For young scientists and buzzworthy

The Bee Mother
by Hetxw’ms Gyetxw (Brett D. Huson); illustrated by Natasha Donovan

Winnipeg: Highwater Press, 2024 
$24.95 / 9781774920800

Reviewed by Ron Verzuh

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Who doesn’t like bumblebees? They shouldn’t be able to fly and yet there they are bobbing among the spring flowers and making Nature come to life. They are a wonder and this beautiful little book simply and colourfully explains why.

First, meet Nox Ap. She’s the queen and she’s just waking from her winter slumber. It’s the beginning of her life cycle as “nature’s gardener” and her work as a pollinator creator brings new vegetation everywhere, as this “picture book for young scientists” recounts.

It’s March, the time of Black Bear’s Walking Moon, the Gitxsan name for the month. The new queen emerges and soon the swift current of Xsan, the River of Mists, will teem with salmon and trout as April becomes the Spring Salmon’s Returning Home Moon. 

We are on the Stikine River in the far north of BC where the Gitxsan Nation lives and thrives on an abundance of strawberries, huckleberries, and other fruits and vegetables that come when the bumblebee and other pollinators pass over the land.

We learn how the queen burrows into decaying trees, lays her eggs, and joins other pollinators like the honeybee and the wasp. The honeybee, explains the author, were brought to the region by settlers.

The queen’s eggs are wrapped up in a cocoon of food and wax until full-grown worker bees emerge. We know the rest from watching the bumblebees cruise over your gardens all summer. June is the Budding Trees and Blooming Flowers Moon for the Gitxsan. 

All the moons are explained in a chart at the back of the book, including their names in the Indigenous language. With November, the Getting-Used-to-Cold Moon, the bee mother succumbs, “but her death is never an end.” Pollination from her bees “allowed food sources for all beings along Xsan.”

The book is visually compelling thanks to Natasha Donovan’s paintings of the life of Xsan and its inhabitants. The changes of season are visualized through her use of bold colours. Scientific terms, like pollination, are defined simply on each page.

***

In mid-life I learned how New Zealand’s Māori indigenous stories are used to teach young people science. A Māori teacher explained how he taught his students science. He didn’t have a bumblebee story, but he called up similar stories. 

When the kids did not understand the concept of air-born gas, for example, the teacher told the story of two brothers. One was a married chief whose brother coveted his wife and planned to win her away. 

He dug a tunnel underneath the chief’s house while the couple were sleeping and blew a giant fart into it. When the chief’s wife smelled it, she left the house and moved next door to the brother’s place. That, said the teacher, is air-born gas. The kids laughed and fully understood.

Part of Hetxw’ms Gyetxw‘s Mothers of Xsan series that looks at the maternal wolf, eagle, frog, and raven, The Bee Mother reminded me that there are many ways to teach science. Sometimes it is more effective to rely on stories of nature to convey a clearer understanding. The Gitxsan and the Māori cultures offer vivid ways to tell us where we live and how the world works. 

I like bumblebees and I have learned to appreciate them more through the teachings of my seven-year-old great granddaughter. She can tell you some of what the Gitxsan First Nation knew a long time ago.

She’s not yet reached the age group that this book is aimed at (9-12, Grades 4-6), but she gets it just as all kids will get this beautiful story.

*

Ron Verzuh is a writer, historian, and documentary filmmaker. [Editor’s note: Ron has recently written two essays for BCR regarding British Columbia links to the film industry: Hello Oscar, Eh! and When Hollywood Calls. He reviewed books by Haley Healey, Keith G. Powell, Geoff Mynett, John Farrow, Andrea Warner, Barry Gough, Elaine Ávila, and Ken McGoogan for BCR; he also contributed an essay about trade unionist Harvey Murphy.]

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The British Columbia Review

Interim Editors, 2023-25: Trevor Marc Hughes (non-fiction), Brett Josef Grubisic (fiction and poetry)
Publisher: Richard Mackie

Formerly The Ormsby Review, The British Columbia Review is an online book review and journal service for BC writers and readers. The Advisory Board now consists of Jean Barman, Wade Davis, Robin Fisher, Barry Gough, Hugh Johnston, Kathy Mezei, Patricia Roy, Maria Tippett, and Graeme Wynn. Provincial Government Patron (since September 2018): Creative BC. Honorary Patron: Yosef Wosk. Scholarly Patron: SFU Graduate Liberal Studies. The British Columbia Review was founded in 2016 by Richard Mackie and Alan Twigg.

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