L'adaptation Climatique

Dear Supporters

Above all, thank you for your steadfast backing during difficult times!

This crowd-funding has failed to attract the necessary commitment from a multitude of people to meet our financial goal, so that is a financial failure in this arena. Even if our title video on Youtube got over 4k views….

Altogether however, we not only have learnt from that, but if you go through all the news and podcasts created over the last four weeks it is an amazing result which we have put onto the scene. And that stands and will help the cause of our work for climate adaptation and the bees and trees initiative – regardless of the financial backing we are receiving from the specific campaign, which is ending this Sunday.

GHF will do its best to find alternative ways of funding for our joint project work in progress, which is needed to be successful for the benefit of bees, trees and, yes, ourselves.

Thanks again, stay well and keep in touch,

Tom, André, Dimi, Hendrik and Yampier With Chris and Cosco watching from the South

Hendrik Haers is living in the centre of a village built in such a green desert – where there’s hardly any ground left that the village authorities don’t sell for building. Therefore Henrik decided to gather all his power to plant as much trees as possible and create an awareness. He’s also sharing his story of how he learned to become a classic beekeeper and how he change from traditional to natural beekeeping.

Chris is an educator and researcher in sustainability issues with a special interest in how today’s separation of people from nature is affecting their ability to cope with conflict, this especially with a view to younger generations. And he has developed methods to remedy this situation by reengaging us with nature. With the help of our ongoing crowd-financing campaign Giraffes fighting for Climate Adaptation, Chris would like to prepare a series of online lectures so as to share his knowledge and experience with a wider audience thus attracting them to actually engage practically for positive change.

Dimi is a filmmaker who has produced several documentaries on shoestring budgets. About his most recent one, which is still in the making Not your bee, he will give some fascinating insights in this talk. He’s asking the right questions, like who do insects belong to and what might be the consequence of this possessive idea men tend to have about bees – about the environment in general.

André Wermelinger, founder and leader of the NGO Free the Bees, Fribourg, Switzerland. He’s also a Giraffe Hero and will be talking among other things, about what could be a solution regarding todays bee keepings problems and how he fights to save the bees.

Campaign for a sustainable change in our society. By Thorsten Hallscheidt

We will probably not be able to stop climate change. We must adapt to the coming change in the most intelligent and sustainable way possible. Bees and trees are key organisms when it comes to mitigating the worst consequences of climate change for us humans.

Trees are by far the most cost-effective «machines» to capture C02 from fossil fuels from the air and at the same time supply both humans and animals with oxygen. Moreover, trees are vital for a healthy climate. For example, the forest near a city functions as a natural air conditioning system for its immediate surroundings. A 150-year-old beech tree has around 800,000 leaves with which it absorbs up to 24 kilograms of CO2 per day. A small car emits this over a distance of about 150 kilometres. It also filters pollutants from the air: bacteria, fungal spores and fine dust. It produces about 11,000 litres of oxygen a day, which is roughly equivalent to the daily requirement of 26 people. Through its leaves, it evaporates up to 500 litres of water daily. 70 percent of all water evaporating in Europe comes from the leaves of trees!

Bees have populated the earth for over 40 million years. The threatened extinction of wild bee populations in particular shows particularly clearly how fatal the current situation is. As bees, with their pollination capacity, lay the foundation of our food production, it is foreseeable how catastrophic this development will be for the global food situation. Wild bees pollinate many wild plants and thus preserve the diversity of nature, the whole ecosystem. The plants are the basis of life, food and habitat for many other animals and thus not least for us humans. It is therefore impossible to imagine our lives without bees - we are dependent on them!

The Campaign Giraffe Fighting for Climate-Adaptation coordinates and supports the work of five people from different professions and in different places in Europe who are working for the preservation and growth of bee colonies, wild-bee populations and trees. Help us with a donation to raise awareness of the importance of bees and trees. Help us to preserve bees and trees to protect us humans from the worst consequences of climate change.

Cosco, the artist, explorer and social activist. When he landed himself in the Alpujarras well over a decade ago, among others he learnt about natural horse keeping. And soon he learnt about the bees and the problems with pesticides down in the low-lands; and that they recovered in the natural highlands where no industrial planting had reached yet. From there it was only one further step for him to plan a Natural Bee Reserve in the Alpujarra – for which he set out to research and design a ’Mediterranean Stone Hive’, as antique as it is innovative…

This two Giraffe Heroes…with other three Giraffe Heroes are looking forward to make Europe wild again! More trees, more bees, more nature. Join us on our campaign Giraffe fighting for climate adaptation!

The Giraffe we want to introduce you to today is Dimi du Mortier. Dimi is a filmmaker who has produced several documentaries on shoestring budgets. About his most recent one, which is still in the making Not your bee, he will give some fascinating insights in this talk. He’s asking the right questions, like who do insects belong to and what might be the consequence of this possessive idea men tend to have about bees – about the environment in general. Other than that he’s revealing very moving stories about his other activities, be it as a filmmaker doing guerrilla actions to demonstrate the consequence of the refugee politics, or be it as a social worker trying to reunify families and help depressed young people. He’s explaining us how the open heart circles he organises help make people talk, how rituals and candle light can help – to talk with each other and open up hearts instead of shielding off the most beloved ones around you.

