- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
In the honey bee colony, you'll see a workforce like no other. You'll see nurse maids, nannies, royal attendants, builders, architects, foragers, dancers, honey tenders, pollen packers, propolis or "glue" specialists, air conditioning and heating technicians, guards, and undertakers. Meanwhile, in the peak season, the queen bee keeps busy laying 1500 to 2000 eggs a day. It's a matriarchal society; the females do all the work. The males: their only job is to mate with a virgin queen. And then they die. Or, if they don't mate, their sisters will kick them out of the hive in the fall. They're not needed.
Want to learn more about honey bees?
Attend the third annual California Honey Festival, to take place from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Saturday, May 4 in downtown Woodland. It's sponsored by the City of Woodland and the UC Davis Honey and Pollination Center. It's free and family friendly.
The festival, launched in 2017, aims to cultivate an interest in beekeeping, and to educate the public in support of bees and their keepers, according to Amina Harris, director of the UC Davis Honey and Pollination Center.
The California Honey Festival's mission: to promote honey, honey bees and their products, and beekeeping. Through lectures and demonstrations, the crowd can learn about bees and how to keep them healthy. Issues facing the bees include pests, pesticides, diseases, malnutrition, and climate changes.
The event will include a cooking stage, a UC Davis educational stage, a kids' zone, a refreshment zone (beer and wine) and live entertainment, including Jayson Angove, Jessica Malone, Big Sticky Mess, Bocado Rio, Case Lipka, David Jacobin, Katgruvs, accordionist Jared Johnson, The City of Trees Brass Band and Double X Brass Band. Other live entertainment includes Space Walker and the Hand Stand Nation. Look for the UC Davis bee lab to present a live bee demonstration. The Pollinator Posse of the Bay Area, headed by Tora Rocha and Terry Smith, will be on hand to explain the importance of pollinators and what you can do to help them.
Meanwhile, let's hear it for the blue collar workers, the honey bees! Have you ever seen a honey bee packing blue pollen? They do when they forage on the tower of jewels, Echium wildpretii, which is blooming right now in the area. (Unlike humans, honey bees don't get the blues--unless they're collecting blue pollen!)
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The inaugural California Honey Festival, to take place from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Saturday, May 6 on a four-block stretch in historic downtown Woodland, will draw folks from all over state and beyond. And it's free and open to the public.
Coordinated by Amina Harris, director of the UC Davis Honey and Pollination Center, the festival will offer honey sampling, mead, live bands, talks on beekeeping and bee friendly plants, and vendors offering bee-related wares. And that's just the "bee-ginning."
At the Honey Lab, located in the UC Davis booth, members of the UC Davis Master Beekeeper Program and knowlegeable volunteers will teach festival-goers about "all things honey."
Some of the activities at the Honey Lab booth:
- Taste honey from around the world and check out the giant honey flavor and aroma wheel
- Learn about UC Davis beekeeping and the California Master Beekeeper Program
- Follow how honey is made from flower to bottle
- Marvel at the life cycle of a honey bee, starting with an egg and resulting in a bee just a couple weeks later
- Learn what is harming our bees
- Peruse the different kinds of bee hives and how they work
- Purchase books and UC Davis honey from the UC Davis bookstore
"The California Honey Festival's mission is to promote honey, honey bees and their products, and beekeeping through this unique educational platform, to the broader public," said Harris. "Through lectures and demonstrations, the festival will help develop an interest in beekeeping by the younger generation. Attendees will learn about the myriad of issues that confront honey bees including pesticide use, diseases and even the weather! In addition, attendees can learn how to creatively plant their gardens to help feed all of our pollinators. It is important for the community to appreciate and understand the importance of bees as the lead pollinator of many of our crops adding to the food diversity we have come to enjoy."
