BEE BULLETINS

This slideshow is from February 2008, when I joined my brother Tibor P Szabo and colleague and friend Dan Douma to experience beekeeping in Chile.  We were guests of Francisco Rey who owns and runs Pacific Queens, Sociedad Comercial Rey, and the www.apicultura.cl website. We also visited with Italo Terrezza and his family. Both Francisco and Italo are excellent beekeepers from a very beautiful part of the world.

During my short stay we spent several afternoons queen catching with Francisco’s team of beekeepers near Limache. Tibor and Dan spent the entire season working and visiting in Chile (Tibor’s second full season in Chile and Dan’s first). We were also fortunate to meet a beekeeper named Augustine and to learn about setting up an apiary for wheelchair use and accessible beekeeping.

photo: Italo and Francisco.

photo: Tibor, Augustine, and Francisco.

photos: Near Guelph Ontario on May 3rd, 2009, a sunny +16°C between 9:00 and 10:00am.

My father likes to plant various nectar plants throughout his lawn and apiaries. Purple Grape Hyacinths look gorgeous and provide a much needed early nectar flow for hungry bees. After they finish blooming the lawn can be mowed as usual and the flowers return in more abundance each Spring.

photo: Honey bee foraging on Purple Grape Hyacinth (Muscari spp.).

photo: Honey bee foraging on Purple Grape Hyacinth (Muscari spp.).

In a shaded part of an apiary grows a patch of Ontario’s official provincial flower - White Trillium (Trillium grandiflorum). Bees were busy collecting bright yellow pollen from the trilliums.

photo: A patch of White Trillium (Trillium grandiflorum).

photo: Honey bee foraging on White Trillium (Trillium grandiflorum).

photo: Honey bee foraging on White Trillium (Trillium grandiflorum).