Category Archives: Science
Bees in Space
Fifty years ago, I was a kid, glued to the TV, fascinated by man’s first frolic on the moon. Grainy black and white images from the moon filled our grainy black and white television. It was a signal from the … Continue reading
Bees learn to drive tiny cars
I wouldn’t believe this if I had seen it with my own eyes! Sam Droege, bee scientist extraordinaire, has a USGS Flickr website populated with great bee photographs. Last week, somewhere around April first, Sam posted the results of some … Continue reading
Turner’s (belated) Birthday
I can’t believe that I missed reminding you yesterday that it was Charles Turner’s birthday. Here’s the story of the man who figured out that honey bees can think. 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝 You probably know that Karl von Frisch … Continue reading
Dr Warwick Kerr, the “Man Who Created Killer Bees”, has died
It is with regret that we report that the humanitarian, geneticist, and scientist, Professor Warwick Kerr, passed away this morning, September 15, 2018. He was six days past his 96th birthday. Dr Kerr, a Brazilian bee scientist, had one of … Continue reading
A Bee ID Expert
How well do you know bees? Not just honey bees, but all the other ones – masons, carpenters, diggers, sweat, cutters, bumblers, and the other many thousands of species. If you are like most of us, not so well. There’s … Continue reading
Prolonging the sweet taste
Most nectar-supping insects land on a flower, take a bit of nectar, then fly off. But bees are different. They hang around the flower, sometimes gorging for ten seconds or more, if there’s enough nectar. Why the difference? Scientists think … Continue reading
Package Bee Population
Yesterday, I wrote about bee populations in a hive that starts as a package. The original bees slowly die while the number of new bees, arising from eggs laid by the package’s queen, rapidly increases. In yesterday’s example, the immigrant … Continue reading
Oh dear, a virus ‘jumps’ from plants to bees
The bane of the bee is varroa. We warn new beekeepers that varroa will kill their bees faster than they can say “varroosis“ five times. Varroa kills. Thirty years ago, the mites weren’t as bad as they are now. In … Continue reading
Why your honey gets hard
One thing that puzzles a lot of new (and used) beekeepers is the way that some honey granulates while other honey doesn’t. There are a number of things that affect crystallization rate, including ‘seed’ floating in the honey (dust, previous … Continue reading