03 Saturday Nov 2018
Posted in beekeeping, honey recipe, recipe
Tags
This was such a simple dinner to make that it made me very happy. The kids happily ate it and we all sat around the table and talked. It was wonderful! I added buttered egg noodles with garlic and some brown beans to complete the meal. This is a recipe that is going back in our rotation.
Read the full recipe here: Honey Garlic Pork Chops — What’s for Dinner Moms?
16 Tuesday Oct 2018
Posted in beekeeping, plants for bees, sustainable
Tags
bee friendly gardens, gardening for bees, planting for bees, plants for pollinators, pollinator gardening, pollinator gardens, sustainability, sustainable apiary
It’s not rocket science it’s just awareness – simplicity itself – what would you rather Bee Dead or Bee Alive – personally l think l would prefer living bees to dead bees and the bees probably agree with me!
“Bees do have a smell, you know, and if they don’t they should, for their feet are dusted with spices from a million flowers.”
― Ray Bradbury, Dandelion Wine
How BEE friendly are you? With Spring just literally on our doorstep now, although even l have to concede at times that in the UK alone, it appears that Mother Nature has withdrawn it … our bees are back into their daily routines. The garden l have here, is not a gardeners’ delight, we have wild herbs growing next to wild flowers, and very soon we shall be planting out our seasons’ rotation for vegetable growing. I tend to like to see more ‘weeds’ and don’t see them as such but more as flowers in the wrong place, it sounds kinder that way.
Plant more BEE friendly flowers and flowering herbs in your garden – With the loss of nesting and foraging habitat due to intensive monocultural agricultural practices and the ever increasing and rising suburbanization driven society pressures demanding more housing – natural landscapes are fast disappearing. You can alter things by planting flowers into your garden. Plant bloom heavy as Bees love forage volume and plant for the seasons that the pollinators are most active – as in early spring to late summer. Plan your flowering crops effectively;
Read the full article with lots of wonderful photos here: How Can We Bee … Helpful? — A Guy Called Bloke and K9 Doodlepip!
10 Wednesday Oct 2018
Posted in beekeeping, beekeeping management, management
How much intervention in the hive is enough? Some beekeepers do lots of management, entering their hives at least weekly, if not more. Others are minimalists with little or no inspections. Every beekeeper has their own unique situation that dictates their management.
In their zealousness, some new beekeepers always want to get into their hives to see what is happening. They are overly enthusiastic with this new endeavor and want to do inspections a couple times a week. And then there are other beekeepers who do minimalist management, letting the bees do what they know how to do with infrequent intervention. And sometimes it becomes very infrequent or even nonexistent.
So, is more management better? Is less acceptable? My guess is many beekeepers will say there’s a point when the beekeeper will overdo their inspections. But this debate could also be about whether the beekeeper does not do enough inspections.
I consider myself a minimalist when it comes to the management of my top bar hives. Often, I put little effort into checking them and managing them. It sometimes reaches the point where a person can consider me more of a bee-haver instead of beekeeper. I don’t even touch some of hives except to harvest them.
For example, one of my apiaries is in the mountains of Honduras on a coffee farm. I don’t get up there very frequently. The last hives in the line get the least attention. Time runs out and the truck is ready to take the workers back down to town. This is a Saturday and they work only until noon. I must go with it (or take a couple hours and walk down the mountain which is not likely after spending all morning in the hives). These are the hives that I only enter to harvest.
But minimal management works for me in my situation. I want honey from them but I don’t do beekeeping as my primary income source. I’m an elementary school teacher and bees have become a secondary income (unfortunately). They give me what they want for effort I put into their management. I accept that and I’m grateful for it.
Read the full article with lots of great pictures here: Musings on Beekeeping
09 Tuesday Oct 2018
Posted in beekeeping, hive products
Good article and yes, my bees pay their way here too. The author makes an important point in closing that one must have a love for the bee primarily and any financial gain an added bonus. ~sassafrasbeefarm
Recently I met a friend for lunch, and over sandwiches she inquired about our honey bees. I love talking about our bees, and she is a good friend who indulges me. After I provided a status update she asked, “Are you making money yet?” Her direct question caught me off guard. Most people ask us when we will have honey available, and I think my friend was curious to know if our colonies had reached a point where we could harvest honey for sale. Doug and I are first year beekeepers, so we are letting the bees have all the honey this year to get them through the winter. Nevertheless, my friend’s question made me wonder if hobby beekeepers could make a profit from their bees.
