Bad Beekeeping Blog

Too Hot for Bees? Arizona Heat, Drought, and Rescuing Bees

Posted on August 14, 2026 by Ron Miksha

How hot is too hot for a honey bee?

That question doesn’t mean much sitting here in Calgary on a mild (20°C) summer day. It becomes important to my niece, keeping bees in southern Arizona where the thermometer was pushing 108°F.

I talked to my niece, beekeeper, teacher and frequent podcast guest, Monica King. She lives southwest of Tucson, where summer beekeeping operates… a little differently than it does in Canada.

For example.

Monica says her bees start working before sunrise. She goes outside around five in the morning and finds bees collecting water and visiting flowering mesquite. I had always associated honey-bee navigation with sunlight and polarization. The bees apparently hadn’t read the same books I had.

Water, for bees in Arizona, becomes more than something nice to have.

Monica described providing water directly inside weaker colonies with frame feeders when heat and low humidity make normal water gathering difficult. She also uses screened openings higher in the hive to improve airflow without simply opening the colony to robbing. Robbing screens, reflective hive surfaces, white boxes and empty rims above the inner cover all become part of managing heat.

After a disappointing spring, rain had finally arrived. Mesquite was blooming, asters were appearing, and Monica’s colonies were beginning to expand and store fresh nectar. For her, however, honey isn’t the main crop. She produces nucs for southern Arizona hobby beekeepers. With good monsoon rains, even a colony started in late summer may have time to build up for winter and get an early start the following spring.

Controlling heat and stress in hot hives:
Rotating ventilation discs
Lid offsets
Screened bottom boards
Empty rims above
White or light hive colours
Himalayan salt from spray cans
Apiary equalization
Robbing screens
Frame feeders filled with water

Monica and I also discussed dealing with bees in neighbouring swimming pools. She had a few tricks for those times when bees ignore the water you’ve set out for them and instead head down the street. That includes an algae killer I had never heard of before. Apparently, you can use it around the pool early in the morning to discourage water-collecting honey bees. That, and hosing the hives to give them water may distract them.

And, later in the podcast, we reached Africanized bees. I don’t think a “Beekeeping in Arizona” podcast would be complete without a mention of ~~Killer Bees~~ AHB.

Monica works around them routinely. Some colonies serve as vigorous donor colonies supplying brood and resources, while the nucs she sells to beginning beekeepers receive European-stock queens. She also does bee removals, always at night when temperatures are lower, bees won’t attack bystanders, and the bees are home.

That led us into a recent Arizona headline about a man reportedly attacked by “100,000 killer bees.” We were skeptical of the number, although certainly not of how frightening the experience must have been for the guy handling the weed whacker. From there, our discussion wandered into sensational bee reporting, Africanized-bee history, feral colonies, native bees and the question of whether honey bees and native pollinators must always be portrayed as enemies against each other.

Monica thinks natives and imports can get along. She teaches native-bee material as well as honey-bee management, and our conversation eventually settled on habitat. More flowers, greater plant diversity and fewer harmful chemical exposures can benefit many kinds of bees.

We even found time for Bayer/Monsanto, genetically modified corn, and a highly secured research greenhouse. A lab where they check your shoes when you leave.

So, yes, our conversation wandered.

But that’s the point when anyone makes the mistake of talking to me.

If you’d like to know more about this, and Arizona beekeeping, my About Bees, Culture, and Curiosity podcast goes into illuminating detail, so I invite you to listen and enjoy. The ideas expressed here on this blog and on the podcast are subject to refinement with my exposure to new facts.

I hope you enjoy this blog and the podcast episode! The podcast is available everywhere you get your podcasts (Spotify, Apple, Podbean, Deezer, Dasher, Donner, Prancer) . . . and online at this link:
About Bees, Culture & Curiosity

Posted in Climate, Culture, or lack thereof, Ecology, Native Bees, Podcasts, Save the Bees, Science, Stings, Strange, Odd Stuff | Tagged About Bees podcast, Africanized honey bees, Arizona, beekeeping, bees, desert beekeeping, hive ventilation, Monica King, Native Bees, Ron Miksha | Leave a comment

Where Have All the Bugs Gone?

