Are you seeing bees?

Damon wrote:Cool. Brine curing? How does that work?

Here is a link to Larry Hall, one of my Youtube favorites. He calls it lactose fermented, but that is wrong, there is no lactose involved. Lactofermantation is salt and water. The salt inhibits other bacteria and lactobascilus ferments the cukes, basically.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qIwad8Labk&feature=g-all-u



Hooray for the pollinators making cukes for you Rooster!

Just a reminder, this thread is about bees.

Pollinator wrote:

donnainzone10 wrote:This morning, I saw a bee enjoying itself in a newly-opened male zucchini flower adjacent to a female flower!

Typically, I see at least several bees in the yard every day, although when we have a chilly night, they seem to hide in their hive.

Many species of male bees normally sleep in the flowers. If you open closed blossoms late in the day, you'll usually find some male squash bees, if they are around your area. They are slightly smaller than a honey bee.

I think that's what I'm seeing sometimes? The male bees? They are wrapped around the thing in the middle of the flower, just laying there? they are smaller than the "other" bees. thanks for the info!!

Was this already posted: http://pollinator.com/identify/whatsbuzzin.htm ?
Soo comfuzled re what to kill, or avoid, & which Good to keep around. Wanna make sure leaving the POLLINATORS to do their job, along with other Beneficial-buggers. So which few of those should we kill? Would you experts, please say?

LittleGardener wrote:Was this already posted: http://pollinator.com/identify/whatsbuzzin.htm ?
Soo comfuzled re what to kill, or avoid, & which Good to keep around. Wanna make sure leaving the POLLINATORS to do their job, along with other Beneficial-buggers. So which few of those should we kill? Would you experts, please say?

I would say only the ones seriously damaging garden crops. Hand picking is good for larger crawling bugs, insecticidal soap on colonies of aphids works pretty well. The method of attack would be kind if critter specific. If one chooses to spray an insecticide always follow the label instructions and spray at the end of the day when most of the flying pollinating insects are heading home. There will always be causalities other than the ones you are aiming to be rid of. I think the biggest thing is to have the healthiest growing medium and healthiest plants you can.

Who here on the forum keeps honey bees?

camprn wrote:Who here on the forum keeps honey bees?

I am a retired beekeeper, and still keep a few hives. In my beekeeping career, I specialized in crop pollination service along the East Coast, USA. As a retiree, who no longer makes a living from the bees, I now have the luxury of trying to breed a "survivor" bee, rather than treat the bees for the parasites and diseases that have been introduced. I have lost many colonies along the way, but I now have some bees that have survived and thrived for many years without any treatments.

I have also been studying the many other kinds of bees that are pollinators. Many of these are on the decline, mainly from pesticides, though land use changes, and introduced parasites and disease are also factors. I participate in the national bee survey on my travels, as we are trying to document the populations of other bees.

Honey bees are the mainstay of agricultural pollination, but other bees are significant in our food supply, and some could even be cultured for much benefit. Some "ivory tower" folks think that honey bees should all disappear, and that wild bees with then take up the slack with pollination. This is nonsense, of course. The reason honey bee keepers have become [migratory] pollination contractors is that wild bees were declining so badly that pollination was failing.

Contrary to the mythology of the media, honey bees are rebounding and thriving, mainly because they have ever increasing numbers of keepers who watch over them and protect them. Wild bees have no such defendants. But we need both for our food supply.

In all cases, we must learn what we are doing with pesticides, or we are apt to drive some of these valuable pollinators into extinction.

We have had several light freezes here in SC and all I have left is Bell peppers and hot peppers. I've seen small size bumble bees(cannot remember what to call them) and yellow jackets and butterflies going to the blooms on the peppers. I do not live near any lg. farms and have not seen honey bees this yr.
Jo

Of course, every spring, just as my flowers are starting to bloom, the sugarcane farmers start spraying pesticides in the thousand acres of field around me, my neighbor sprays pesticide on his trees, and everyone within a 20 mile radius is getting visited by their friendly exterminator. So, after a month long disappearance, I had visitors today on my cucumbers. It made me as giddy as a chicken in the compost.

BEES!



I love bees! When I was young(er), I kept a few hives in northern WI, and it was pretty rewarding. I definitely started seeing things in a different light, like seasonal cycles, circles of life (I know, trite), and the delicate balance of how things work in nature.

Sorry for the soliloquy! I just love me some bees!

I'll even put up with wasps, because some of them parasitize or otherwise eat bad bugs. I actually enjoy watching them come to drink out of my pool (they land on the surface). Bees are funnier...they land as close as they can to the water's edge, then do a little 180 degree turn to drink from the edge.