Doug and I became beekeepers because we find bees fascinating. We like learning about bees and talking about bees and taking care of them. I also wanted to increase the output in my vegetable garden. Neither one of us eat that much honey, and we never considered keeping bees for the purpose of generating income. First year beekeepers spend money but don’t make money. However, subsequent years may bring opportunities to actually earn some revenue. Therefore, I decided to make a very rough estimate to see if it is possible for a hobby beekeeper to be profitable. As the saying goes, this is a back of the envelope calculation.
Read the full article here: Can a Hobby Beekeeper Make a Profit? — Married with Bees
23 Sunday Sep 2018
Posted in beekeeping, biology, honey bee behavior, honey bee biology
“What role would you want in the hive?” we asked, the eight of us sitting in the circle of benches surrounded by Q Gardens’ newly green herbs and late spring blooms. The answers differed, but on one thing, we agreed: No one wants to be the queen.
The life of a drone sounds idyllic, if short-lived. Lay about the hive. Eat. Wait for a sunny day to fly out to the drone congregation area—how exactly the drones know the congregation’s location is a mystery—and find a young virgin queen to explosively impregnate. And die, gracelessly but with purpose.
The worker bee’s life isn’t so bad either. She has a number of roles, from nurse to scout, so it’s never boring, and workers have the highest “autonomy,” collectively making the hive’s “decisions.” A worker’s life is always busy, always productive.
Read the full article here: Beek Reads: Nobody Wants to be the Queen — Q Gardens
19 Wednesday Sep 2018
Posted in beekeeping
For a beginning beekeeper, opening a hive for the first few times can be somewhat overwhelming – and downright scary! There are all those bees in there. They have stingers. What if they get angry??? Then there is all of the unfamiliar gear: a veil or suit, big gloves, and a new hive tool. It can all be a bit overwhelming and cause a beginning beekeeper to feel quite anxious.
This nervousness almost certainly makes matters worse. While it is hard to say for certain whether bees can intrinsically sense this unease, they most certainly do sense unsteady and jerky movements. Bees do not like these kinds of rapid or rushed actions. They especially do not like any kind of rough treatment. For an experienced beekeeper, swatting at bees, darting about, dropping things, and banging things are all completely out of the question.
Beekeepers need to be relaxed and calm around their bees. If you are nervous as a beginner, you need do your best to pretend that you are calm. (“Fake it until you make it!”). Bees are sensitive creatures. If you move carefully and calmly, treating them with peace and respect, they will return the favor. One of the joys of keeping bees is the opportunity to get in touch with and to give respect to the magnificent sense of peace and purpose that is in the heart of every beehive.
Read full article at: The Zen of Beekeeping — Wildflower Meadows
15 Saturday Sep 2018
Posted in beekeeping, honey, honey as food, honey recipe, recipe
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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:
14 Friday Sep 2018
Posted in beekeeping, feeding bees, honey bee nutrition
More and more it’s pointing to nutrition to help us save our bees.
~ sassafrasbeefarm
Researchers have discovered that honey bees alter their diet of nutrients according to the season. A spike in calcium consumption in the fall, and high intake of potassium, help prepare the bees for colder months when they likely need those minerals to generate warmth. A careful inventory of the bees’ nutrient intake revealed shifting sources and how limitations in nutrient availability from these sources can have implications for the health of both managed and wild colonies.
Read full article here: Bees adjust to seasons with nutrients in flowers and ‘dirty water’ — Save The Bees Concert
13 Thursday Sep 2018
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
08 Saturday Sep 2018
Posted in beekeeping, honey, honey as food
Hi everyone! I thought I would post food for today. Back on the grind of eating healthier. Breakfast is known as the most important meal. This is breakfast. Strawberries, blueberries, mango, kiwi over yogurt and oats on the bottom drizzled with raw honey. My way of eating healthier. Although at times I go off course. […]
Read full blog post here: Breakfast fruit bowl. — Sunsets Sunrise
28 Tuesday Aug 2018
Posted in beekeeping, honey, raw honey
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New guidelines for doctors from the National Institute of Clinical Excellence (NICE) say they should tell patients to use honey first when they have a cough. This is based on 3 studies that showed honey reduces symptoms by 2 points on a 7 point scale.
