Viewer mail: Spreading the word

A reader writes:

I found out your website today... I'm really enjoying, even I don't do beekeeping... We are planning to do it as part of our projects for sustainable living in Zambia and later in Brazil (my country).

I should say that its really impressive how well I can understand what you explain, and gotta say, love your laugh... hehehe It really make me laugh and enjoy your movies... Thanks for all the information, hope we can keep getting it for free, so more people can get to know how to do things backwards in way to keep moving forward... =))

Alexandre L

Thanks, Alexandre!

The bees know what to do

On his Facebook page, Kirk writes:

Me and Val did a cut out, oh, about a month ago. It was big and ran down below the foundation wall. We could only get 40% of the hive out. So we took 4 big frames of open Brood and nurse bees. Put them in a cardboard box and took them to Jordan's house.

I checked them Saturday. They made their own queen and are up and running. I love letting the bees do their thing.

Bee legalization in the LA Times

LA Backwards Beekeepers Rob and Chelsea McFarland are leading the charge to get beekeeping legalized in LA. They're pursuing a successful neighborhood-by-neighborhood campaign, building political support and momentum as they go.

Along the way, through their site HoneyLove.org they're helping to spread the word about bees' essential place in our environment and how anyone can learn to become a beekeeper. Now they're profiled in an LA Times piece:

McFarland and his wife, Chelsea, became interested in beekeeping but discovered that Los Angeles does not allow hives in residential zones. So, the McFarlands decided to launch an unusual grass-roots drive to change the city's law by first winning support from at least 10 of L.A.'s 95 neighborhood councils.

Now, almost a year and a half later, their devotion has won support from eight councils. And an enthusiastic city councilman has initiated a formal study, a first step that could bring L.A. on board with other bee-friendly cities, such as New York, Seattle, San Francisco and Santa Monica.

"We have to be clear that this environment that we live in is threatened, that bees are an essential part," said Councilman Bill Rosendahl, who boasts that he has two wild hives in his yard.

Bee fans try to get Los Angeles to allow hives in residential areas
(LA Times)

Next meeting: Sunday, July 29

Thinking about becoming a beekeeper but have no idea how to start?

Want to meet a bunch of friendly beekeepers ready to share their knowledge?

Come to the next meeting of the Backwards Beekeepers!

Backwards Beekeepers meetings take place on the last Sunday of every month.

The next meeting is scheduled for this Sunday, July 29 at 11am. As always, we'll be at the Atwater Crossing arts complex.

Here's what we have planned:

–Russell takes questions from new & aspiring beekeepers (Kirk will be out of town)

–Update on the Bee Rescue Hotline, and how you can get involved

–Dennis shows off his latest & greatest Bee-Vac (a great tool for bee rescues!)

–Ruth brings beeswax to help new beekeepers make starter strips for their hives

–Lots of experienced beekeepers answer your questions about all things bee!

–We'll also have a very limited number of t-shirts for sale—grab one before they're all gone!

Location:
Atwater Crossing
3265-3191 Casitas Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90039-2205

There is ample free parking in the complex parking lot  - PLEASE park in the lot so the residents of the neighborhood can park near their homes.

The Atwater Crossing Cafe now serves a full breakfast! Come early and make a morning of it.

Map link

Closest freeway exit is Fletcher off the 2 freeway
Casitas is between Minneapolis St & Silver Lake Blvd…
1 long block SW of N. San Fernando Road (across the railroad tracks)
1 ½ blocks NW of Fletcher Drive
2 ½ blocks SE of Glendale Blvd

Upcoming meetings (mark your calendar!):

•August 26

•September 30

•October 28

See you there!
Anne & Gwen

Viewer mail: Bees in a BIG fallen tree!

Diana in Maryland writes:

Hi! I just rescued my first wild hive on Sunday... all due to the knowledge I gained from YOUR site! Wouldn't have been able to do it without all the info you post all the time!

She tells the story on her blog:

...a friend of a friend had a bee tree come down in the recent storm, and instead of calling the exterminator they called me instead! And thanks to Backwards Beekeepers, I’d read enough tutorials on wild hive cutouts that I felt confident enough to give it a shot.

These storms have been devastating for hundreds of people. Many of my friends are without power in this hundred-degree heat. (I’ve opened my house and pool to them and their kids.) But this particular family came very, very close to utter catastrophe. It is an absolute miracle that this bee tree, about 5 feet in diameter at the base, fell away from the house. I’m so glad that their family came through without injury or property damage.

This is only the bottom half of the tree:

And the top half is over here:

It is about 3 feet in diameter at the point it broke off. It could have killed someone if it had fallen on the house.

Another miracle is that the bee colony inside was fairly ok. There were thousands of bees in there, and astonishingly they were the most docile bees I’ve ever worked with, especially considering what they’d just been through.

Read the rest: Bees in the trees (These Two Hands blog)

London community garden bees

A couple of days ago I got to visit these beautiful hives at the allotment (that's British for community garden) in Biggin Hill, Upper Norwood. It's about 9 miles south of central London.

