLOWER
  When you think that about 33% of the human diet is organically sourced from plants that must have pollination we realize how serious the problem is. We only need to think what we would do without apples, almonds, sunflowers, watermelons, zucchini, cherries, blueberries and avocados, just to name a few! 

If we think of what are the most important elements in the ecosystem, bees are pretty near the top of the list. Scientists are in no doubt at all that the survival of the bee population is absolutely crucial for the survival of the human race. Albert Einstein said that human life would disappear in four years! There is some doubt that he ever said that as he was no entomologist or ecologist, but any sensible person will realize the urgency of the situation.

So, bee pollen benefits are not just about a super food which you could live on indefinitely. It is much, much more and while we all deserve to have some bee pollen benefits, we must make sure that we are doing nothing to destroy the honey bee. Some people take a more proactive stance and actually take up backyard beekeeping and there are many public institutions now encouraging people to do the same.