Honey and over-the-counter medicines should be the first line of treatment for most people with coughs, new guidelines recommend.
Read full article here: Use Honey first for a cough, new guidelines say — Lytchett Bay Apiaries
25 Saturday Aug 2018
Posted in beekeeping, honey recipe, recipe
Tags
Do you enjoy simple dinners that are healthy and tasty?
One of my favorite meals is Honey chicken toast because it is a great meal on a busy day. This meal is perfect for one person or a whole family. My favorite honeys to use on this recipe are; alfalfa clover and the plain whipped honey from Honeyville. I switch between two different honeys depending on my mood. These are nice and sweet; which is complemented by the salt sprinkled on top. This dish is perfect for sparking your taste buds. Don’t take my word, try it out for yourself and see what the buzz is all about.
Read full recipe here: Honey Chicken Toast — The Honey Cottage
22 Wednesday Aug 2018
Posted in beekeeping, humor
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A little humor in the bee yard always helps as this article by Christine at The B(ee)log demonstrates. Cheers! sassafrassbeefarm
On my last colony check, I leaned over too far and my cell phone slipped out of my pocket. Neither the bees nor my phone were best pleased by this occurrence, but we all survived largely unscathed. (Note to self: Phone goes in lower suit pocket, not upper pocket!)
Fortunately, much like buttered toast, cell phones always land screen-down. Actually, this usually isn’t fortunate at all – but it was today. That universal law meant my phone didn’t slip between the frames, so I could pick it up again quickly. Although I can picture the discussion with the repair tech if that had gone another way…
11 Saturday Aug 2018
Posted in beekeeping, honey recipe, recipe
Tags
And for your busy days, here’s an easy dinner, done in about 30 minutes. It’s full of citrusy flavor with just hint of sweetness. A little mixed rice, a bright salad and it’s dinner!
Read the full recipe at: Citrus Honey Chicken — The Thankful Heart
10 Friday Aug 2018
Posted in beekeeping, feeding bees
In the course of a study on mosquito movement at a zoo in Manhattan, Kansas, researchers discovered that local colonies of honey bees had foraged on a sugar bait for the mosquitoes that had been applied to foliage near the zoo. The bait had been dyed for the purpose of tracking mosquitoes that had fed on it, but the dye also showed up in much of the bees’ honey. Here, a frame from one of the zoo’s bee hives shows honey dyed red (black arrow). The bait in this case was nontoxic, but the discovery indicates a need for further study on attractive toxic sugar baits’ impacts on bees and other nontarget insects. (Image originally published in Kapaldo et al 2018, Journal of Insect Science)
Read the full article here: Funny Honey at the Zoo Reveals Bees’ Foraging on Sugar Baits — Entomology Today
09 Thursday Aug 2018
Posted in beekeeping
Worldwide there’s concern that the survival of many bee populations — in particular honeybees (Apis mellifera) — is threatened by several complex factors that will require a multi-pronged approach to resolve.
The loss of natural habitat, stress, the lack of nutrition, the use of neonicotinoid insecticides, a parasitic mite (Varroa destructor), and many bacterial and viral diseases seem to be the prime causes of decline in all bee species.
Read the full article here: Create a garden habitat to help essential bees — Vancouver Sun
08 Wednesday Aug 2018
Posted in beekeeping, pests, varroa, varroa destructor, varroa mites
Deformed wing virus (DWV) is a highly viral disease transmitted by Varroa destructor. The disease is commonly found in colonies infested with mites. Deformed Wing Virus is regarded as deadly due to its ability to spread fast in any colony. It causes massive wing deformation in bees making it difficult for them to live normally. DWV which is regarded as a low-grade infectious disease is commonly triggered by mite infestations. It has a reputation for being massively destructive leading to the decimation of well-established colonies globally. The deformed wing virus is common in late summer and early fall. A high concentration of mites can be overwhelming for any bee colony.
Read the full article here: Deformed Wing Virus — Prime Bees – College Station Bee & Honey Farm
05 Sunday Aug 2018
Posted in beekeeping
A collection of beehive cams that includes views from inside a hive, a zoom camera the viewer controls in an apiary, and lots more.