Posted on August 6, 2026 by Ron Miksha

This is what a healthy windshield should look like.
Are those days gone forever?

A few weeks ago, I drove from Calgary to Banff and back again. It was a beautiful summer day. The mountains were spectacular, the wildflowers were in bloom, and the bumble bees were busy. When I returned home, however, something seemed strangely absent.

My windshield. No, I hadn’t lost my windshield.

What was missing was the bug juice that usually covers my windshield after a 250-km round trip.

Years ago, a trip like that almost guaranteed a stop at the gas station to scrape away hundreds of dead insects. This time I counted only three. I could have named them if I wanted to. In fact, I have more kids than I had dead bugs.

Why were there almost no splats? I was driving fast enough, 130 kph there and back. Was it better aerodynamics? Had my modern vehicle become more insect-friendly? No, I’ve been driving a Honda Odyssey for 25 years now. Were there genuinely fewer insects in the air? An insect apocalypse?

Scientists refer to something called the windshield phenomenon. While windshields themselves aren’t scientific instruments, they have prompted researchers to investigate whether flying insects are becoming less abundant. They are up here, around Calgary. I’m not the only one to notice this. Here’s a news story you might appreciate. It’s from five days ago.

The evidence is compelling.

One of the most influential studies was carried out by the Entomological Society of Krefeld in Germany. For nearly three decades, volunteers collected insects in standardized Malaise traps located within protected nature reserves. When the insects were weighed, researchers discovered that flying insect biomass had declined by more than 75 percent.

**Malaise trap, in use in Germany. From the study cited above.**

The result – a 75% decrease in insect biomass over the 27-year study – sparked worldwide discussion.

Some researchers questioned whether weather could explain much of the apparent decline. Others reanalyzed the data. The result – bugs are seriously disappearing – remain.

Still others have been conducting something like a windshield test, but it’s rigorous, repeatable, and it’s generating a huge data set. This is the Bugs Matter project in England, which reports a 60% drop in insect bodies sticking to license plates on the front of cars.

There is also a very recent (June 2026) paper from Switzerland showing a drop in insect populations over a 90-year period.

The debate continues, but remarkably, the discussion today is no longer whether insect populations are changing. Instead, scientists are asking how rapidly those numbers are falling and what is driving those changes.

The causes are complex. And overlapping.

Habitat loss, agricultural intensification, pesticide use, climate change, light pollution, and landscape simplification all appear to play a role. Different insect groups respond differently. Honey bees, managed by beekeepers, are not disappearing globally, while many native bees, butterflies, moths, and beetles continue to struggle.

The good news is that insects can recover when habitat improves.

Native prairie restoration, wetland rehabilitation, wildflower plantings, and thoughtful land management have already demonstrated encouraging results in some regions.

If this subject interests you, I have an entire podcast episode about dead bees on windshields and no dead bugs on windshields. And I try to answer the Insect Apocalypse question on that podcast.

If you’d like to know more about this, and the disappearing bugs, my About Bees, Culture, and Curiosity podcast goes into illuminating detail, so I invite you to listen and enjoy. The ideas expressed here on this blog and on the podcast are subject to refinement with my exposure to new facts.

Posted in Culture, or lack thereof, Ecology, Native Bees, Podcasts, Science, Strange, Odd Stuff | Tagged About Bees podcast, Banff National Park, bees, biodiversity, bugs matter, insect apocalypse, insect decline, Native Bees, pollinators, Ron Miksha, windshield phenomenon | Leave a comment

What happens to beekeepers if Alberta leaves Canada?

Posted on July 24, 2026 by Ron Miksha

Alberta has a separatist movement with a minority (20%?) of people out here thinking Alberta should become an independent country, then join the USA. I talked about this in detail on my latest podcast (which also includes a recap about my backyard Calgary bees and some bee news stories).

Please listen to this podcast episode, my 99th published so far, for a bit more of the story. But, meanwhile, here are some of the key points that I cover.

What beekeepers could expect if Alberta became the 51st state.

1. Alberta’s bee border would effectively disappear
Canada’s restrictions on importing packages of honey bees from the United States have probably slowed the introduction of pests, diseases, and undesirable genetics into Alberta. If Alberta became a U.S. state, those barriers would likely disappear, bringing cheaper replacement bees but some biological risks.

