Wednesday, June 17, 2015

Learn how you can BEE one in a MILLION

The 'Million Pollinator Garden Challenge' is a nationwide call to action looking to register 1 million gardens that are pollinator friendly. 


If you agree to the following, you too can BEE one in a MILLION:
1. Grow a variety of bee-friendly flowers that bloom from spring through fall.
2. Protect and provide bee nests and caterpillar host plants.
3. Avoid using pesticides, especially insecticides.
4. Talk to my neighbors about the importance of pollinators and their habitat.

Sign up here to be make the pledge and be included.

  June 15 - 21, 2015
Celebrate and Save our pollinators!

Tuesday, June 16, 2015

I bet you didn't know Indiana had this program!


In the late 90's, Indiana began an innovative program called 'Hoosier Roadside Heritage' but for some reason, hardly anyone knows about it.  The primary goal of the 'Hoosier Roadside Heritage Program'  is to promote and incorporate native plants and wildflowers into Indiana's roadside landscape.

This program helps pollinators by providing food for them in otherwise barren areas covering 25,000 acres of ground found along Indiana roadsides.  It also helps the Indiana State taxpayers because it reduces costs associated with mowing.  And, the seeds for this project are grown on state properties.  Department of Correction crews help to maintain these seed farms – allowing inmates to gain skills they can use to pursue a horticulture career.   How cool is this?

Beautiful - right?
Recently, I talked with William Fielding, the INDOT coordinator of this project.   He said that it is a very hard project to maintain because everyone complains.  They complain because the roadsides are not mowed.  But just look at those gloriosa daisies - why would you complain about that?

In celebration of National, State, and Local Pollinator Week, I am going to call you to action: 
  1. I encourage you to click here to learn more about the project.  
  2. Just don't stop there, send Mr. Fielding an email and tell him how much you appreciate this project. (Note:  You'll find Mr. Fielding's email at the bottom of page.)
  3. Then, forward this blog post to 3 of your friends and ask them to thank Mr. Fielding for keeping this project going.


  June 15 - 21, 2015
Celebrate and Save our pollinators!

Monday, June 15, 2015

Why Care About Pollinators?


I care because I like to eat!

Three-fourths of the world’s flowering plants and about 35 percent of the world’s food crops depend on animal pollinators to reproduce. More than 3,500 species of native bees help increase crop yields. Some scientists estimate that one out of every three bites of food we eat exists because of animal pollinators like bees, butterflies and moths, birds and bats, and beetles and other insects.


  June 15 - 21, 2015
Celebrate and Save our pollinators!

Sunday, June 7, 2015

Do bees need air conditioners?

I get asked a lot about what the bees do during the cold months of winter, but hardly any one asks about the heat in the summer.  Maybe you haven't thought about it.  But, can you imagine living in your house with 50,000 other people during the dog days of summer without air conditioning?  I sure can't.
 
One thing they do to cool the hive is to create a 'swamp cooler' effect.   The nectar being retrieved from flowers can have a moisture content as high as 80%.  However, 'ripe' honey (what we eat) contains only 18% water.  In order to cure the nectar into honey, the bees use their wings to fan the liquid causing evaporation.  This in turn also cools the hive.  Cool? or Cool!


Saturday, June 6, 2015

Indiana Joins in on National Pollinator Week

Eight years ago the U.S. Senate unanimously approved and designated a week in June as “National Pollinator Week”. This marked a necessary step toward addressing the urgent issue of declining pollinator populations. Pollinator Week has now grown to be an international celebration of the valuable ecosystem services provided by bees, birds, butterflies, bats and beetles. But, although the growing concern for pollinators has brought progress, but we must continue to maximize our effort to protect our pollinators.

Pollinating animals, including bees, birds, butterflies, bats, beetles and others, are vital to our delicate ecosystem. Therefore, Pollinator Week is a week to get the message of valuable pollinators out to as many people as possible and let them know pollinators positively affect all our lives. So let all be sure to use this time to SAVE and CELEBRATE these creatures critical to life on planet Earth!

The 2015 National Pollinator Week falls on June 15 – 21. Now, the state of Indiana is joining this celebration. Governor Mike Pence and First Lady Karen Pence have a bee hive at the governor’s mansion and are very supportive of the pollinators in our state. Knowing this, we asked the Governor to declare Indiana Pollinator Week during the same timeframe and he agreed. She recently received the certificate and proclamation from the Governor’s office and is excited to share it with fellow beekeepers.

To help celebrate honey bee pollinators, there will be a Summer Apiary Field Day hosted by Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana on Saturday, June 20, 2015. This event is a must attend for all beekeepers in the state and it is a great way to celebrate the culmination of Pollinator Week. Put it on your calendar. We hope to see you there.