Visit all the Honey Bee Hive Cams here: A Curated Collection of Beehive Cams — Grove Greenman
04 Saturday Aug 2018
Posted in beekeeping, honey, honey as food, honey recipe, recipe
Tags
I wish we all had time to stand in front of the barbecue and have parties on the deck (or by the pool if you’re so lucky) but man, sometimes we’re just busy and need to eat! That’s when this big batch of Honey Barbecue Pulled Chicken is a lifesaver.
Read full recipe at: Honey Barbecue Pulled Chicken — Frugal Hausfrau
31 Tuesday Jul 2018
Posted in beekeeping, honey bee photos
Tags
The typical honey bee (female forager) will visit 100 flowers in an hour’s time before returning to the hive to drop off collected pollen. The bee will repeat this process about ten times in a day. I like to say the honey bee travels at a speed of 100 FPH, even though it beats it wings around 12,000 times per minute.
View original article here: Honey Bee Speed: 100 Flowers Per Hour — 67steffen
28 Saturday Jul 2018
Posted in beekeeping, honey recipe, recipe
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What a great way to use fresh Summer produce and compliment anything that you are tossing on the grill.
Get the full recipe here: Spinach Strawberry Salad with Honey Dressing — Farm, Garden and Beyond
07 Saturday Jul 2018
Posted in beekeeping, honey, honey as food, honey recipe
Tags
BERRY HONEY MILKSHAKE
You can use non-fat milk, ice cream or yogurt if you wish
- 1 pint vanilla ice cream or frozen yogurt
- 2-1/2 cups strawberries
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1/4 cup honey
- 4 small mint sprigs (optional)
In blender combine all ingredients except mint. Blend about 30 seconds until smooth and creamy. Serve immediately in tall chilled glasses. Garnish with mint sprigs if desired. Makes four servings.
03 Tuesday Jul 2018
Posted in beekeeping, beekeeping management, management, Winter
I used to buy bees, lots and lots of bees; singles from South Carolina, nuclei from Florida and frames of brood from New York. I used to buy queens, lots and lots of queens; queens from Georgia, queens from Texas and queens from California. Every year it was the same. Pick up the pieces of my apiary in the Spring, send a big check to southern queen breeders, split up my best colonies, and hope I made enough of a honey crop to pay the bills. Some years I did, some years I did not.
Read full article here: Over Wintering Nucs- A Better Way — BEEKeeping: Your First Three Years
27 Wednesday Jun 2018
Posted in beekeeping, humor
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Apparently, I had been speeding down a South Carolina highway without wearing my seatbelt (uncharacteristic, I swear) and couldn’t provide a logical answer to a state trooper’s question, “So where you heading?” My conundrum was I didn’t know where I was heading. I was searching the countryside for a logging crew, any logging crew to photograph. I had just written an article, in fact my first ever as a freelancer, for Grit magazine on forest management, and the editor wanted photos to accompany it. The state trooper doubted my story and asked me to exit the car and follow his finger with my eyeballs without moving my head. Then he proceeded to tell me to recite the alphabet backwards from M.
You try.
It’s difficult, even sober. I was sober but petrified because my story sounded ridiculous. After walking a line, toe to toe, which isn’t so easy either under the gaze of a lawman, the trooper asked if he could search my backpack in the passenger’s seat. I consented thankfully. If not, I might have been escorted to the slammer. In that backpack was a copy of William Zinsser’s On Writing Well and about a year’s worth of Writer’s Digest. After that, the trooper handed me a seatbelt violation and let me go on my aimless way.
Today I use that same backpack to tote beekeeping stuff. It contains, among other things, a crowbar-looking thing with a little hook on the end that looks like a perfect tool for burglary. I have a grafting tool that looks like a lock pic and an unlabeled ziplock bag of a white powdery substance. In my truck bed is a long metal wand that I can hook to my truck battery to volatilize my white powdery substance. I reek of smoke. If stopped by a state trooper today, I would soon be sitting behind bars until the lab results came back showing oxalic acid.
Read full article here: Self Incrimination — BEEKeeping: Your First Three Years
26 Tuesday Jun 2018
Posted in beekeeping, beekeeping chores
They say death and taxes are unavoidable. There is a third item that can be added to this list; physical changes whether due to aging or disability.
This article is written for any beekeeper who is encountering physical barriers that affect their ability to continue keeping bees. These barriers can come in the form of mobility issues, arthritis, diminishing strength, back problems, eyesight or other unexpected challenges.