2. Migratory beekeeping would transform Alberta’s bee industry
Alberta beekeepers could become part of the vast American migratory pollination circuit, wintering colonies in southern states before returning for the canola honey flow. While this would create new business opportunities, it would also increase competition from very large commercial operators and place additional pressure on forage and bee-yard locations.

3. Alberta could lose protection against excessive colony density
An influx of tens of thousands of migratory colonies could dramatically increase the number of hives competing for Alberta’s nectar sources during the summer. Higher colony densities often lead to reduced honey yields, increased drifting and robbing, and faster spread of pests and diseases.

4. Cheap replacement bees could weaken local bee breeding
Easy access to inexpensive package bees might reduce the incentive to overwinter colonies and raise queens adapted to Alberta’s harsh climate. Over time, this could erode locally selected genetics that have proven their value under northern conditions.

5. Canadian honey standards would be replaced
Canadian honey is produced under CFIA regulations, while American honey falls under a different regulatory framework administered primarily by the FDA. Alberta honey would also enter a much larger market where imported honey plays a far greater role than it does in Canada today. 80% of honey eaten in the USA is imported. That’s only 15% in Canada.

6. Varroa treatment options would change
Beekeepers would transition from Canadian pesticide registrations to the American regulatory system, where approved treatments and product labels differ. Increased movement of colonies could also speed the spread of treatment-resistant Varroa mites across the province.

7. Pesticide policy could become less predictable
Responsibility for pesticide regulation would shift from Canada’s national system to a combination of federal EPA oversight and individual state rules. Policies change when politics changes, creating uncertainty for farmers and beekeepers.

8. Commercial beekeepers could face much higher health insurance costs
Beekeeping is physically demanding and dangerous work. Injuries are a reality. A move to the American health-care system could substantially increase insurance costs for self-employed beekeepers and family-run operations.

9. Seasonal labour would become more complicated
Alberta’s commercial beekeeping industry depends heavily on seasonal workers. Many arrive under Canadian immigration programs. Transitioning to U.S. visa and labour rules would create additional paperwork, uncertainty, and higher operating costs during the changeover.

10. Canadian research and support networks might be lost
Alberta currently benefits from world-class Canadian bee research, diagnostics, and national biosecurity programs developed specifically for Canadian conditions. Although American institutions could provide some replacement services, Alberta would become only one of many bee-producing states competing for federal attention and research funding.

Also, I have to mention the latest US tariff threats. If they go into effect on August 19, 2026, a 50% duty will be applied to Canadian honey. American packers, who would have to pay the duty, won’t be able to buy honey from Canada. If Alberta were an American state, that duty would not apply.

Winners and Losers

Alberta’s beekeepers might get access to almond pollination, southern wintering, less expensive packages, a big domestic honey market, and American equipment suppliers. But Alberta could lose its geographic and regulatory separation from the flow of millions of migratory colonies.

The likely winners would be large, mobile, well-capitalized operations able to participate in American pollination circuits.

The likely losers would include smaller honey-focused commercial beekeepers, Alberta queen breeders, operators used to uncrowded canola locations, family businesses facing private health-insurance costs.

Beekeeper leaving Canada?

If you’d like to know more about this, and catch a bit about summertime beekeeping in Alberta, my About Bees, Culture, and Curiosity podcast goes into illuminating detail, so I invite you to listen and enjoy. The ideas expressed here on this blog and on the podcast are subject to refinement with my exposure to new facts.

I hope you enjoy this blog and the podcast episode! The podcast is available everywhere you get your podcasts (Spotify, Apple, Podbean, Deezer, Dasher) . . . and online at this link.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/about-bees-culture-curiosity/id1760959092

Posted in Beekeeping, Commercial Beekeeping, Culture, or lack thereof, Honey, Podcasts, Strange, Odd Stuff | Tagged Alberta, Alberta joining USA, Alberta referendum, beekeeping, beekeeping economics, bees, Canola honey, CFIA, Commercial Beekeeping, honey bees, Honey production, package bees, USDA | 4 Comments

