VicHoney

Flowering Eucalypts Report

Alf Brugman — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 06:35:36 +0000

Bees working in Red Flowering Gum

As of late January 2012, there a several species of flowering eucalypts that our bees are working. North of the Divide, Yellow Box (Eucalyptus melliodora) is still flowering heavily and has been going since late November. Red Stringybark (E. macrorhyncha) is well budded and due to [...]

Beekeeping Lessons for Beginners

Sharon Livesey — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 07:05:51 +0000

Students searching for signs of brood

On the 7th January, 2012, we conducted our first beekeeping lesson for beginners. Our students were very enthusiastic and the day seemed to fly by.

The weather held out and it was almost perfect conditions for opening up the hives in the afternoon after a pleasant lunch. Our [...]

Soldier bees discovered

Julian — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 21:08:36 +0000

There is an interesting taster article (and ensuing discussion) on a new caste of soldier bees in a stingless bee of South America – the Jatai bee (Tetragonisca angustula).

Soldier bees guard their nest against attack by robbers

The study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that Jatai soldiers [...]

Website hackers

Julian — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 10:24:58 +0000

I hate hackers with a passion now.

Our website was hacked five times over the last six months – the most recent being today – leading to drastic measures including a complete reset.

It’s just so senseless.

My deepest thanks go to my bro – Rob – who has been helping us with the wordpress [...]

Inadequate standards

Alf Brugman — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 11:46:26 +0000

I received a phone call last week from a man from country Victoria who stated that he wanted to ask a few questions about organic honey. He said he bought a jar of certified organic honey for a premium price from the health food shop in his town and was shocked to find,in small print [...]

Yellow Gum honey flow

Alf Brugman — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 10:43:20 +0000

Yellow Gum or Eucalyptus leucoxylon has been flowering throughout the winter in the northern country of Victoria where we have some hives. It has been yielding nectar freely and is expected to flower until the end of November. Last week I visited the hives and found that each one had up to three boxes full [...]

The spring dwindle

Alf Brugman — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 02:11:42 +0000

This spring around Melbourne has seen a quite severe cold snap having a detrimental effect on our beehives. Queens have produced a lot of brood in October and the cold and windy weather into November has stopped the field bees from flying and so, instead of gathering pollen and nectar, bees have been eating into [...]

Requeening day

Alf Brugman — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 12:15:56 +0000

This morning we picked up a post bag containing 15 Italian queens from our local post office. They came in the little queen cages which are about the size of a matchbox and contain a young queen and about a half dozen workers as attendants. We immediately went to our home bee yard and started [...]

Conditions, conditions, conditions.

Alf Brugman — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 09:36:48 +0000

There is a perception among beekeepers that commercially bred queen bees are essential to achieve very populous colonies and therefore large yields of honey. This is not necessarily always the case because local bees which are endemic to an area for several generations can also be very successful. Colonies which have been hived from swarms [...]

Honey to feed the people

Alf Brugman — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 03:24:37 +0000

Yesterday I read an article in the Melbourne Age that gave me optimism about the future survival of the honeybee. Jaqueline McGlade, executive director of the European Environmental Agency says that our cities have the potential to become a major supplier of honey. “City honey is cleaner than country honey because there are fewer pesticides”, [...]