My friends Pippa and Charlie (seen above with daughter Willow) have been tending a plot here for several months and weren't even aware that they share this space with about ten very healthy and active bee hives.

While I was visiting and getting a tour of the grounds, we met Melvyn (above), who's been gardening here for several years. He clued us in that just down the path, behind a small stand of trees, is Bee World. The tree divider seems like a great idea to help keep the bees from establishing a direct flight path to the garden, thus lessening collisions with the gardeners.

Everyone seems to be coexisting nicely.

Motorcycle swarm capture!

LA Backwards Beekeeper Danny writes on his blog:

I got a call from Mike. He works for the City of Oxnard and had a "bee problem."

They had landed on his bike!

I went out and tried to brush most bees into the box.

There were so many places where they were hiding, including under the speedometer, that I decided to smoke them out of there. Most flew up and landed again on the bike.

I suited Mike up in an extra suit, and when I had smoked most of them away, he moved the bike to another place. The bees came down and landed in the wooden bee box. Exactly what we wanted. I gave them a couple of hours to regroup and picked them up, just in time for a long weekend.

They can now live in one of my bee yards.

More photos: Bee Swarm on a Motorcycle (Bees And Beyond blog)

Reminds me of Amy's bicycle swarm from almost three years ago!

Ruth visits the Brooklyn Grange Bees

Los Angeles Backwards Beekeeper Ruth writes:

Last week I visited family in New York and was able to attend an "Apprentice Day" of the Brooklyn Grange Bees.

Brooklyn Grange Bees (BGBees) is a brand of the Brooklyn Grange Rooftop Farm, the largest rooftop farm in the world! The apprenticeship program is just a cool side project of the BGBees.

Tim O'Neal of BoroughBees joined on to specifically design and execute the apprenticeship program,and he was there, bare-hands-on, working with the newbies.

Also with the group that day was Chase Emmons, Managing Partner, Chief Beekeeper, and Director of Special Projects for the Grange Farm. Chase and Tim are both founding members of the Backwards Beekeepers of New York City, and they practice treatment-free beekeeping with the BGBees as well.

The meeting gathered its members in a hip cafe in Building 92 of the old Navy Yard in Brooklyn. The group chatted and drank coffee while waiting for everyone to show up.

This was a meeting not of the Bee Club per se, but rather of the 12 lucky individuals who were chosen from over 175 applicants to be Apprentice Beekeepers. They will learn how to take care of the club's 40-some hives. They and their mentors had met several times already at the cub's Navy Yard Apiary, to switch out frames and hive boxes from a group of 10- year old hives which were purchased for this purpose.

We shared the few vehicles and carpooled across an expanse of asphalt to the empty lot where the hives were located. In spite of the fact of all the concrete the apiary is on a sweet little plot of undeveloped land adjacent to the East River and backed by stands of pine and poplar.

Though the BGBees crew takes care to keep anyone from wandering into the hive yard and getting stung , I was about to be completely blown away by how docile and basically non- stinging these bees were!

East Coast beekeepers only use bottom boards that are screened to increase ventilation in the seriously humid heat of the warm months.But in winter they have to switch out their screen bottoms to solid ones to protect bees from the extreme cold! Tim tells me the eastern bees make a lot more honey than our local western ones, because there is no winter foraging so they have to make enough food when they can. In winter they stay inside a lot!

The bees had originally been purchased in packages from local bee-raisers by a farmer years ago, who lost interest in them and left them to the elements. The result: bees that had built and rebuilt so many times on the same comb that they basically regressed themselves over the course of a decade. And so we have Non-feral Small Cell Local Survivor Stock Bees that (almost) don't sting. Am I jealous? More than a little.

Video: Subculture Club meets the Backwards Beekeepers

Check out this fantastic episode of Thrash Lab's Subculture Club, all about the Backwards Beekeepers. Lots of familiar (and new!) faces make an appearance. It's a great overview what our members are up to!

Our group isn't even 4 years old yet, and look what we've accomplished. All without elected officers, membership dues, incorporation, a treasury, rules, regulations, or bylaws. We fly under the radar and we're pretty damn effective that way.



Bonus Thrash Lab videos:
The History of Bees (animated)
Urban Beekeeping Life (16mm film).

A strong year for honey in LA!

Yesterday Betty Hallock of the LA Times (pictured above) came by to check out our operation and taste some honey in the comb.

We're seeing a lot of honey production from Backwards Bees in LA this year. Last weekend here at Feral Honey HQ we got about 50 pounds from three of our hives (shameless plug: this honey is now available at Village Bakery in Atwater).

Kirk writes:

Last week I helped out Joy [of the Old Bank District bees] with a honey harvest downtown. I took along Valerie from the club.

Kirk continues:

I also took some off in April from my Silver Lake hives—I got one five gallon bucket.

My hives in Studio City are full, same with Eagle Rock. Haven't been able to get to them!