Slide show from Venice

Those new beekeepers in Venice made a slide show of their cut-out adventure with Kirk.


Photos: Augusta Quirk, Sarah Bay Williams, Paul Gachot; Song: "Bees" by Caribou.

Via Hynogogic Zoo.

Kirk makes new beekeepers in Venice

Kirk went to Venice the other day to work his hive cut-out magic, and his clients sent some hot-off-the-presses video of the process. Be aware that there's a bit of very colorful language when an onlooker gets stung on the hand.




Hey, new Venice beekeepers: send us an e-mail (see the sidebar on the right) and let us know how it's going!

A new generation of Urban Beekeepers?

Yesterday I had the privilege of talking about Urban Beekeeping to about 150 12-to-13-year-old students at King Middle School in the Los Feliz/Silver Lake area.

I was invited by the folk at Farm Feliz, who created a beautiful organic vegetable garden & composting facility right in the middle of the campus, which the kids help plant and maintain. Bees seemed a perfect complement for the garden, so the volunteering opportunity presented itself.

The kids were unruly, somewhat defiant and very funny. Some of them had a genuine interest in the topic of bees, how to care for them, pollination, etc, and all of them went crazy about tasting honey in the comb and pollen. The highlight of the day was the demonstration of how to wear the veil and gloves, for which I had a long list of volunteers. We were also able to observe some bees at work on the broccoli in bloom.

As I was leaving one of the girls stopped me and said "Mr. Leonardo, I knew nothing about bees until today."

Earlier I got an e-mail from the science teacher, Miss Ralph: "Thanks so much for yesterday- I've quizzed my students today, and they really learned a lot!"

Mission accomplished.

Viewer mail

A reader writes:

Hi guys -

As backstory, last year I had a homemade top bar hive with some bees that a friend had given me - didn't know anything about their background/heritage, or what size cell they were making.

This year, I'm getting 2 Langstroth hives, and am going to go foundationless as it appears you folks do. My question is: should I find someone who is selling "small cell bees", or can I get bees from any reputable source, and they'll draw out on their own at an appropriate size?

I'm on the East Coast, so it's probably not as easy as asking you where you get yours. But I want to raise these bees naturally like in my top bar hive, but I'm not sure if a regular package of bees will be prepared for it.

Any thoughts?

Thanks,
Matt

Kirk replies:

The Fat Bee Man sells small cell bees. Give him a call.

Don Kuehenmeister
292 Ashley Brook Dr.
Lula GA 30554

(706) 677-3502

kirkobeeo

The ShopVac Bees Clean House

Following up on the Backwards Beekeepers TV episode The ShopVac Bees, Erik of Homegrown Evolution writes:

The bees must have seen the BB video. They got around this morning to getting rid of some of the string. The pollen they are collecting has gone from white to yellow. Spring must be near...

Hope to see you all soon.

Best,
Erik

Next Meeting: February 28

Current and future Backwards Beekeepers -

Please join us at Farmlab downtown at 11am on Sunday, February 28 for our next meeting. We'll post more juicy details about what we'll be talking about as the date nears.

Save the date and bring the kids!

Know your Queen cells

Kirk writes:

I have noticed that new beekeepers have a hard time telling if a Queen cell is a queen cell. Now the books say it looks like a Peanut, and they're right. Here are some queen cells with some peanuts for all the New beekeepers to see. Notice the size—they are long, almost 3/4 of a inch.

kirkobeeo

Freeing The Bees

In the aftermath of the Bee 911 Disaster/Adventure, we had a chainsaw crew come in to remove the enormous Eucalyptus that fell in our yard and overturned our bee hive.


We wanted to put the hive back in its original location once the work was done, so on Kirk's advice I plugged the opening with cheesecloth and set the hive in the shade while the crew cut up and removed the tree.


Here's what it looked like when I let them out.

The Original "Bee Movie"

Backwards Beekeeper Phil sent the link for Bee City, a 1951 educational film that gives a thorough and knowledgeable account of life inside the hive. The photography is impressive for its time—and because it was made before commercial beekeepers started dumping all sorts of noxious chemicals on their bees, it also fits the Backwards Beekeeping philosophy pretty closely, except for its advocacy of queen excluders.

Best of all, though, is the voice-over. Editor and narrator John Kieran sounds like an easily-distracted grandfather after a couple of glasses of wine, regaling the family with stories during a home movie.



Via the essential Internet Archive.

UPDATE: A reader adds:

Love the blog. I have it linked from my own. Good stuff and very entertaining!

I am a second year beekeeper here in North Carolina, and we're on a winter weather watch for 5-8 inches of snow on Friday. I will be so glad when spring arrives. Wish us luck and that the snow goes away faster!

I wanted to send you a link to a theater short made in 1933 called "Her Majesty The Queen Bee". Its an oldie, but goodie...and it was filmed in Cali. Just thought you might want to share it with your readers.

Mark C.
Reidsville, NC

Thanks, Mark!

Viewer mail

A reader from Silver City, New Mexico writes:

I'm a recent subscriber to your blog, after reading about the insane (imo) behavior in the food industry regarding bees.

Great work, first off. Thanks.

I am wondering if you have any insight into setting up hives strictly for a permanent establishment of a hive, with no honey collection, and hopefully little to no maintenance. I'm mostly concerned with the bees being happy and self sustaining. Would there be anything that would be done differently? In nature, I would assume the bees would naturally achieve this balance.

Would love to hear any insight on this topic.

--Ed C.

Kirk replies:

Well, My Philosphy is to do what is best for the bees. For example, there is a Bee Log at Farmlab in downtown Los Angeles, where we have our bee club meetings. Those bees will be in that log for as long as they chose to be; no one will mess with them.

I have Hives I go check maybe three times a year, and sometimes remove no honey. We let all our bees draw their own comb. Backwards Beekeepers are low-impact beekeepers, and let the bees do the Managing.

kirkobeeo