Pollination: it's vital to life on Earth, but largely unseen by the human eye. Filmmaker Louie Schwartzberg shows us the intricate world of pollen and pollinators with gorgeous high-speed images from his film "Wings of Life," inspired by the vanishing of one of nature's primary pollinators, the honeybee. Source: TED talks
Today our wonderful beekeeper, John Duffy, came out to assist Peace Temple Community Garden in expanding our bee hives. I am so grateful for his help, wisdom, and encouragement he's given me in my journey to help save the bees.
Our hives were established Earth Day of this year and in just 3 short months we've now doubled our original hive capacity, huzzah! The honeys are loving the Peace Garden and I am loving every second of this experience. Each hive has a wire Queen excluder so all the boxes above the base will be pure honey, no chance of me endangering brood if I have to pull frames. The right hive has a 9 inch riser above the excluder and the left has a 6 inch riser. Each riser contains 8 frames with beeswax foundation. With our warm weather approaching the honey bees will be in full production for winter stores for the hive. We expand the hives to minimize the chances of a swarm. A swarm occurs when the hive is running low on space to expand or can no longer expand. The hive will produce a virgin queen from the royal brood, she will release a dose of pheromones, and fly off to find a new home. Unfortunately when she does this she takes a majority of the colony with her, which we would like not to happen. |