Ever wonder why bees do what they do? Why and when do some of the bees in a hive become foragers? How do the pheramone levels in the hive affect honeybee performance. Answers to these questions and more can be found in this interesting article about honeybees and their genes. For more click https://uiaa.org/2021/07/06/gene-and-the-honey-bee/
March 21 is the Vernal Equinox which herallds the beginning of Spring. While March can be a mix between winter and spring and the weather may be volatile, the bees are charging full speed ahead. The queen is laying an enormous amount of eggs now. That brood requires a lot of honey and pollen to fully develop. The […]
Using a dance routine, the bees can tell each other the best place to find nectar, but once they’ve picked up their nectar and pollen, how do they find their way back to the hive? Honeybees have another trick – tiny compasses, in their tummies, that sense the Earth’s magnetic field. There are other creatures […]
Some believe it’s time to return to the old ways for harvesting honey for the sake of the bees. Many blame viruses, mites, bacteria and beetles for the decline of the bees, but these are only symptoms of what ails them. Exploitative and mechanistic bee keeping methods could be the real culprits. What if the bee’s very […]
A large, healthy blueberry plant produces thousands of flower buds every year. With up to 16 individual flowers developing from each bud and every flower a potential berry, pollination needs in blueberries are great. In order to set fruit, pollen that is produced by the flower’s anthers must reach the stigma so it can fertilize […]
Carefully crafted by young worker bees into six-sided honeycomb cells, beeswax provides tiny storage units for bee larvae, honey and pollen. There are two possible explanations for why honeycomb is composed of hexagons rather than another shape. One is that a hexagonal structure uses the least material to create a lattice of cells. Another is that […]
From time to time, beekeepers will need to replace old queens or provide a queen to a hive that has, for one reason or another, lost their queen. One method of making new queens is by the Doolittle Method (named for G.M. Doolittle). This is done by grafting the appropriate aged larvae into homemade wax cups. This […]
There are many varieties of honey available, but sometimes you might not be exactly sure why certain types are more popular than others. At Winter Park Honey, our Tupelo honey is one of our most popular varieties available, but what makes it a favorite?
Jean, the beekeeper, with a swarm This month and for the next few, Amaral will be visiting Winter Park Honey from Haiti. We are helping him learn to be the best beekeeper and take those skill back to Haiti. There has been progress made in that country since the earthquake of 2010, but there is still much […]
This is an image of a honeybee walking on a frame on female drone brood. Just above her leg, there is a varoa mite. This mite is causing a lot of trouble for honeybees. They are responsible for infecting bees with numerous viruses. How to eliminate the varoa mite from beehives is the main topic […]