The 3-in-1 Bee Tree: Linden, Lime, and Basswood

Posted on July 9, 2026 by Ron Miksha

**Ivan Mikša in 1975 with his 1945 Pennsylvania basswood in bloom**

Basswood is nice, if you don’t mind hanging around with a tree accused of murdering millions of bees. Falsely accused. For over a hundred years, people have found dead bumble bees under basswood trees. Starved? Poisoned? Do you remember the Great Bee Poisoning of 2013, over in Oregon? Over 50,000 dead bumble bees were found under basswood trees in a Target store parking lot. You might want to blame the tree’s poisonous nectar, but should you? Maybe the deaths are the result of the world-wide neonicotinoid conspiracy to end life on Earth. My own thoughts are leaning that way.

I have just released a timely podcast episode about basswood, which is either blooming or just finishing its blossoms today across most of the northern hemisphere. I hope you can listen, maybe on your way to work, to the bee yard, while washing your hair, or driving over to Papa John’s for pizza.

Here’s a link to the podcast.

Basswood, also known as linden or lime, is so special that it needs at least three names. Actually five names, if we include the scientific Tilia and the colloquial Bee Tree.

During ideal weather, big beautiful bountiful basswood blossoms pump out astonishing amounts of nectar, yielding one of the world’s finest white honeys. Early beekeepers told stories of colonies gaining more than 600 pounds per colony in a single season during exceptional basswood flows.

Yet the tree gives more than honey. Across Europe, families have long gathered its blossoms to make sleepy-time linden-flower tea. Woodcarvers like its soft, workable wood, while Indigenous peoples used its strong inner bark (called bast) to make ropes, baskets, and shoe laces for the snowshoes they invented.

I won’t detail everything there is to know about basswood on this blog, but my About Bees, Culture, and Curiosity podcast goes into insufferable fatiguing detail, so I invite you to listen and enjoy. I researched botany, history, beekeeping, and beekeepers and I revived memories from Scotland, Germany, Pennsylvania, Florida, and Alberta to tell the story of basswood.

Perhaps, after listening, you’ll plant one of these trees yourself.

I hope you enjoy this blog and the podcast episode – available everywhere you get your podcasts, and at this link.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/about-bees-culture-curiosity/id1760959092

Posted in Beekeeping, Books, Comb Honey, Ecology, Honey, Honey Plants, Native Bees, Save the Bees | Tagged basswood tree, bee trees, beekeeping, bumble bees, Comb Honey, honey, honey bees, Honey Plants, lime tree, linden blossom tea, linden tree, pollinators, Tilia | Leave a comment

Bees on the Rocks

Posted on June 13, 2026 by Ron Miksha

Combs clinging to rock ledges and human foragers climbing to harvest part of the sticky sweet honey gathered by wild bees on the edge of the Himalayas conjures up images of a way of life few of us will ever witness.
However, a couple of weeks ago, I had a note from someone who rekindled my envy.

The note was from Deepa Pudasaini, who works for a community-run honey company, Himalayan Cliff Honey, in Nepal. They have been working with the indigenous people of the Himalayas who harvest a sustainable amount of wild cliff honey produced by the giant bees in Nepal. We are also directly working with the local beekeepers of the Himalayan region helping them market their honey and other bee products. Deepa’s role is editor and contributor for Himalayan Cliff Honey and you can read more about her at https://deepapudasaini.com.np/

Here is Deepa Pudasaini‘s story of the cliff bees…

Wild Bees of the Himalayas

In the high altitude of the Himalaya Kush Region- mountain range in Asia, there lives a giant bee species. The world knows it by the name of the Himalayan giant honey bee and the scientific community recognizes it under the name Apis laboriosa.

As a bee behavior common in any honey bee species, it makes honey recognized by the world as “mad honey”. But before the immense popularity prevailed, natives in Nepal were already using it- for centuries with the name cliff honey (“Bhir maha” in Nepali).

This blog covers every aspect of these Himalayan pollinators, from this bee’s detailed description, its popular honey to how only natives of the mountain villages in Nepal harvest it.

Double The Size of Regular Bees

Beginning with how the bee appears to be, it’s almost double the size of the regular honey bee species. For your best imagination, you can compare its body size with that of a hornet.

