- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
First you give them roots, then you give them wings.
That's what's happening in our bee condo, a wooden block (nest) with drilled holes for leafcutting bees (Megachile).
They flew in, laid their eggs, provisioned the nests with pollen and leaf fragments, and capped the holes.
We had 11 tenants. Now there's a hole in one.
Success! A leafcutting bee emerged. Native pollinator specialist Robbin Thorp, emeritus professor of entomology at UC Davis, says that "Some leafcutting bees, especially the introduced ones like the alfalfa leafcutting bee, have more than one generation per year. Bees of the second and third generation may clean out or partly clean out old nest holes like this and construct a new nest inside. Sometimes you can find new leaf material inside the old cocoon of the previous nest builder. Thus, the tunnels get smaller in diameter with succeeding generations. Kind of like the build up of old cocoons in honey bee comb and resulting smaller inner diameter of the brood cells in old dark comb."
It's all rather exciting being a "beekeeper." We've never had a hole in one--'til now.
If you, too, want to keep native bees, Thorp has compiled a list of where you can buy homes for them or where you can learn how to build your own. The list is on the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research facility website.
You can also buy them at beekeeping supply stores.
Now that we have a hole in one, 10 tenants to go...
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
The places to "bee" for beekeepers in September and November are the Big Island of Hawaii and the not-so-little-city of Rohnert Park, Calif.
The Western Apicultural Society, founded by UC Davis scientists in 1978, has scheduled its annual conference for Sept. 12-15 at the Hapuna Beach Prince Hotel, Big Island, north of Kona.
The California State Beekeepers' Association, organized in 1889, will gather Nov. 15-17 for its 2011 convention at Sonoma/Wine Country Doubletree Inn at Rohnert Park.
Bee health, and the latest updates on colony collapse disorder (CCD), will be among the topics at each conference.
Among the UC Davis experts participating at both conferences will be Extension apiculturist Eric Mussen, member of the UC Davis Department of Entomology faculty since 1976 and one of the founders of the Western Apicultural Society.
It's called "WAS" for short, but there's nothing past tense about it.
Meanwhile, you can get up-to-date bee news by reading Mussen's from the UC apiaries newsletters and Bee Briefs, both located on the UC Davis Department of Entomology website and downloadable for free.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Up close and personal, those blue damselflies (suborder Zygoptera, order Odonata) look prehistoric.
Fact is, they were here before the dinosaurs.
These needlelike insects add an iridescent presence as they fly awkwardy over our fish pond, catching prey. In the early morning, they land in our nectarine tree. They're not there to pick nectarines. They're warming their flight muscles.
Their brilliant colors draw us to them. But their huge compound eyes quickly notice us and off they go.
Awkwardly.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Award-winning journalist Hannah Nordhaus tells the story of migratory beekeeper John Miller of Gackle, N.D., who trucks his bees throughout much of the country to pollinate farmers' crops, including almonds in California.
She frames her story with interesting tidbits about bees, bee health, honey, research and beekeepers.
Nordhaus writes exceptionally well. Although not a beekeeper, she followed Miller around to his bee yards, beekeeping conferences and to his home in Gackle (which is about 100 miles from Bismarck).
Bees, she says, "are creatures of routine, sticklers for order. Their short lives revolve around tending and cleaning and feeding the queen and the young. Bees are single-minded. They do not ditch their queen just because they feel like it. They do not get restless and leave their young. They do not go on flights of fancy. They do not enroll in semesters abroad on a whim or grow dreadlocks or get tattoos or go on extended vacations. They do their jobs."
That's her marvelous lead-in for colony collapse disorder (CCD), the mysterious phenomenon characterized by adult bees abandoning the hive.
Nordhaus describes Miller as a guy who loves bees, spreadsheets, humor and his friends. He's descended from Nephi Ephraim Miller, a Mormon farmer known as "the father of migratory beekeeping" and the first beekeeper to produce "the nation's first million-pound crop of honey."
Miller maintains one of the biggest beekeeping operations in the country--although not quite as big as South Dakota's Richard Adee, who has 80,000 hives, Nordhaus says.
Born in 1954, Miller has a "Jimmy Stewart-like voice and an eternally bemused expression," Nordhaus writes. He doesn't cuss. He uses "cowboy words" (especially when he gets stung).
Other bee guys mentioned in her book include California queen producers Pat Heitkam of Orland and Bob and Bill Koehnen of C. H. Koehnen & Sons of Glenn. (Note: Students who enroll in bee breeder-geneticist Susan Cobey's annual instrumental insemination class at UC Davis visit these queen bee-breeding operations.)
Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. (1907-2003), also mentioned in The Beekeeper's Lament, was Cobey's mentor. The Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility on Bee Biology Road at UC Davis bears his name.
Laidlaw is considered "the father of modern queen-rearing," Nordhaus points out. (Note: he's also considered "the father of bee genetics.")
"He (Laidlaw) was the pope to anybody that raises queens," Heitkam told her. "To have shaken his hand is an honor."
Yes, indeed.
Nordhaus writes as if she's chatting with John Miller in his living room and we're listening in and don't want the conversation to end. We want to hear more about the bee folks, how they feel about their bees, and what they're doing to ward off pests, pesticides, diseases and the like.
Anyone who has ever opened a hive can identify with Nordhaus' comment: "Ask any beekeeper: bees are addictive--their purposefulness, their solidarity, their endless complexity. Miller loves nothing better than the sight of a teeming frame of bees, of sealed-up honeycombs and brood heady to hatch."
"Ah," he told Nordhaus, "that's prosperity right there."
Bee folks are like that.
She got it right.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
There's nothing quite like a cone--no, not an ice cream cone.
A purple coneflower.
The purple coneflower (Echinacea purpurea, family Asteraceae), looks like royalty in the Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven at the University of California, Davis.
The drought-tolerant plant is a favorite of not only gardeners, but honey bees, bumble bees and sweat bees.
The haven, a half-acre bee friendly garden planted next to the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility on Bee Biology Road, is open (free admission) from dusk to dawn. It's a year-around food source for honey bees, an educational experience for visitors, and a research garden.
Most folks who visit the garden vow "I'm going to plant those purple coneflowers in my garden."
If they do, it will be like royalty. The throne is where the honey bee sits. She's graced with yellow jewelry (pollen). As she moves, she wears a robe--a robe of petals.
There's nothing like a purple coneflower.