Click Here for Purdue Field Day Agenda
Click Here for Purdue Field Day Registration
Click Here for Directions to the Purdue Bee Lab



http://pollinator.org

Wednesday, May 13, 2015

How to sooth a bee sting

Plantain:  a great plant to know
 
Plantago Major, the broad leaf plantain plant, is a weed to many.  You'll see it just about anywhere the soil has been disturbed: - lawns, driveways, roadsides, and even in sidewalk cracks.  Because all parts of this plant are edible, the early European settlers brought it with them.  But rather than eat it, I use it to sooth bee stings.  Just take a leaf of the plant, crush it up in your hands and apply to the sting site. 


Friday, May 8, 2015

Springtime in the Apiary

I have always found it difficult to explain to someone what I do for my job.  When I worked in computers, I always tried; but it was just difficult to explain the details.  So, usually I gave up and just said I was a computer geek.  Most could get that.

Now, I'm realizing that it is just as hard to explain beekeeping.  Most assume bees live by themselves in the wild, therefore you just put them in a box and that is the end of it.  However, when I put bees in a box, I take them out of nature and have an obligation to provide the best possible care for them.  Much like livestock or pets, I need to ensure they have food, water, medical care, and shelter.

In the spring, bees replicate themselves by swarming.  With the warming weather and abundance of nectar in flowering plants, swarming activity is eminent.  Nectar and pollen are stored in the honeycomb cells and will become a future food source for the bees.  This also stimulates the queen to lay eggs in honeycomb cells.  Soon, with all this food and baby production, all of the honeycomb cells will become full.  With a crowded home, the bees decide to replicate themselves as a colony.  So, they choose to make a new queen and half of the bees leave the hive to start a new home with the old queen.  Thus a swarm.

As a beekeeper, it is in my best interest to have as many bees as possible.  Each hive of bees that swarms is a loss of $125 worth of bees plus $200+ of honey.  So, swarm prevention is on my spring management list.  Very similar to calving or lambing on a farm, it is a time consuming task to check frequently to see when the time is right and assist  through the process.  The management style I choose depends on my desired outcome but can often mean creating 'artificial swarms' by splitting the hive or putting on additional honey super boxes so there is enough room for them to grow.

On the farm in the spring, farmers change from feeding hay(stored food) to putting livestock out on lush green pasture.   A similar transition takes place in the world of bees. They also have a stored food source for the winter- which is honey.  Additionally, as a keeper of the bees, I provide them an emergency food source to ensure there is enough food to get through an Indiana winter.  After all, the winter time provides no plants for them to visit.  In the spring, enough food needs to remain  available until flowers can provide the bees with a resemblance of a 'lush green pasture'.  Beekeepers call this a 'nectar flow'.  It might mean feeding them a sugar syrup supplement until the time is right, eventually removing any extra emergency stores, and adding honey super boxes to the hive.

Next, the bees have been cooped up in a box all winter long.  So, another spring task is to ensure the hive is clean is to clean up the bottom board.  Just like you would clean out the floor of a barn stall, you need to do the same thing for the bees. The bottom of the hive will contain a lot of debris.  Bees are really hygienic and may eventually clean this up.  But, I'm going to help them.  This requires a lot of heaving and lifting.  One of those boxes can weigh 60+ pounds and there are usually 2 of them.  These heavy boxes need to be lifted off the bottom board in order to get to the floor.  I also study the debris to see if I can learn anything - was there too much moisture and therefore mold?  Are there small hive beetles or larva?  How many varroa mites do I see?  Where is most of the trash?  Does it cover the entire bottom or just a portion?

What about the health of the hive?  Do I see deformed wings?  What about the bee poop?  Is it inside the hive?  Are there too many parasites?  Again, all something that farmers are used to doing except they look at the condition of the skin/coat/fur and examine feces for parasites.  If there are problems,  I have a responsibility to care for these bees and ensure their health.  The goal is to remedy any health issues prior to the bees storing honey for human consumption.

If I don't take care for my bees and they become sick or parasite infested, they could die or decide to leave the hive in search of a new home.  Either way, it's like I've sent my kids to school with a nasty flu virus.  The hive full of sick bees will eventually decline and not be able to protect their home.  Other bees in the area will realize there is food available in this virus ridden hive and rob it.  At this point, the virus not only impacted this one hive but many.  Not a very good stewardship plan for those with hives around me.

And, this just skims the surface of early spring management.  We haven't even talked about raising bees for others to buy, moving bees for pollination and to new locations, answering new beekeeper questions, honey flows and extraction, raising queens, equipment repairs, or creating 'the plan' for the rest of the summer.  So, if you are not a beekeeper, hopefully you understand a little more and see the value in that jar of honey you purchase.  If you are a beekeeper, hopefully you see that you need to provide the utmost animal husbandry skills to keep your bees well.  And, if you don't have that knowledge or time, you need to find a way to obtain it.  You owe it to the bees.  That is the difference between being a 'beekeeper' and a 'beehaver'.

As for me, I have around 70 hives spread out in Southern Indiana and the greater Louisville area.  Between that and the 50+ acres of grass that needs to be mowed at the airport, it's unusual to see me much during the spring.   If you do, it will be atop a tractor or in my veil.