Brandi, who spoke at a 2015 symposium at UC Davis, said that the major issues that negatively impact colonies include pesticides, varroa mites, nutritional issues and diseases. "It's much more difficult to keep bees alive and healthy today than it was in the 1970s," he told his audience. "I had a 5 percent winter loss in the 1970s, and a 13 to 45 percent winter loss in his operation during the past 10 years."
Among the many other speakers: Extension apiculturist Elina Niño, booked from 11 to 11:45 a.m. and from 2 to 2:45 p.m., and Billy Synk, director of pollination programs for Project Apis m., and former manager of the Harry H. Laidlaw Honey Bee Facility at UC Davis. Sync speaks from 12 to 12:45.
The California Honey Festival website includes a program schedule.
Expect lots of honey--which has been described as "the soul of a field of flowers."
- Author: Fox News Latino
Common Sense Media released an exhaustive survey Tuesday outlining how young people spend screen time. One concern: the number of youngsters who feel comfortable multitasking while doing homework.
Two thirds of teenagers said they listen to music every day, and 58 percent said the same about watching television, the study said. By contrast, 45 percent reported using social media every day and only 36 percent said they enjoyed that activity "a lot"; Twice as many said they really enjoyed their music.
Television is the favorite activity of preteens, with 62 percent of respondents aged 8 to 12 saying they watched every day, the study said. Tweens said they spend just under six hours a day of media time. Exactly half of the time teenagers spend with video involves watching a TV program at the time it originally airs. The rest is parceled out among time delayed viewing, DVDs or online video, the study said.
Boys are much more likely to play video games than girls. The survey found male teenagers spent an average of 56 minutes a day gaming, while girls devoted only seven minutes. Girls spent more time on social media or reading than boys. Half of the teenagers said they watch TV or use social media either "a lot" or "sometimes" while doing homework, and 76 percent said they listen to music while working. Half of the teens say that listening to music actually helps their work, while only 6 percent said they thought it hurt.
"As a parent and educator, there's clearly more work to be done around the issue of multitasking," said James Steyer, founder and CEO of Common Sense Media, an organization that monitors youthful media use and gives recommendations to parents. "Nearly two thirds of teens today tell us they don't think watching TV or texting while doing homework makes any difference to their ability to study and learn, even though there's more and more research to the contrary.
"More kids said their parents have talked to them about the content of what they watch or listen to rather than the time spent on media, the study said. Poor children have less access to computers, tablets and smartphones than wealthier kids, but spend more time on devices when they have one, the study said. Common Sense Media conducted a survey of 2,658 young people between Feb. 6 and March 9. The results have a margin of error of plus or minus nearly 2 percent.
Source: Published originally on Fox News Latino as Study: Teens spend nearly 9 hours a day absorbing media, and Latinos even more, November 4, 2015.
- Author: Nielsen.com
This growth trend is also evident when examining Black and Hispanic audiences—the weekly reach of radio among Blacks and Hispanics has been growing steadily over the past five years. Since 2011, the weekly national Black radio audience has grown 5% (from 29.8 million to 31.3 million) while the Hispanic audience has grown 11% (from 36.5 million to 40.4 million). Combined, these groups account for almost a third (29.3%) of the national audience, representing 71.7 million audio consumers.
And because radio reaches more than 90% of both of these audiences, the footprint of where that listening is highest mirrors the larger population trends taking place in the U.S. today. When looking at the markets and states with the highest penetration of listening to urban or Spanish language formats—the formats most popular with Black and Hispanic listeners, respectively—geography and market size play a large role in scoring which parts of the map index above or below the national average for audience share to those formats.
The states with the highest share of Black consumers listening to urban radio formats are centered in the East, specifically the mid-Atlantic and the South. There are only two states west of the Mississippi (Arkansas and Louisiana) that index above the national average.
Conversely, the Hispanic map looks a bit different, where western states and states with large urban areas (New York and Chicago) lead the way for listening to Spanish language radio.