We are proud to share every week inspirational stories from remarkable individuals. Stories that come from many different places. Each Giraffe’s story is unique with the underlying theme of overcoming challenges present in all. Take a look at each individual experience, and although each person is different, they all have one thing in common: Heroism. We want to hear your stories, too. If you’d like to tell us about your front-line hero, visit us at giraffe-heroes.eu. You´ll find the Giraffe Heroes Stories every Tuesday on Spotify, iTunes, our Homepage and every other place, where you hear your podcasts Join us again next week!

Another aspect in our bees and trees initiative: Green Education Programme. Join us in our campaign, let’s do something for our environment together!

A little while ago a friend who lives in a mid-size town reported this: a traditional beekeeper had told her, that «in his place there are just too many bees!» So, she asked, what the heck the fuss about all this bee crisis talk? – Well, here is the thing: too many beekeepers can naturally translate into too many bees, means, flowers are too scarce to extract honey from for the bees – and for the beekeepers who are after it. On top of this, due to industrialized farming with mono-cultures, pesticides etc. there is not enough food for the bees anyway – so they are being fed with sugar, which is weakening them while being geared to produce as much honey as possible. Result: sickness and bee death, if there is no treatment with acaricides, oxalic and other acids, - which can be found in most of the honey today - , and even that stops working at a certain point. So, we need a paradigm shift in dealing with the bees and restore a more natural habitat for them…. Which is what Dimi’s film Not Your Bee is about and all the protagonists in the film are working to this end. They are all gathered under this campaign. So, please support us!

Chris is an educator and researcher in sustainability issues with a special interest in how today’s separation of people from nature is affecting their ability to cope with conflict, this especially with a view to younger generations. And he has developed methods to remedy this situation by reengaging us with nature. With the help of our ongoing crowd-financing campaign Giraffes fighting for Climate Adaptation, Chris would like to prepare a series of online lectures so as to share his knowledge and experience with a wider audience thus attracting them to actually engage practically for positive change. Furthermore, Chris has profound knowledge about growing and protecting trees, something which will help greatly with the creation of our Bee and Wild Bee Reserve, which is planned to be created high up at the National Park Sierra Nevada.

We are proud to share every week inspirational stories from remarkable individuals. Stories that come from many different places. Each Giraffe’s story is unique with the underlying theme of overcoming challenges present in all. Take a look at each individual experience, and although each person is different, they all have one thing in common: Heroism. We want to hear your stories, too. If you’d like to tell us about your front-line hero, visit us at giraffe-heroes.eu. You´ll find the Giraffe Heroes Stories every Tuesday on Spotify, iTunes, our Homepage and every other place, where you hear your podcasts Join us again next week!

Hendrik is doing an outstanding job: the PHD veterinary doctor turned savior for the environment, specifically bees and trees in his local Bassevelde, Belgium. Listen to his own words here:

https://open.spotify.com/episode/0cFA3T8QV4x5nd2ou3ZXAL

André Wermelinger, a member of this campaign we’re running and also a Giraffe Hero, has also a message to the crowd. We are committed to save the bees and the trees. If you want to help go to wemakeit and look for the Giraffes fighting for climate adaptation: the bees and trees initiative and join us!

We are committed to save the bees and the trees. They need your help. Your contribution counts

Be part of it

(In case above link does not function, please go here: https://www.slideshare.net/THOMASPILSCHEUR/alqueria-de-moraymainstituteforregenerativestudies2)

This 3-days workshop event shall take place at two fascinating places: the Alqueria de Morayma - conceptual introduction above - as well as next to the Bibliotheca del Sol - a film about it - you find two news posts underneath here. Courses will be held by Chris and Cosco and cover a range of subjects, emphasis on which to be chosen together with you:

• Bees & Trees in the Alpujarra Bee Reserve
• Specialist study and activity – Water
• Specialist study and activity – Light and Fire
• Specialist study and activity – Space and Air
• Specialist study and activity – Earth
• Therapeutic Well-being, Art and Mind More details and a personal impression of the course leaders you may glimpse from our podcasts with Chris and Cosco, please check our website: www.giraffe-heroes.eu.

Yesterday we were introducing the area where Cosco’s Bee Reserve is to be located. Hope you enjoyed watching the movie and if not, you may have a look below now. Here you see a centuries old but well preserved stone marker in the upper Sierra, Alpujarras, which triggered the inspiration for the Mediterranean Stone Hive creation. - Listen to our forthcoming Podcast with Cosco where he explains how it works…..

This is to give you an impression about our protagonist Cosco Louis de Cordier. What Louis has managed to do is extraordinary: he is not only a highly imaginary artist he is also a visionary in other fields. His historic rediscovery of the Lost Labyrinth of Egypt is the most spectacular, but the creation of Bibliotheca del Sol near the Refugio Sulayr in the Alpujarras is a feast of its own. We have uploaded the link of a video for that so you can have a look and get a feel for the place. It is at this place, that Cosco now is venturing to create the first European Natural Bee Reserve. And for that he is working to realize an antique as innovative Natural Stone Hive construction of which we shall talk a bit in our news release tomorrow. In the meantime, enjoy the movie and do not forget to pass the word! Thank you.