Category Archives: Bee Yards
Dead bee, in the middle of the ‘shield…
A few days ago, I had a road trip that took me two hours from my home in Calgary. Flying low at 130 kph, I expected to whack a lot of bees on the forehead of my van, but I … Continue reading
Posted in Bee Yards, Beekeeping, Culture, or lack thereof, Humour, Strange, Odd Stuff
Tagged Alberta, dead bees, dead skunk, windshield bees
2 Comments
Bees Do Do-Do
Diapers for bees? Some folks stopped me when I was leaving an apiary that I once had in a Florida orange grove. They didn’t own the grove, but their house was within fifty yards. They told me that my bees … Continue reading
Posted in Bee Yards, Beekeeping, Commercial Beekeeping, Humour, Strange, Odd Stuff
Tagged bee crap, Massachusetts
15 Comments
Dropping into Sunshine Valley
My hometown – Calgary, Alberta, Canada – is having a much needed wet spell. In fact, there has been some ghastly local flooding which I’ll cover in a future blog. Lucky for me, I am a few hundred kilometres farther … Continue reading
Posted in Bee Yards, Beekeeping, Ecology, Friends, Save the Bees
Tagged Arlo's Honey, British Columbia, Kelowna, marketing honey, Okanagan
5 Comments
Meanwhile in Montréal
Here’s an interesting idea. Beekeepers rent massive numbers of colonies to almond, blueberry, cranberry, durian, eggplant, and so on farmers. Money is the attraction – neither the meager honey crop nor the diseases picked up on most of these pollination … Continue reading
Posted in Bee Yards, Outreach, Save the Bees
Tagged Montreal, Pollination, urban beekeeping
2 Comments
Almonds, Water, and Bees
February is almond pollination month in California. A couple of nights ago, the CBC aired a story about almonds, water, and bees. They try to cover everyone involved – the consumer who loves the heart-friendly food, the almond grower who … Continue reading
Posted in Bee Yards, Beekeeping, Commercial Beekeeping, Ecology, Honey Plants, Pollination
Tagged almond pollination, almonds, California, migratory beekeeping
2 Comments
The Honey Threshers
A century ago, threshing crews worked their away across the American and Canadian prairies, harvesting farmers’ grains. When I was rather young (not quite a century ago) one of my Saskatchewan buddies signed up for a threshing crew job. Maurice … Continue reading
Posted in Bee Yards, Beekeeping, Commercial Beekeeping, Honey, Strange, Odd Stuff
Tagged mobile extracting, pulling honey, robbing bees
9 Comments
Some Mountain Beekeeping
A month ago, friends invited me to see some bees at a ranch up in the foothills of the Canadian Rockies. Beekeeper Stephen, a fellow geophysicist, guided us as we meandered the secondary roads west of Calgary. We gradually gained … Continue reading
Posted in Bee Yards, Beekeeping, Friends
Tagged Alberta, Calgary, foothills beekeeping, package bees
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Airport Honey
Looking for a noisy place to keep some bees? Urban beekeepers struggle to find spots to set landing boards for their hives. Most towns and cities have limits on the number of hives that can be kept in the backyard. … Continue reading
Beehives vs Drunken Elephants
Drunken elephants have been a problem for as long as I can remember. Elephants are known to booze-up, get rowdy, and attack farmers – sometimes even entire villages. A herd of elephants got drunk on rice beer in Assam, India, … Continue reading
Posted in Bee Yards, Ecology, Hives and Combs, Strange, Odd Stuff
Tagged beehive fence, elephants, Lucy King, Save the Elephants
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Bees: Targeted and Poisoned!
Three million bees were apparently poisoned. The RCMP is investigating. A commercial beekeeper with about 1,200 colonies now has fewer than a thousand. The Winnipeg Free Press says that Manitoba beekeeper Jason Loewen suffered a “targeted attack.” Beekeeper Loewen told … Continue reading
Posted in Bee Yards, Beekeeping, Culture, or lack thereof
Tagged bee theft, Manitoba
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Bad Beekeeping Blog 