Straw bale gardens are unique. They fit anywhere, support your plants, provide ample space for roots, suppress weeds, and raise your garden up off the ground where it is easier to reach. Plus, if you have bad things in your garden soil, like nematodes or potato scab, straw bales can provide a clean slate. And […] Read more
Briefly each spring, this bee fools me into thinking she’s a honey bee. For me, the first clue that she’s not a honey bee is her size: she’s slightly smaller, but unless you have both species right next to each other, it can be hard to notice the difference. Yesterday, as I was watching my […] Read more
Winter aconite, a tuber-producing plant in the buttercup family, is cherished by pollinators because it is one of the first flowers of spring. It will often pop through the snow ahead of the crocus and the cheery yellow blooms are a welcome addition to the dormant landscape. Native to Europe and Asia, winter aconite (Eranthis […] Read more
Some questions reach out to me. Upon reading this one, I imagined a muscular hulk with diaphanous wings and hairy legs daintily kissing tiny alder flowers with sloppy brown lips, gently spreading their seed amidst the vernal grass-green tree tops. I thought is was a joke and it made me laugh. But when a similar question […] Read more
The popular press has created a mythical picture of honey bee decline, at least in North America. Sadly, many people are confused by all the misinformation. Some non-beekeepers imagine that if thirty percent of all colonies are lost each year, then honey bees will soon become extinct. For example, if you start with 3 million […] Read more
Too busy to write, I decided it’s time for a photo post. The bee on the left is your average-size bumble bee. The one on the right is a sweat bee in the genus Lasioglossum. They were sharing a flower and pretty much ignoring each other when I made the photo back on April 1. […] Read more
Now here is something you don’t see every day. This amazing photo taken by beekeeper Morris Ostrofsky of southern Oregon shows a honey bee carrying a thread of evening primrose pollen. The genus Oenothera contains about 145 species of flowering plants, many of which have pollen grains that are strung together by viscin threads. Viscin […] Read more