Making Mead (Honey Wine)
The Bee Journal
by
3y ago
If anyone is interested in learning how to make mead (honey wine) here are some resources: What are the Basics? Mead is the oldest alcoholic drink known to man. When honey has water added, or if it hasn’t been fully cured, it will ferment. To make mead you basically add water to honey and yeast. Then you add an airlock, or a balloon, remember MASH when Hawkeye would use a surgeons glove? That prevents air coming into the container. The mead ferments for about a month and then your “rack” which is siphoning it into a clean container. The dross is the yeast or any fruit you may have added f ..read more
Visit website
Fun Fact: Honey Bee Waggle Dances
The Bee Journal
by
3y ago
How bees talk to each other about flowers. Fun Fact: A small percentage of older bees will act as scouts and search for new flowers. When she finds a good source of nectar or pollen she'll return to the hive and inform her hive mates where the source is by doing the Waggle Dance to recruit foragers to go and collect this food. At the hive there will always be a reserve of forager bees that are waiting for this call to duty. Some people have said their bees are lazy because they're sitting around doing nothing but that's not the case. They're waiting for the scouts to come back and dance. For ..read more
Visit website
Fun Fact: Bees Have Pockets
The Bee Journal
by
3y ago
Fun Fact: Bees have pockets. Bees produce beeswax from their own bodies. On the underside of their abdomen are four pairs of wax glands. Under the wax glands are tiny pockets which hold the wax scales as they are being made. When a wax scale is ready for use, the bee takes it out of the pocket by spiking it on the strong hairs of her back legs, and then passes it to the jaws. There it is chewed, and other materials may be mixed with the wax. When it is soft, the worker puts it into place on the comb being built. Source: Life of the Honey-bee - A Ladybird Natural History Book ..read more
Visit website
Fun Fact: How Bees "see" inside the hive
The Bee Journal
by
3y ago
Fun Fact: When building combs in the darkness of the hive bees don't use visual sense. They have cushions of sensory hairs at all their joints which are stimulated by gravity to move like a pendulum or lever relative to one another. This aids the bee to detect the in which direction the force of gravity acts. (taken from Jurgen Tautz book The Buzz about Bees - this book has incredible macro photography of the bees ..read more
Visit website
Fun Fact: Do you know about Filling Stations?
The Bee Journal
by
3y ago
We looked at two types of chores bees do to heat up the wax and assist with keeping the brood temperature consistent. When a bee dunks into a cell to warm up the adjacent cells, she burns off a tremendous amount of energy. We look at how the bees will deliberately leave cells without brood in them and that these cells are used by heater bees. The cells are also used as Filling Stations.  They're filled with nectar so that the heater bee, after exhausting all her resources to heat up the wax, can refuel herself. See photo with the shine of nectar in the empty cells. Next time you're ..read more
Visit website
Fun Fact: More about Heater Bees
The Bee Journal
by
3y ago
Fun Fact: Bees will leave about 10 to 15% of brood comb with no eggs. This is deliberate. Heater bees who are hot from warming up will dunk their bodies into these empty cells and rapidly telescope their bodies for a period of time and then rest. The pumping bee is heating up the wax and adjacent cells. Previously it was thought these empty cells were missed by the queen ..read more
Visit website
Fun Fact: Did you know about Heater Bees?
The Bee Journal
by
3y ago
Fun Fact: Do you know what the largest organ in the hive is? It's the beeswax. Recent studies have shown that the bees communicate through the wax by vibrations that they make. Wax also holds the warmth of bees' bodies and acts like an insulator. One chore for workers is to be a heater bee. A bee may look like she's just standing on a capped cell doing nothing but if you looked at it with infrared you'll see she's pressing her thorax to the cell cap and she's contracting her flight muscles to transfer heat to the wax which will warm up the cell. They can stay in this squatted position for a ..read more
Visit website
Did you Know? Quick Facts
The Bee Journal
by
3y ago
Did you know that bees deliberately build their honeycombs with a 15 degree slant? This helps keep the honey from dripping out of the cells. Did you know that when bees fly their bodies create static electricity? This makes it much easier to collect pollen which attaches to their fur when they land on a flower. Did you know that bees have four wings? And that they have tiny teeth on the inner edges of their wings. When they want to fly they attach the zipper-like teeth together so that they have two large wings for flying ..read more
Visit website
Blue Halo on non blue flowers attracts bees
The Bee Journal
by
3y ago
A really good article on a new discovery about how flowers attract bees.  I've pasted it below and the link to the story is at Discovery of blue halo on flowers A “bat signal” for bees? Scientists have discovered that common garden flowers have an “invisible blue halo” for attracting bees    Monday, November 13, 2017 by: Janine Acero (((Natural News) What was thought to be a disorder in petal surfaces of certain flowers turned out to be an ingenious adaptation to attract bumblebees which are usually found hanging around flowers with more blue and ..read more
Visit website
Beekeeper's Best Friend - A Tool Belt
The Bee Journal
by
3y ago
I love this handmade leather tool belt. It's made specifically for beekeepers and they are sold by a friend of mine who has been keeping bees for close to 30 years and also teaches beekeeping. How many times have you had your hands full of bees and needed your hive tool and couldn't find it? This belt eliminates losing the hive tool and keeps it close at hand. What is on the belt?  There is a magnetized clip that you slap you hive tool onto. The best part is you'll always know where the tool is and won't have to go looking for it. I had my belt customized after a few years to have ..read more
Visit website

Follow The Bee Journal on FeedSpot

Continue with Google
Continue with Apple
OR