Rose Hill Flowers is enamored of the humble worker bee—and we think you should be, too.

After all, this industrious little insect pollinates at least 90 commercially-grown crops, as well as 80% of all flowering plants. Without them, we’d be missing everything from apples and avocados to coffee and carrots. Over millions of years, bees have adapted into efficient machines for transporting both nectar and pollen back to their colonies, which can consist of anywhere from 10,000 to 60,000 bees. There, they turn that nectar into honey and bee bread, a nutrient-rich food source. And along the way, they pollinate thousands and thousands of plants, which is the only way those plants will grow. How do they do it?

For starters, they’re attracted to certain flowers more than others. The ones that fall within a color range they can perceive obviously get the most attention. The sunflower, seen here in our Sunflower Power design, does everything right. It presents in a color that the bee can detect. It has a deep, arresting center that visually guides the bee right to the nectar, and as for that nectar, sunflowers have plenty of it. 

Once the bees alight on their flower and begin stuffing themselves with nectar, they’re also in a position to pick up some pollen on their bodies. When they flit away to the next flower, they take this pollen with them, dusting the next flower with it. That flower receives the genetic material it needs to create seeds. It’s a beautiful, millennia-old cycle, and an important one to protect.