The bulky body mass is of benefit to them. At least when they have to sit intact in their nests amidst the turbulent mountain breezes and also when they need muscle power to generate enough energy for long-term flights while foraging in the huge mountain forests.

The structural difference can be observed as nature’s way to help them function optimally in the harsh living conditions of the higher altitudes.

Pollinators of The Himalayas

The Himalayas have one of the most extreme environments on Earth. The colder climate and windier environment are the main hurdles to the existence of any pollinators. The air at high altitudes above a certain level has a sparse oxygen level where normal bee species can not survive.

Among the limited population of unique pollinators seen in the region, Apis laborisa has been reported to survive beyond 4,000 metres. This species has played the role of key pollinator and spends its life helping alpine and subalpine plants thrive. The local crops in the Himalayas are also a gift of these honey bees.

They are the best fits as the main pollinators of the mountain ecosystem. And for this they went through major adaptations over time. Some of the surprising features we hardly get to see in regular bee species include:

Apis laboriosa has huge hives that can accommodate more than 100,000 bees. This huge population forms a tight cluster year-round and the warmth thus created is what sustains them throughout the year in extreme conditions.

The hives are built facing south-east directions with the motive to get warmth from the sun throughout the day (amazing how nature has shaped these bees!).

Worker bees make a huge proportion of the colony. This allows for the storage of a huge amount of food. So there will be less chance of scarcity.

The colony’s defensive behavior is too aggressive especially to protect the hive from the birds and other predators.

The migratory behavior is also sophisticated. Once the cold hits the mountains and the temperature starts to become intolerable, the colonies move down the cliffs to overwinter.

Limited Honey Batches

Unlike commercial honey production, these wild bees have their own cycle of nectar deposition and use. Spring and autumn are two different seasons when flowers bloom in the mountain regions where they inhabit. These are the only times when they can collect enough nectar to survive for the rest of the year.

One single honey hive has 90 to 100kgs of mad honey in it and the excess was consumed only by natives residing on the foothills of the Himalayas for centuries. But now, the scenario is different. The “cliff honey” once limited to the mountain villages is now established as an exotic honey in the international market as “mad honey”.

There is an interesting turn to how cliff honey got the name “mad honey”. Rhododendron flowers, the main alpine floral nectar source for these bees have a psychedelic compound known as “grayanotoxin”. This compound is deposited in the produced honey and once it gets metabolized in our body, we feel mild euphoria, and what we experience is dose-dependent. When compared, the spring batch is more potent than the autumn ones as it is mainly made of rhododendron nectar.

Centuries-old Honey Hunting Tradition

It can be quite unnatural if you think wild honey can be harvested like regular honey, especially when it comes to cliff honey. The bees’ hives are hundreds of meters above the ground and reaching them is already a challenging task.

The Himalayan natives recognised cliff honey as a potential food source and deliberately developed ways to reach the honey hives that seemed too far away, Over time, an established cliff-hanging technique was developed that’s still in use. Every step was continuously refined considering safety, convenience to climb the steep cliffs and no harm to the bees.

Today, the community comes together for the preparation. They make their own climbing ropes using bamboo fibers, collecting baskets with bamboo strips and cutting tools from bamboo poles. The hunter climbs the cliff and cuts down mature hives taking hours. For anyone viewing the whole process, every move the main harvester makes is nothing short of a thrilling adventure.

The honey’s use was previously limited to the harvesting communities. They added it to their traditional fermented drink, herbal potions which they used as a remedy for various ailments and stored excess for the rest of the year. Today, they sell it at a price enough to feed the whole community making it an important commodity along with the mad honey expedition attracting tens to hundreds of tourists each year.

Conclusion

Himalayan giant honey bees are survivors of high altitudes. And nature has shaped their behavior perfectly for sustenance. The alpine and subalpine floras limited in the mountains are thriving because of the existence of a few pollinators including this bee species.

Although this significant pollinator has a huge role in the world ecosystem balance, they are more known for its “mad honey”. The Himalayan residents are the original harvesters of mad honey which later became an important source of economic support and food security. In return, they have contributed to maintaining the sustainability of the bees by carefully avoiding any actions that could damage cliffs or hives. In conclusion, they share a long-standing relationship of coexistence.

For more photos and details about the giant cliff bees, be sure to visit the Cliff Honey website!

