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The international bee crisis is threatening our global food supply, but this user-friendly field guide shows what you can do to help protect our pollinators. The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation offers browsable profiles of 100 common flowers, herbs, shrubs, and trees that attract bees, butterflies, moths, and hummingbirds. The recommendations are simple: sow seeds for some plants — such as basil, rhododendron, and blueberries — and simply don’t mow down abundant native species, including aster, goldenrod, and milkweed. 100 Plants to Feed the Bees will empower homeowners, landscapers, apartment dwellers — anyone with a scrap of yard or a window box — to protect our pollinators.
Bee populations are plummeting worldwide. Colony collapse disorder poses a serious threat to many plants that rely on bees for pollination, including a significant proportion of our food crops. Top bar hives are based on the concept of understanding and working with bees' natural systems, enabling top bar beekeepers to produce honey and natural wax while helping bees thrive now and in the years ahead.
Advanced Top Bar Beekeeping picks up where author Christy Hemenway’s The Thinking Beekeeper left off, providing a wealth of information for backyard beekeepers ready to take the next step with this economical, bee-friendly approach. Hemenway shares:
While continuing to emphasize the intimate connection between our food system, bees, and the well-being of the planet, Advanced Top Bar Beekeeping breaks new ground in the quest to shift the dominant agricultural paradigm away from chemical-laden, industrial monoculture and toward healthy, diverse local farming. See what all the buzz is about with this must-read guide for the new breed of thinking beekeeper.
Tony Pisano's step-by-step illustrated instructions show you how to build everything you need, including hive bodies, supers, covers, hive stands, frames, swarm catchers, feeders, and more.
Learn natural beekeeping from Europe's foremost beekeeping authority. Georges de Layens, inventor of the world's most popular horizontal hive, shares a lifetime of experience on how to get started in simplified beekeeping; choose the best hive model for you and your bees; manage your hives with just two visits per year; take advantage of horizontal hives and deep frames, and much more.
Keeping Bees in Towns and Cities features everything an urbanite needs to know to start keeping bees: how to select the perfect hive, how to buy bees, how to care for a colony, how to harvest honey, and what to do in the winter. Urban beekeeping has particular challenges and needs, and this book highlights the challenges and presents practices that are safe, legal and neighbor-friendly.
The text is rounded out with profiles of urban beekeepers from all over the world, including public hives at the Maryland Center for Horticulture; beekeeping on an office balcony in Melbourne, Australia; and a poolside hive at a hotel in Vancouver, British Columbia.
At the center of every beehive is the queen been. Can you find her?
This fun and informational book includes 48 search-and-find challenges that will improve any bee enthusiast’s queen spotting ability.
Though she rarely leaves the hive, the queen bee’s days are marked by dramatic events, from battles for dominance in the virgin death match to aerial romance in a cloud of drones.
Follow urban beekeeper and swarm catcher Hilary Kearney on a trip deep inside the golden, fragrant, buzzing hive for a vivid exploration of the queen bee’s fascinating life and domain.
Take the queen spotting challenge! Can you find the Queen?
Learn how to plan a hive, acquire bees, install a colony, keep bees healthy, prevent new diseases, harvest honey crops and more. You’ll also find useful information on colony life, colony-collapse disorder, honey bee anatomy and behavior, and apiary equipment and tools.
Swarming is a powerful instinct, one that most successful beekeepers have encountered by their second year. Swarm Essentials outlines the ramifications of swarming behavior (highlighting the often overlooked benefits), proven management techniques, and how to recover and even prosper from a successful swarm attempt. Author Stephen J. Repasky's inaugural publication marks the latest addition to the Essentials series from Wicwas Press and is an excellent read for any beekeeper who hopes to make it past their first year.
Detailed instructions for making candles, furniture polish, beauty products and nearly 100 honey-themed recipes are included. Fully illustrated with how-to photography and unique etchings, The Beekeeper's Bible will provide any backyard enthusiast or gardener with the confidence to dive into beekeeping (or simply daydream about harvesting their own honey while relaxing in the comfort of an armchair).
A honeybee hive produces much more than honey; it also produces pollen, propolis, royal jelly, beeswax, and bee venom. And humans have found uses for all these products. The Benevolent Bee will describe how and why the bees make these products, how they've been used by humans throughout the ages, and how beekeepers harvest the products. It will also present simple do-it yourself recipes for using the products in health and wellness, body care, nutrition, and craft. Beekeeper, herbalist, and artist Stephanie Bruneau explores six amazing products of the honeybee hive--honey, pollen, propolis, royal jelly, beeswax, and bee venom. Learn how to make a salve for burns and a cough syrup from raw honey; how to make a tincture, an infused oil, and a mouthwash from propolis, the anti-bacterial "bee glue" that lines the inside of the hive; and much more.
From honey experts C. Marina Marchese and Kim Flottum comes this comprehensive introduction to the origin, flavor, and culinary uses of more than 30 varietals of honey, from ubiquitous clover to tangy star thistle to rich, smoky buckwheat.
Like wine, cheese, coffee and chocolate, honey has emerged as an artisanal obsession. Its popularity at farmers markets and specialty food stores has soared as retailers capitalize on the trend. The Honey Connoisseur teaches consumers everything they need to know about how to taste, select and use a diverse selection of honey.
After a brief explanation of how bees produce honey, the authors introduce the concept of terroir, the notion that soil, weather and other natural phenomena can affect the taste of honey. As with wines, knowing the terroir of a honey varietal helps to inform an understanding of its flavor.
The book goes on to give a thorough course in the origins of more than 30 different honeys as well as step-by-step instructions on how to taste honey, describe its flavor and determine what other flavors will pair best with it. Also included are simple recipes such as dressings, marinades, beverages and quick-and-easy desserts.
Beautifully illustrated and designed, The Honey Connoisseur is the perfect book for foodies and locavores alike.
What's the buzz about the growing popularity of backyard beekeeping? Providing habitat for bees, pollinating your garden and producing honey for your family are some of the compelling reasons for taking up this exciting hobby. But conventional beekeeping requires a significant investment and has a steep learning curve. The alternative? Consider beekeeping outside the box.
The Thinking Beekeeper is the definitive do-it-yourself guide to natural beekeeping in top bar hives. Based on the concept of understanding and working with bees' natural systems as opposed to trying to subvert them, the advantages of this approach include:
Top bar hives can be located anywhere bees have access to forage, and they make ideal urban hives because of their small footprint. Emphasizing the intimate connection between our food systems, bees and the well-being of the planet, The Thinking Beekeeper will appeal to the new breed of beekeeper who is less focused on maximizing honey yield and more on ensuring the viability of the bee population now and in the coming years.