Dulcis Coccora Recipe by Savor the Southwest

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art, dates, fruit recipe, honey, honey recipe

A bit of history to sweeten an excellent historical recipe. Have a visit and read the full recipe. – sassafrasbeefarm

Monica King here to kick off National Honey Month since I’m a beekeeper. This awareness month was initiated by the National Honey Board in 1989 to promote American beekeepers and honey.

One pharoah, Cleopatra, used honey in her beauty regime. One of Cleopatra’s secrets, and her most famous, was her ritual bathing in milk and honey. Both of these ingredients naturally soften the skin, exfoliate, and leave a fresh, sweet scent. You can do this yourself by adding two cups milk and half cup honey to your bath water.

Personally, it is Cleopatra’s sweet tooth that I can relate to. Cleopatra’s favorite treat was a sweet honey ball called “Dulcis Coccora” also known as “Tiger Nut Sweets.” A recipe was reported to have been found on a broken piece of Egyptian pottery dating from 1600 BCE.

“Dulcis Coccora”
1 pound pitted dates
water
2 Tablespoons ground cinnamon
1/2 Teaspoon fresh ground cardamon
4 tablespoons chopped walnuts
honey – to coat
ground almonds and/or pomegranate seeds

Read full recipe here: Bees: Tears of the Sun God Re — Savor the Southwest:

Why Smoking Soothes the Stressed-Out Bee Hive by Meredith Swett Walker

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art, bee smoker, beekeeping equipment, defensive behavior, honey bee behavior

Smoke has long been the beekeeper’s secret weapon to avoid getting stung. Ancient Egyptian art dating back over 2,500 years ago depicts beekeepers blowing smoke into hives. But despite the age of this practice and human’s enduring fascination with honey bees, we still haven’t figured out exactly why smoke soothes bees.

Meredith Swett Walker

In research published in August in the Journal of Insect Science, Stephanie Gage, Ph.D., with colleagues at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Carl Hayden Bee Research Center and at BetaTec Hop Products, presents a scientific evaluation of smoke on the honey bee’s defensive behavior. The researchers focused on the “sting extension response” and evaluated the effects of two different types of smoke: burlap, which is commonly used by beekeepers, and spent hop pellets—a recycled material made from hop flowers after they have been used to make beer.

Because a honey bee (Apis mellifera) hive contains valuable treasure—sweet honey and protein packed larvae—bees must mount a coordinated defense to protect the hive from the many predators that would love to plunder it. A small number of worker bees serve as “guard bees” that patrol the entrance to the hive and watch for intruders. If a threat is detected, the guard will raise her abdomen and extend her stinger into the air. This behavior is called the sting extension response, and it releases an alarm pheromone, or a chemical signal, to the rest of the colony, mobilizing other workers to prepare to attack an intruder. If the intruder provokes the bees further, stinging commences.

Read the full article here on Entomology Today Why Smoking Soothes the Stressed-Out Bee Hive — Entomology Today

Mite Treatments by What Should I Be Doing With My Bees This Month?

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art, beekeeping, seasonal management, varroa, varroa destructor, Varroa management, varroa mites

Mite treatments will be the hot topic for all beekeepers very soon. Look at the graph above about the bee and mite population and the timeline. The Varroa population lags the bee population, up until early September. Then the mite population keeps increasing as the bee population goes down. This high infestation of mites damages the bees physically and also exposing honeybees to viruses. This high infestation of mites is what kills honeybee colonies.   Beekeepers need to stop this rising mite population during the month of August before the Varroa population explodes. Looking at the graph one can see there is a sharp rise in the month of August in the mite population. Treating colonies in September in many cases is too late. The bees may be so damaged by the rising mite population that they cannot recover.

Read the full article at:  Mite Treatments — What Should I Be Doing With My Bees This Month?

Breeding a better bee: Three social immunity traits, one massive experiment by Alison McAfee | Honey Bee Hub

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art, beekeeping pests, breeding better bees, diseases, honey bee diseases, honey bee genetics, opinion

Living in a honey bee hive is like living in a house with 40,000  siblings. It’s a pathogen’s dream. Left unchecked, contagious diseases can bring a colony to its knees, but honey bees – as well as other social insects – have evolved a way to fight back. Over millions of years, they have developed a collection of behaviors called ‘social immunity traits’ that help combat disease and parasite outbreaks.

Read the full article here: Breeding a better bee: Three social immunity traits, one massive experiment — Alison McAfee | Honey Bee Hub

Promoting Pollinator Habitat as Landscape Architects by Anthony Fettes, ASLA, PLA, AP

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art, bee friendly gardens, ecology, environmental ecology, landscape architects, pollinator gardens

“As landscape architects, one of the most effective ways we can improve the ecological benefit of any landscape is knowing how to identify, enhance, and create habitat for pollinators. But before maxing out a planting design with an abundant array of colorful blooms and anticipating the buzz of activity, there is more to consider than simply specifying a preselected pollinator seed mix or plugs. So, what exactly is pollinator habitat? For many, an open wildflower meadow or garden with the familiar stacked box (Langstroth) style beehive may be the first thing that comes to mind. However, pollinator habitat includes a diversity of floral resources for foraging, safe locations, and materials shelter/nesting sites (or host plants for butterflies and moths—Lepidoptera).”

cont.