I hope you enjoyed this blog. Remember that I have a podcast, About Bees, Culture, and Curiosity. It’s available everywhere you get your podcasts, and at this link.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/about-bees-culture-curiosity/id1760959092

Posted in Beekeeping, Ecology, Honey, Honey Plants, Native Bees, Save the Bees, Travels | Tagged beekeeping, Himalayas, honey bees, mad honey, Nepal | Leave a comment

Dandelion: The Bee Plant That Doesn’t Need Bees

Posted on April 18, 2026 by Ron Miksha

Some things I didn’t know about dandelions until today: Dandelions don’t need bees. Or any other pollinators – not even wind or gravity to move their pollen. Each dandelion flower is made up of a hundred florets, each an individual mini-flower that gives up the plant’s own tissue to create a seed. Each seed is unpollinated, a clone, identical in genetics to the original dandelion that arrived in North America centuries ago. Looking at a field of dandelions is the same as looking at a field of clones and it’s the same as looking at the same flower that our ancestors saw.

Dandelions don’t need bees at all. Most common dandelions reproduce through apomixis. They produce seeds without pollination. No pollen transfer. No fertilization. Each plant creates clones of itself. So while bees visit dandelions for nectar and pollen, they aren’t helping the plant reproduce.

That runs against the usual story we tell about flowers and pollinators. In this case, the relationship is one-sided. The bees take what they need, and the plant carries on without them.

Dandelions show up early. In many places, they’re the first thing people notice in spring. Bright yellow, everywhere at once, and full of bees. It’s easy to assume they are the first and best food source for honey bees. They aren’t.

Before dandelions bloom, bees are already working. Alders, maples, willows, elms, and even skunk cabbage come first. These plants provide much of the early pollen that gets colonies moving again after winter. Dandelions arrive a bit later, and by then, the colony is already expanding.

Even then, dandelion pollen is not ideal food. It is abundant and easy for bees to collect, but it lacks a complete balance of essential amino acids. Bees can use it, but they do better when it’s mixed with pollen from other plants.

As a honey plant, dandelion is inconsistent. In some years and places, bees may store a modest surplus. The honey is strong, deep yellow, and granulates quickly. Most of the time, it’s not worth extracting.

But dandelion arrives at the right time. It provides nectar and pollen when colonies are building. It helps bridge the gap between early trees and later flows.

Dandelions are not invasive in the ecological sense. They are naturalized. They prefer disturbed ground like lawns, roadsides, compacted soils. They follow human activity rather than reshape ecosystems. You don’t see them taking over intact prairies or forests. You see them where people have already changed the land. That’s a twist, isn’t it? Dandelion is a species that does better because of people, not worse.

Dandelions are also useful to people. The leaves can be eaten, especially when young. The flowers can be made into wine or syrup, or sewn together to make temporary sweaters. The roots can be roasted and brewed as fake coffee. For centuries, they were carried around the world as a medicinal plant, which explains how they spread so widely.

If you’d like to hear more about this amazing yellow and green weed, listen to this episode of the About Bees, Culture, and Curiosity podcast.

I hope you enjoy this blog and the podcast episode – available everywhere you get your podcasts, and at this link.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/dandelion-the-bee-plant-that-doesnt-need-bees/id1760959092?i=1000762147786

Posted in Beekeeping, Ecology, Honey, Honey Plants, Native Bees, Save the Bees | Tagged beekeeping, dandelions, honey bees | Leave a comment

March is Orange Blossom Month

Posted on March 24, 2026 by Ron Miksha

I just released a podcast episode about citrus trees. I’ve been trying to find honey plants in bloom during each month. I’ve been surprisingly consistent since I started this series in July with sweet clover. This is March, there is usually an orange tree or two blooming somewhere in Florida, Texas, Arizona, or California this month, so I created an episode about orange trees.

I’ll start with something that sounds trivial but isn’t. Oranges don’t grow in orchards. They grow in groves. It’s a small linguistic difference, but indicates history, geography, and culture all tangled together.

Say “orchard” in central Florida and you’ll immediately identify yourself as someone who has never driven down a sandy trail between rows of citrus trees with sticky side mirrors and bees bouncing off your windshield.