Bayou Life, The photos are professional enough for a bee book. Well done.

Yes, bees and yellow jackets. The bees first appeared in early May when my flowering plum trees blossomed. Oops, that's not quite correct; the first ones showed up to savor my hyacinths.

They feast on my dandelions (before I pluck them), and love the abundant clover in my yard.

I have finally seen 3 bees today in my garden. Hopefully when my lavender flowers I'll see some more. Figers crossed

Nope , not in my garden...but I've seen a few of the smaller ones around town. No bumblebees at all, though.

brainchasm wrote:BEES!

This is so great! Hahaha

Here in SW Washington I have seen only a few. Even on the Euphorbia that all other buggies seem to love, I have seen only one or two honey bees. A friend in Portland was also commenting that he hasn't seen many - and the ones he has seen have shown up much later than usual.

I almost set up some mason bee houses last year but never got around to it...I think I'll start on those soon.

Has anyone here had experience with mason bees/building the houses? The houses look super easy to build - I wonder if anyone has noticed an increase in bees after setting up some houses?

I am seeing a lot fewer so far this year, but not much is in blooming yet. We haven't planted many flowers and our neighbors do not have any in yet this year. We have a bee keeper with about 5 hives 1/4 mile down the road and hoping his bees make it my way when everything needs pollinating. We have a lot of commercial farm land around us and am afraid of what all they are spraying and the impact is is having on the bees and environment. We are hoping to actually get some landscaping in next year and do lots of bee-attracting flowers. I'm pretty sure that our dwindling population is another contributing factor to some of my lower garden production. Glad I've learned about hand pollinating for this year.

we have a big pepper tree growing a little ways from our SFG...there are so many bees it's literally humming...kinda freaks me out a bit, but I know they're doing their job. I can barely get enough pollen to "hand pollinate" anything because there are already bees in my flowers! yippee!!

The Honey Bees (with a hive about 25 feet from my garden) don't like the flowers in my garden because I never see them flitting around the flowers. But I do have a large number of bumble bees that are constantly working on the cosmos, borage, and cantelope. Every once in a while they visit my watermellons. Once the summer squash starts producing more flowers, the honey bees will show up. That is the only flower they like in my garden. Weird.

yolos wrote:The Honey Bees (with a hive about 25 feet from my garden) don't like the flowers in my garden because I never see them flitting around the flowers. But I do have a large number of bumble bees that are constantly working on the cosmos, borage, and cantelope. Every once in a while they visit my watermellons. Once the summer squash starts producing more flowers, the honey bees will show up. That is the only flower they like in my garden. Weird.

I agree. they do like the squash! They also seem to really like my sunflowers and cucumbers. Not much else in my garden have flowers, so I guess they do like my garden......haha

Yes, last year I had a lot of sunflowers and they did like those. I have not seen any bees around my cucumbers yet.

We have lots of bees, both native and honey bees
My daughter took this picture last week. She say's they are native Long Horned Bees that sleep in groups on the sunflowers.

Brainchasm, not trite around here!

Lindacol, I did a gasp when I saw those bees! That is so cool!

Here is a picture of a bumble bee by my front porch that I took a few years ago. They have a nest under the front porch, how cool is that! The weeds are partially hiding their entrance.

Lindacol wrote:We have lots of bees, both native and honey bees
My daughter took this picture last week. She say's they are native Long Horned Bees that sleep in groups on the sunflowers.

Hah, is it wrong that as soon as I saw this pic, I was all "D'awww...so cute!"

brainchasm wrote:

Lindacol wrote:We have lots of bees, both native and honey bees
My daughter took this picture last week. She say's they are native Long Horned Bees that sleep in groups on the sunflowers.

Hah, is it wrong that as soon as I saw this pic, I was all "D'awww...so cute!"

No.

So I was out checking on things (I do this a lot...it's my break from anything else), and I noticed a lot of small critters zooming around my melon vines. Finally saw that they are some small kind of bee (definitely not honeybees, and not wasps), they love to go face-first into melon blooms for probably a good 10-15sec at a time, they chase each other, and even wrestle/tussle. I know they're just insects, and that I'm anthropomorphizing, but I swear it looked like they were playing.

Anyway, watching their antics kept me out in the 105+ degree weather for probably a good fifteen minutes, grinning and laughing at them.

It was odd though - they seemed to completely ignore the cucumber blooms right next to the melon plant. I did see one adventurous girl go check out the few pea blossoms I still have, but I don't think she found anything she liked.

And of course, as I turn to leave, a big ol' paper wasp rises out of my basil like a monster, and stares me down with this "Can I help you..." look. I'll put up with them, and I know they're doing good things, but hngh!..don't like wasps so much!