Bees for Hire
Nice article in the
NY Times about migrant Bee Wranglers. Few people stop to think about where their food comes from and the fact that any plant requires pollination to set fruit or seed.
From the article:
bq.
Hives for Hire Stop Only to Pollinate
Each spring, the Hackenburgs and a dozen or so other East Coast beekeepers embark on a six-month journey from Florida to Maine. Along the way they stop in orange groves in Florida, apple orchards and squash and pumpkin fields in Pennsylvania, blueberry barrens in Maine, cranberry bogs in Massachusetts, clover fields in upstate New York and other places favored by bees. Farmers pay the beekeepers to place hives in blossoming fruit and vegetable fields.
bq. The bees pollinate the plants (greatly improving crop yields), and the beekeepers keep the honey made from the collected nectar. Out West, a similar migration is made by beekeepers who drive through Texas, the Dakotas, California and Oregon.
bq. "We live like a bunch of Gypsies," Mr. Hackenburg said as he steered the truck out of the rest area in Brooksville, Fla., and onto Interstate 75. "In the last 25 years, I've only been
We are looking at a different species of Bee for our Apple Orchard -- the
Mason Bee -- these guys can be overwintered in a refrigerator. No honey harvest from them though...
Posted by DaveH at June 9, 2004 2:10 PM