I know a bit about Florida citrus because I kept bees in the groves there for about 10 years back in the ‘70s and ‘80s. Back then, there were nearly a million acres of citrus.

You could pull off the road almost anywhere and grab an illegal orange or grapefruit for a quick snack. Try that today and you’ll likely be standing in someone’s driveway. The groves are disappearing.

At its peak, Florida produced about 12 million pounds of orange blossom honey each year. Today it’s down to a quarter of that. The acreage has collapsed. Disease, development, and changing economics have taken their toll.

In this episode of the About Bees, Culture, and Curiosity podcast, I look at the death of Florida’s citrus groves. Along the way, we visit the trees, their flowers, orange blossom honey, and beekeeping in the Sunshine State.

This was skinny me, at the edge of a grove, shaking fresh orange nectar from a frame.

I hope you enjoy this blog and the podcast episode – available everywhere you get your podcasts, and at this link.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/march-is-orange-blossom-month/id1760959092?i=1000756871427

Posted in Honey Plants, Beekeeping, Bee Yards, Culture, or lack thereof, Commercial Beekeeping, Podcasts | Tagged beekeeping, Florida, honey bees, orange blossom | 3 Comments

Serving the Perfect Cup of Tea

Posted on March 16, 2026 by Ron Miksha

The perfect cup of tea starts with honey. At least, that’s how the royals do it. It’s hard to argue that anyone else would know better. They’ve got history, experience, connections and money. And tea is important in their part of the stratosphere. So how do you do tea, if you want to do it royally?

Begin by putting honey in the cup. Not sugar. Brew the tea – 100C for English breakfast tea, or 70C for green tea, measured with a thermometer. (Butler style, I dunk in a clean finger – you get to know the temperature with experience.) Black tea should be brewed for five minutes, and not consumed at all, while green tea should only get three minutes, then enjoyed vigorously.

If you must use milk, as the Queen herself did, it goes in last. Now, you might sit back and watch the clouds in your tea, but proper etiquette demands that you stir the concoction – never in circles! – but slowly back and forth, like the paddle of a canoe that will never cross a lake. Oh, and never let the spoon clang against the side of the bone china while paddling or you’ll be having tea with the servants before you know what’s happened. (If they let you join them.)

Remember, the honey goes into the cup before the tea. That’s easy to remember – add the best first. What sort of honey should you use? The mildest you can find. It should be white, never amber, and very neutral in flavour. Buckwheat or manuka will turn your tea into medicine. I know. I have been eating a spoonful of manuka every day and I tried some in today’s green tea. I won’t make that mistake again.

How much should you use? Well, that depends on the type of honey. If you use a high fructose honey, such as tupelo, one or two small drops is probably plenty. On the other hand, honey that’s high in glucose (such as canola), is not as sweet and may take a spoonful. You really should work this out for yourself – I don’t know how well your taste buds control your life. What I do know, however, is that a good cup of green tea with honey in mid-winter will make life worth living.

To really enjoy that tea, you need to consider the cup, too. We are excited about the Umi Tea Set, which we discovered a couple of weeks ago. It is double-walled glass, which gets rid of the cup handle, so it becomes simple and clean – without burning your hand when you hold it.

Our set came with an acacia serving tray and hand-blown cups and kettle. The double-layered insulated cups are especially nice because we can watch the honey dissolve in the cup. It’s a winner, a keeper, and about $100 US – here’s a link. It arrived safe and very durably wrapped, direct from the tea set factory. Go get it and enjoy!

Posted in Culture, or lack thereof, Honey | Tagged English royalty, food, honey, tea, Umi | Leave a comment

When Bees Finally Get a Bathroom Break

Posted on March 8, 2026 by Ron Miksha

March is a confusing month here in Calgary. Three weeks of it belongs to winter. Snow sits around in gray crusty patches that melt, refreeze, and melt again. Nights are cold enough to freeze the ground solid.

But when I stand beside a beehive at noon, you can feel that the sun is stronger. That tiny bit of warmth is enough to trigger one of the most important events in the honey bee calendar.

The bathroom break.

Honey bees spend the winter clustered inside their hive, eating honey and keeping the colony warm. But unlike humans, cattle, dogs, or politicians, they absolutely refuse to relieve themselves in their own home.

