I can hear you all now, nodding and murmuring, "Ah, yes, Stonehenge." And yes, well done you! Stonehenge was (we suspect) built to mark the seasons as well as a place to bury your (most important) dead. However! Stonehenge is not my favorite. My favorite is a place far north of Stonehenge, built on the Orkney Islands. It's called Maes Howe. 

And every year there is a live webcam of the sun penetrating the long tunnel into the chamber on the Winter Solstice. Before you roll your eyes at me, there are a few things you need to know. 

1. It was built around the year 2800 BCE (How did they engineer this thing? HOW?)
2. It is a burial chamber, and can fit 15 people comfortably inside with plenty of head room. 
3. When the sun shines fully into the chamber, there is a display shelf on the rear wall that gets bathed in sunlight (What?!
      HOW DID THEY DO THAT?!)
4. There is graffiti on the walls, in RUNES from when some Norsemen got snowed in one winter. It's fairly vulgar, and thus
​      hilarious.
5. Maes Howe and surrounding neolithic monuments are a UNESCO World Heritage Site. 

The Maes Howe website has some great information (and pictures!). The website itself was built a while ago (and thus lacks bells and whistles), but it is my favorite thing this time of year. 

I should mention that I have BEEN there, but all of my photos are analog and around here somewhere. If I can locate them, I will share with the class. 

I would be remiss in my librarian duty if I didn't share at least one title with you! I found two delightful nonfiction picture books that cover both the scientific reason behind the Solstice and the ways it was celebrated. 

The Winter Solstice by Ellen Jackson

Covers both the scientific reason for the Solstice and folklore associated with it. Offers historical perspectives from Europe and South America. 

The Shortest Day by Wendy Pfeffer

Discusses the holiday traditions that are tied to ancient Solstice traditions from all over the world. Includes a clearly illustrated explanation of why winter in the Northern Hemisphere has shorter days. 

Let me start by saying that yes, I have been stung by honeybees and by wasps. When I get stung, I require a week's worth of steroids to flush the poison out of my body. I was stung by honeybees when I was 12 and walking my beagle--she could smell the honey and decide to dig up the hive to get to it.  If she hadn't decided to invade the hive I would never have been stung. From that point on, I was terrified of bees. Then many years later, I went to visit my best friend who kept honeybees and she insisted that I get over my fear. She kitted up herself and my son (who was 4 at the time), told me to get my camera and come take photos.  I took some amazing pictures and stuck my finger into freshly-capped honeycomb on a frame that was crawling with bees. And they were beautiful and industrious and kind of amazing. I thought to myself, one day I will have bees.

But I don't have the proper yard (too shady) or the right kind of neighbors (the ones I have are both elderly and allergic). Then I discovered that there are many different kinds of bees. I don't even remember how I learned about indigenous bees, but once I knew that I could have tiny pollinators of my own I was thrilled. Honeybees are not native to the United States. They were brought over by the first colonists in Jamestown, and some argue that without honeybees the colonists wouldn't have been successful farmers. 
The US has it's own bees--over 4,000 different types--that have different preferred foodstuffs and different times of activity. Most of these bees are solitary bees--they don't live in hives. Some live in rotted out trees, some live underground, some prefer hollow reeds. Not living in hives eliminates the need to protect a queen--each female is her own queen. They devote their time to laying eggs, collecting pollen to feed the larvae, and creating protective cases for their eggs. Many people refer to these bees as "gentle bees" due to their reluctance to sting. A few years back, I ordered a bee house, some cardboard tubes, and some Mason Bees. It was great fun to watch them shake their fuzzy bodies inside flowers and zip back and forth to the bee house. But two years ago, we had a big die-off. I'm not sure if someone was spraying their yard or garden with pesticide (DON'T DO THAT!), or if it was the late spring cold snap, but the girls all died without laying eggs. 
This spring we ordered Horn-faced Mason Bees (twice the fuzzy!) and installed them into the garden in mid-April. I was worried because it has been unseasonably cold, but the girls have been going strong.

You can see the hollow tubes that the girls are in, and the capped tubes that are full of eggs. I've named the girls Eleanor, Rosalynn, and Geraldine (after First Ladies). I've held them in my hand and I have kept a close watch on their progress. This afternoon, I'm going to be sneaking out the full tubes and replacing them with empty ones. They aren't spending a lot of time in my yard, so I don't know who's flowers they are visiting--I just hope that person knows better than to squish my girls. 
Even if you are allergic to bees and wasps, you can have happy buzzy pollinators in your yard! I order my guys from Crown Bees--they have everything you need to get started and are super helpful if you have questions. (This is not a sponsored post!) 

Let's talk a little bit more about honeybees. 
They are super important to most of the food that we eat. If you have been paying attention at all in the last few years, you know that a lot of honeybees are dying off--this presents a problem for all of us who eat food. It's partly pest infestation, partly pesticide exposure, partly they are running out of things to eat (monoculture is bad for bees!). It's gotten to the point where trucking hives from orchard to orchard is standard business. And while I love honey (so yum! so magical!) honeybees are not the most efficient pollinators--due to the fact that they carry pollen around in those little pollen sacs.

Mason bees are super sloppy about pollen. They are covered in pollen and move from flower-to-flower, dropping little pollen granules everywhere they go. This makes them more efficient in pollen distribution. It also makes them look ridiculous.

Because they are so sloppy, one mason bee can do the pollination work of 100 honeybees. And unlike honeybees, they don't need you to check the hive and maintain the comb. They are low-maintenance, high-yield additions to your yard. 
For further information about mason bees, check out Crown Bees. 
For information about our honeybee problem, check out this Youtube video.

And remember--if you don't want to raise bees, you can help by growing a variety of flowers and stop spraying your garden with pesticides!