The power of radio is evident not just as a whole, but also within the diverse communities of listeners stretching from coast to coast. In this quarter's report, we focus on the record 71.7 million blacks and Hispanics who combine to account for almost a third (29.3%) of the national average quarter hour (AQH) audience.
These black and Hispanic consumers spend more time with radio each week than any other group, and possess enormous buying power for advertisers looking to reach a qualified audience when they are away from home and in the marketplace ready to purchase.
Music is a key component of Hispanic life and Hispanics are among the most enthusiastic consumers of music across a variety of genres regardless of acculturation level. Having roots in Mexico and various countries across Central America, South America and the Caribbean, Hispanics are diverse, speak multiple languages, and straddle multiple cultures. There is no single narrative that applies to those who identify themselves as Hispanic. Some are recent immigrants who speak only Spanish, some are descendants of families who immigrated generations ago and speak only English, and some speak Spanish and English with equal ease.
One thing that binds Hispanics together is a passion for music.
A Love For Music
The average Hispanic spends $135 per year on music, considerably more than the average consumer, who spends $105 per year. Much of this difference is explained by Hispanics' love of live music and a cultural tradition that values communal celebration.
Source: Published originally on Nielsen.com as Mapping Radio's Reach with Black and Hispanic Consumers, August 4, 2015.
- Author: Susan Croissant
In August we visited Greater Vallejo Recreation District's (GVRD) Children's Wonderland for their Annual Summer Concert Series: Art & Concerts in the Park June - Sept (one each month). Raymond Victor was a guest artist (he plays around Vallejo in many a charitable event). We were amazed at how few people attended to hear some FREE blues on a beautiful day in a lovely park. Usually there's a $2 entry fee per person. Not everyone can or wants to pay for that privilege, but the grounds are very pleasant. http://www.gvrd.org
Just outside the park entrance, the front of the Vallejo Parent Nursery School building has a Tulip tree (Liriodendron tulipifera) and Lily-of-the-Nile (Agapanthus orientalis). A small playground with slides and swings is surrounded by a fence covered in Morning Glory (Ipomoea tricolor 'Heavenly Blue').
Enter the park through a castle guarded by crocodiles, with stained glass windows (Jack & the Beanstalk, Alice, Pinocchio, dinosaur) and with small dragon heads on the backside. Several playground areas, with many slides: giant teapot house/slide with teacup chairs, sandlot with in-ground dinosaur and stone picnic table/benches, train with station house and hotel, swings (for varied ages), Vallejo fire truck, and a large playground with slides and stationary, bouncing rides. Picnic areas: tipi/teepee open area, Humpty Dumpty open area, large pergola, covered band shell, Alice in Wonderland gazebo (with painted murals inside & out with quotes from Maurice Sendak and other children's books). A giant, working chessboard where you move the pieces as you walk the board. The bathroom has giant King and Queen playing cards at the entrance to identify gender.
Many, many trees (both young and old) provide pleasant surroundings and shaded areas. Tulip, Yucca, Canary Island Date Palm (Phoenix canariensis), Fir (Abies spp.), Cedar (Cedrus spp.), young Redwoods (Sequoia sempervirens), young Crape Myrtle (Lagerstroemia spp.) , and many large and impressive specimens that I could not identify. The main ground cover is Bermuda grass (Cynodon dactylon) with Clover (Trifolium repens) mixed in. Bermuda is strong and sturdy for foot traffic and activities. Wild strawberries (Fragaria vesca) appear on various ground areas. A brick flower bed filled with aster (Aster amellus cordifolius) . Red Geranium in various spaces. A somewhat narrow, long strip where water could flow, surrounded by various grasses, Mexican sage (Salvia mexicana), flax (Phormium), Lily-of-the-Nile 'Blue Yonder.' Similar plants are gathered against the fence. Small shrubs appear in various spots throughout the park. Near the train station English ivy (Hedera helix) covers the wall, with several Yucca trees on the outside of the fence setting a nice background to the ivy.