Bees treat the inside of their hive like a sterile nursery. It contains brood, honey, pollen, and the queen. Defecating inside would invite mold, disease and parasites into the colony.

**These streaks are from the bees defecating. It’s not a good sign – they should have been strong enough to fly far away from the hive.**

So they hold it.

For weeks. Sometimes months.

A winter bee can store waste in her hindgut until it reaches nearly a third of her body weight. Imagine carrying around a heavy backpack full of all of the winter’s lunches.

Eventually, the colony waits for a suitable day: sunshine, calm winds, and temperatures warm enough for flight muscles to operate.

The sky fills with bees. And then—well—relief happens. Tiny yellow, brown, and black droplets scatter across the snow.

To a beekeeper, those dots can be comforting. They mean the colony survived winter. Of course, bee droppings occasionally become someone else’s problem.

Years ago, I kept a bee yard behind a very expensive house in Florida. One day the neighbor, a lawyer, stopped me and asked if I knew where I could buy a million tiny diapers.
He pointed at his car.
Yellow spots everywhere. I moved the bees that night.

But stories about bee droppings gets even stranger.

During the Cold War, mysterious yellow droplets reportedly fell from the sky in Southeast Asia. People believed aircraft were spraying chemical weapons. The phenomenon became known as “Yellow Rain.”

Analysis of the samples revealed something strange. Partially digested pollen grains. Scientists eventually concluded the “rain” may have come from mass defecation flights of giant Asian honey bees. When thousands of bees take flight and lighten their digestive load at the same time, the results can look surprisingly like a yellow shower. Sounds weird that they would mimic a traditional Roman public bath, but you can never tell about bees.

If you are curious about this complete story, and the bees’ digestion system, and how bees can fly on cool winter days, jump over to my podcast for the rest of the story.

You can enjoy this podcast episode wherever you listen to podcasts.

Check out the About Bees, Culture, and Curiosity podcast.

Posted in Beekeeping, Podcasts, Tools and Gadgets | Tagged Alberta, beekeeping, wintering | 1 Comment

An Apiary in a Box

Posted on February 25, 2026 by Ron Miksha

The image above is from the BeeCube website. Inside that box is an entire apiary. It can be loaded on the back of a truck and hauled off to a new location – wintering spot, spring build-up, pollination, summer honey production. Open the door, and you are immersed in the bees’ world. The colonies each have a separate exit to the flowers beyond their hives, which are clustered inside. The beekeeper enters the BeeCube to do inspections, super the colonies, feed or simply encourage them. Colonies are fully accessible inside, fully free to fly outside. This is a new innovation here in Calgary. I have never seen anything quite like it here.

This photo, taken in northern Croatia by my family in 1983 shows the same basic principles of the BeeCube – a doorway (behind the wagon), a hallway for the beekeeper to open the backs of hives, bee exits facing out, and a way to move the entire apiary to new pasture.

The BeeCube is much more advanced, with insulation and sensors, but the basic idea has proven itself over generations.

I saw another version of the BeeCube a couple of years ago, in Israel. It’s manufactured by a company called BeeWise. I visited their corporate headquarters where 70 employees worked in the development of an apiary-in-a-box that included cameras, sensors, robotic frame manipulation, and even an extractor inside each unit.

BeeWise development shop at the BeeWise Campus in Israel. Here are three units (out of many) being tested before deployment. Primary clients are in the pollinator business. (photo: Miksha)

I recently chatted with Herman van Reekum, founder and chief innovator of BeeCube in Calgary, Alberta. We talked a bit about the development of the BeeCube as well as other projects he is designing at Beekeeping Innovations. You can enjoy this podcast wherever you listen to podcasts.

We discuss the advantages of the BeeCube and other new developments that Herman creating – a beekeeper’s app (Be the Bee) for recording and analyzing bee colony health and management; and, Global Bee Digest, a Substack newsletter that aggrandizes current news and research in bees and beekeeping. Listen to the podcast to learn the whole story.

Beekeeping Innovations: https://www.beekeepinginnovations.ca/

BeeCube: https://www.beecube.io/

The Global Beekeeping Digest: https://globalmobility.substack.com/