- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Honey bee foragers collect nectar, pollen, water and propolis.
Propolis? What's propolis?
It's that sticky plant resin or "goo" that the bees use to seal small spaces in the hive. It's also known as "bee glue." When you see beekeepers using their hive tools to pry apart the frames, they're confronting that glue.
Norm Gary, emeritus professor of entomology at UC Davis and author of the newly published Honey Bee Hobbyist: The Care and Keeping of Bees, writes: "Bees use it as a caulking material to seal small cracks and crevices inside the hive, especially at the joints between chambers, making it difficult to separate hive chambers that are glued tightly together. In warm weather, propolis is sticky and pliable. In cold weather, it’s hard and brittle.”
“A few bees in each colony collect propolis during warm weather when it is pliable enough to manipulate," Gary continues. "This natural bee glue is so sticky that other bees need to assist the propolis forager during the unloading process. It’s amazing how they can manipulate it without becoming hopelessly entangled and stuck together, but they seem to manager just fine."
Bees also use propolis to narrow the entrance to their hive, or encase a large, immovable object in their colony--such as a dead mouse or lizard. Basically, they remove the smell by covering it up.
Humans also use it; it's highly marketable.
In Storey’s Guide to Keeping Honey Bees by Malcom T. Sanford and Richard E. Bonney, the authors write: “Research in human medicine has shown propolis to be an antimicrobial agent, an emollient, immunomodulator, dental anti-plaque agent and anti-tumor growth agent. Studies also indicate that it may be effective in treating skin burns.”
It's also used for such products as vehicles waxes and musical instrument varnishes. Antonio Stradivari (1644-1737) reportedly favored it for the instruments he crafted.
But have you ever seen a bee carrying a load of propolis?
Staff research associate Elizabeth Frost of the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility, UC Davis, recently noticed a bee returning to the hive with a heavy load of propolis.
Sticky, sticky stuff! Especially when temperatures hit 100 degrees.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
That they're Public Enemy No. 1?
According to a recent Nature journal essay, non-natives are so vilified today that a “pervasive bias” exists against non-native species, a bias embraced by “the public, conservationists, and managers and policy-makers, as well by as many scientists, throughout the world.”
The native-vs.-non-native species distinction appears to be the “guiding principle” in today’s conservation and restoration management, say 19 ecologists in their essay, “Don’t Judge Species on Their Origins.”
Mark Davis, a biology professor at Macalester College, St. Paul, Minn., is the lead author. The other co-authors include Scott Carroll of UC Davis.
Carroll, an ecologist in professor Sharon Lawler’s lab, and the founding director of the Davis-based Institute for Contemporary Evolution, contributed his work on conciliation biology to the thought-provoking essay. He holds a doctorate in biology from the University of Utah.
“Global change alters conditions for all species, and from a practical perspective, origin can be only one of many criteria we consider,” Carroll told us. “Appraising non-native organisms more openly invites us to more seriously contemplate our aims when managing novel communities of mixed origin.”
Carroll is often out chasing soapberry bugs (a key research interest), writing research papers and delivering presentations. He considers soapberry bugs "wondrous examples of evolution happening right now--as we change the world, these beautiful insects are quickly adapting, and in the process directly revealing how evolution works."
You can't miss his presence. At 6 foot-10 inches, he towers over his colleagues.
And the soapberry bugs!
Related Links:
Department of Entomology website
Conciliation Biology: the Eco-Evolutionary Management of Permanently Invaded Biotic Systems by Scott Carroll, published in 2011 in Evolutionary Applications.
Soapberry Bugs of the World Website (Scott Carroll)
Scott Carroll Website
Scott Carroll: Curriculum Vitae
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Have you hugged your favorite pollinator today?
It's National Pollinator Week, and you're allowed to do that this week. Actually, any time you feel the inclination.
Honey bees, bumble bees, wool carder bees, leafcutter bees, sweat bees--they're all out there, ready for a hug.
'Course, they may misinterpret your actions.
This is the fifth annual Pollinator Week, when we pay tribute to bees, birds, butterflies, bats and beetles--and flies, too. Don't forget the flies. And all the other pollinators out there.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture is encouraging us to celebrate pollinators June 20-26. Perhaps what we should do, along with celebrating them, is vow to save them.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Who celebrated the most? Homo sapiens or Apis mellifera?
It was difficult to tell.
The Celebration of the Bees, held June 18 at the hillside home of a Mill Valley resident, drew avid fans of honey bees and native bees (no, honey bees are not natives; the European colonists brought them to America in 1622).
Sponsored by Savory Thymes, the event featured a honey bee talk by master beekeeper-writer Mea McNeil of San Anselmo; a native bee demonstration and talk by native pollinator specialist Robbin Thorp, emeritus professor of entomology at UC Davis; and learning stations staged by the Marin Beekeepers' Association.
Folks tasted honey, sampled meads, listened to live music, and feasted on hamburgers, hog dogs, beans, salad and freshly picked cherries and strawberries. It was all a benefit for the beekeeping projects of SuperOrganism: the Marin Pollen Project and the Marin Survivor Stock Queen Bee Project.
UC master gardener Kathy Ziccardi, who tends the hillside garden twice a week, thoughtfully numbered the native bee plants so guests could match each number to a hand-out sheet containing the common and botanical names. The plants ranged from African blue basil (Ocimum) and California phaelia (Phacelia cicutaria) to tickseed (Coreopsis grandiflora).
While the guests mingled, the bees worked the flowers.
There's a "bee" in benefit.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Tabatha Yang saw it first.
She's the education and outreach coordinator for the Bohart Museum of Entomology at UC Davis.
What she saw--in a grassy field at the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility, west of the central campus--was a golden ladybug, aka lady beetle.
It looked just like a yellow jelly bean.
Not!
Systemic entomologist Natalia Vandenberg of the Agricultural Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, identified it as Coccinella septempunctata.
Tabatha is "holding an adult ladybug that is newly eclosed from the pupa," Vandenberg said. "Note that the flight wings are yellow in the teneral adult instead of grey and they are stretched out so that they can expand fully and dry properly. The pronotal markings and body shape identify this as a member of the genus Coccinella. When the adult first leaves the pupa the dark pigment of the pronotum is already present, but the elytral spots develop gradually."
"If you had watched the beetle for 15 minutes the spots would begin to show. There is a spotless Coccinella that occurs in California (C. californica), but what you have is most likely to be a 7 spot that hasn’t developed the spots yet."
We watched it for several minutes and then released it back into its habitat.
By now, it's no doubt formed those characteristic spots.
Somewhere out there is a yellow jelly bean....with spots.