Beekeepers are resourceful and find creative solutions to continue keeping bees. Aging or other obstacles can be addressed on multiple fronts: lifestyle, equipment and management changes. Some of the solutions can be put into practice now and some will take planning and time to implement. The objective of this article is to provide practical information to help beekeepers adapt to changing physical conditions thus allowing them to continue doing what they love.
Read full article here: Barriers — BEEKeeping: Your First Three Years
22 Friday Jun 2018
Posted in beekeeping, beekeeping management, management, pollen
Most beekeepers have come to realize that due to lack of natural forage in our urban and agricultural landscapes, feeding pollen substitute has become necessary to keep bees healthy in most parts of the country. Last summer was an especially challenging season in the West due to extremely hot and dry conditions. Despite a wet spring in California and Oregon last year, the spigot was shut off abruptly early in the summer and what little forage was available quickly shriveled. Beekeepers who had not been providing supplemental feed saw their colonies dwindle as the summer went on. Although it’s still early, this year is looking like it could be similar.
Read the entire article here: Pros and Cons of Feeding Dry Pollen Sub — Bee Informed Partnership
21 Thursday Jun 2018
Posted in beekeeping, beekeeping seasons, seasons
Here we are at the Summer Solstice. Here’s some good advice from Rusty…
~sasafrasbeefarm
Your beekeeping year is about to change:
The beekeeping year can be divided into two halves. One half is characterized by expansion, and the other by contraction. Tomorrow we begin the next phase. Whether you live in the northern hemisphere or the southern, the solstices mark the boundaries, the points at which things begin to change.
The most important concept in beekeeping:
If I were to write a book on beekeeping, this is where it would begin. Relatively unimportant issues like how to feed, where to put a hive, or how to inspect would be relegated to the appendix. The how-to part of beekeeping is unimportant compared to the why of it. Once you understand how bee colonies respond to their environment—what they do and why—the how-to stuff becomes easy. You can figure it out without instructions because you understand the purpose.
The honey bee lifestyle is much easier to understand when you look at bees as a part of the natural world, not the man-made one. Honey bees respond to cues provided by nature, and once you understand their place in the ecosystem, their life cycle begins to make sense.
Read full article here: Your beekeeping year is about to change — Honey Bee Suite
21 Thursday Jun 2018
Posted in beekeeping, beekeeping management, beekeeping seasons, seasons
For beekeepers and the bees, the summer solstice marks the end of the period of increase and the beginning of the journey to the winter equinox. The next six months will be a period of reduction and preparation for winter.
~sassafrasbeefarm
As the sun reaches its most northerly position relative to the earth, the bees also reach their maximum strength. The summer solstice, which occurs on June 21st, brings the longest day of the year in the northern hemisphere. It also marks a delineation between the two broad seasons in the year of a beehive: the season of expansion and the season of contraction.
Read the full article here: Summer Solstice — Wildflower Meadows
20 Wednesday Jun 2018
Posted in beekeeping
Those that know me know that I have an interest in beekeeping history and those who have contributed so much to our knowledge. Beehive Yourself has created an interesting video titled: William Woodley – An Introduction. I encourage a visit to his blog to view the short, but well done and interesting video. ~sassafrasbeefarm
Click here to visit Beehive Yourself and view the video: William Woodley – An Introduction
19 Tuesday Jun 2018
Posted in beekeeping, national pollinator week, pollination, pollinators
Here’s a reminder from our friend Ron Miksha over at Bad Beekeeping Blog to celebrate NAtional Pollinator Week. Thanks Ron!
~sassafrasbeefarm
National Pollinator Week has arrived: June 18-24! Today, I’m re-running part of a blog I posted last week. It had some ideas on what you might do to celebrate Pollinator Week.
Pollinator Partnership tells us, “National Pollinator Week is a time to celebrate pollinators and spread the word about what you can do to protect them.” Eleven years ago, when colony collapse was at its peak and the end of civilization was near, the US Senate approved “National Pollinator Week” unanimously. Unanimously! Has the US Senate ever approved anything else by undissented decree? That’s a hundred out of a hundred. Congratulations to them for collaborating, for once, on something important. They wanted every American to recognize the pollination services provided by birds and bees and beetles and bats.
Read the full blog post at: National Pollinator Week — Bad Beekeeping Blog
