This morning driving in to work, I heard a great piece on NPR about honey bee decision making, with a delightful interview with Tom Seeley, author of Honeybee Democracy
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The NPR piece is certainly worth reading but is even better to listen and hear the sound effects as well as Seeley discussing his bee research. Click on "Listen to the story."
:The NPR piece is certainly worth reading but is even better to listen and hear the sound effects as well as Seeley discussing his bee research. Click on "Listen to the story."
Hey, Linda - great info on bees. My top bar hive is going gang busters. Worried about not enough space. Julia is worried about ventilation. In any case they all seem so happy. Enjoying my first year. And your blog is so helpful/insightful. Thanks! :) Maxine
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ReplyDeleteHello Linda,
ReplyDeleteI'm enjoying my time at your beekeeping blog, and just listened to the NPR podcast which was very enlightening. I'm looking for information relating specifically to royal jelly, and trying to get a better understanding of why it doesn't seem to be harvested by USA beekeepers. I understand that it's available in such small quantities, but there are larger bee farms here in the USA, yet still the vast majority of the raw royal jelly is imported from Asia.
I run a small family website specializing in bee products at http://thenaturalshopper.com and we've been having a lot of trouble in the last year sourcing raw materials from USA sources. Bee pollen is abundant, as is honey, but it's getting more and more difficult to find domestic sources of royal jelly and propolis.
I wonder from your perspective what would be the smallest number of hives required to make royal jelly collection more viable here in the USA?
Appreciate in thoughts or comments,
Regards
Carl
Sorry, Carl, I have no idea about the amount of hives to help you collect royal jelly. I haven't ever tried to collect or wanted to so I haven't researched the question for myself. Guess I can't be of help.
ReplyDeleteTom Seeley is a great guy. I got to know him when he was doing studies out on the Isle of Shoals at the Shoals Marine Lab run by Cornell and U of New Hampshire. I was a cook out there, and he set up on one of our back porches of the house we emps. lived in. There would either be this cluster of Bees on a stand, or they would be clouding the air around the house...I loved it, but not being allergic to stings helped. It freaked other emps out. I learned so many cool things about bees from talking to Tom and his compadres....incredible. And so nice to hear Tom on NPR on my way to work...great stuff.
ReplyDeleteKeep up your keeping, keep em healthy!