Author Archives: Ron Miksha
Should Prince Charles be king? Or should he be a beekeeper?
I am one of the few people I know who has taken a personal public vow of allegiance to the Queen. And all her heirs. I take my duties seriously. It is my job to offer helpful life skills to … Continue reading
Estonian Choco-propolis
Friends bought a chocolate bar for me. Not just any bit of chocolate, of course. They were in eastern Europe and the stuff they found was really interesting. It contained propolis. And tasted like it. Eating chocolate-propolis is not for … Continue reading
Posted in Apitherapy, Culture, or lack thereof, Hive Products
Tagged candy, chocolate, Estonia, patents, propolis
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Knowing what we don’t know
It’s easy to know a lot these days. But being smart is quite another thing. It can’t be bought or taught. Not the way facts are. The internet is the reason knowing things is all rather easy. I research for … Continue reading
The Perfect Honey Jar
Forget Steve Jobs and all that i-stuff. If you want to talk about design that trumps utility, then look at what Tamara Mihajlović and her co-designer Njegos Lakic Tajsic have created. This is magic. A brilliant honey container like none … Continue reading
Posted in Culture, or lack thereof, Honey
Tagged honey containers, marketing honey, Serbia
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Keeping ahead of the sheep
Democracies often work better than dictatorships. Democracy is based on crowd decisions, or, in the trendy new parlance, crowd sourcing. Crowd sourcing really came of age with the internet – put your question, issue, project, or some politician’s dirty laundry … Continue reading
Posted in Culture, or lack thereof, History, Swarms
Tagged crowd sourcing, Henry David Thoreau, Honey Bee Democracy, Tom Seeley
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Talking about bee science
Ted talks and so do bee scientists. Maybe you know Ted. TED, actually with capital letters, stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and the TED Talks are a series of conferences with great (entertaining) speakers. The talks are filmed and then … Continue reading
Invasive bee hives
Dutch bee hives in Manhattan? Of course. Four hundred years and counting. New York was known as New Amsterdam by its first settlers, the Dutch from Holland who arrived on lower Manhattan Island in 1614. That’s even before the Pilgrims … Continue reading
Posted in Bee Biology, Culture, or lack thereof, Ecology, History
Tagged invasive species, Manhattan bees
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The economist’s bees
You can be one of the smartest economists in the world, and still not realize beekeeping is a lousy investment. The celebrated author and public speaker, Gary Shilling, who writes for The New York Times, Forbes, and The Wall Street … Continue reading
Getting away with murder
A bee-kill decision in Florida. According to The Ledger, beekeepers Barry Hart and Randall Foti lost $390,000 worth of bees and honey production when one of Florida’s largest citrus producers sprayed pesticides. (The loss does not seem exaggerated. For example, … Continue reading
Posted in Beekeeping, Culture, or lack thereof, People, Pesticides, Save the Bees
Tagged Ben Hill Griffin, citrus, Florida, Florida's Natural, imidacloprid, insecticide, lawsuits
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China car swarmed
Does this story remind you of Hitchcock’s Birds? According to this Metro news story, a Driver’s Ed instructor and two students were trapped in his car until fire fighters were called to pressure-wash the car. I suppose the bees were … Continue reading
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