Anthony Fettes, ASLA, PLA, SITES AP, is a Senior Landscape Architect and Ecologist at Sasaki in Watertown, MA.

Read full article here: https://wp.me/p2opir-25p

April Showers Bring May Flowers by settling for bees

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art, honey bee forage, nectar flow, nectar sources, spring nectar flow

Treat yourself today to a visit to this interesting article filled with beautiful pictures of the current nectar flow sources in Maryland. ~SassafrasBeeFarm

And the nectar flow!  The Maryland nectar flow relies upon tulip poplar, black locust and blackberry, all beginning to bloom as my scaled hive proves with steady increases of five to seven pounds each day last week.  As we revel in warm weather, watching our busy girls returning to the hives with full bellies of nectar and fat pollen pants, it’s time to think about…the fall.  While there’s an abundance of blooms outside this month, have you considered what your bees will eat after you harvest honey and the supplemental plants are spent?  We can take a lesson from the bees and plan now for what’s to come.

Read full article and see the beautiful pictures here: April Showers Bring May Flowers — settling for bees

Banana Sandwich — Peanut Butter * Raw Honey * Apothecary

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art, banana honey sandwich, honey, opinion, recipe, snack recipe

A great tasting, super easy, healthy after school snack!

This Banana Sandwich was and still is a favorite!

*  banana sliced lengthwise

* reid’s gourmet peanut butter

* reid’s gourmet raw honey

* cinnamon

* raw cacao nibs or grated chocolate

spread nut butter on 1 banana slice and drizzle with honey
sprinkle cinnamon
sprinkle chocolate

place other half of banana on top, wrap in plastic wrap and freeze

Read the full article here:  Banana Sandwich — Peanut Butter * Raw Honey * Apothecary

The Life of The Bee by Maurice Maeterlinck

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art, beekeeping, beekeeping books, beekeeping history, book review, education, Maurice Maeterlinck, print art, The Life of the Bee

Below is a nice enticement to appreciating the art in The Life of the Bee by Maurice Maeterlink and illustrated by E.J. Detmold. The text can be read online here: The Life of the Bee by Maurice Maeterlink. And more on the illustrator at: Edward Julius Detmold

via Art Book of the Month, July 2016 — Books & the City:

The Life of The Bee by Maurice Maeterlinck
(Translated by Alfred Sutro)
Illustrated by E J Detmold
George Allen & Co Ltd
Illustrated edition 1911

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The Life of The Bee by Maurice Maeterlinck is a wonderfully eccentric book written in a variety of genres. It is informed by the author’s years of experience studying the complex behaviour of bees. Yet this intricate factual account is suffused with epic drama and wildly poetic philosophical digressions.

Maeterlinck, in telling the story of the bee, explores the subjects of life, death, truth, nature, humanity, and everything in between.

The story of the bee becomes almost a mystic parable to describe all human experience. It has the added charm of being one of the most beautifully illustrated books in our collection. Edward Detmold’s paintings perfectly reflect the sentiment and beauty of the writing.

Below I have gathered together some of Detmold’s illustrations and selected a few memorable passages from the chapter entitled, ‘ The Nuptial Flight’ which presents the tragic sex life of the heroic male bee. I hope you enjoy them.

‘Most creatures have a vague belief that a very precarious hazard, a kind of transparent membrane, divides death from love and that the profound idea of Nature demands that the giver of life should die at the point of giving. Here this idea, whose memory lingers still over the kisses of man, is realised in its primal simplicity. No sooner has the union been accomplished than the male’s abdomen opens, the organ detaches itself, dragging with it the mass of the entrail, the wings relax, and, as though struck by lightning , the emptied body turns on itself and sinks into the abyss.’
(Part V THE NUPTIAL FLIGHT 87 –page 166)

‘Nor does the new bride , indeed, show more concern than her people, (for the poor male Bee ) there being no room for many emotions in her narrow, barbarous, practical brain. She has but one thought, which is to rid herself of as quickly as possible of the embarrassing souveniers her consort has left her,…She seats herself on the threshold, and carefully strips off the useless organs…’
(Part V THE NUPTIAL FLIGHT 89 –page 173)

‘Prodigious nuptials these, the most fairy-like that can be conceived, azure and tragic , raised high above life by the impetus of desire; imperishable and terrible, unique and bewildering, solitary and infinite. An admirable ecstasy, wherein death, supervening in all that our sphere has of most limpid and loveliest, in virginal, limitless space, stamps the instant of happiness on the sublime transparence of the great sky;…’
(Part V THE NUPTIAL FLIGHT 90 –page 174)

Source:  Art Book of the Month, July 2016 — Books & the City