Education

Pollinators are anything that carries pollen from the male part of the flower to the female part of the same or different flower. Honeybees are pollinators but there are so many other types of pollinators. Bumblebees, butterflies, hummingbirds, and bats are a few examples. Pollinators are quietly working in the background while your garden blooms. Without them there would be extreme food shortages and very little biodiversity. 

Honeybees were introduced in North America by European colonists in the 1620s. They are for agricultural purposes and most often kept by humans for honey and to pollinate crops. There are thousands of species of native pollinators that can be even more effective in pollinating native plants. Many of these pollinators are now endangered or extinct after hundreds of years of habitat loss. This has created a desperate need for honeybees. Without bees about 70% of plants would go extinct. This includes many of your favorite foods like apples, strawberries and pumpkins. The mix of honeybees and native pollinators can take care of plants together. However agriculture has relied heavily on honeybees to pollinate crops. In an effort to rid crops of pests, pesticides are used and kill the bees along with the pests. Over the past few decades colony collapse disorder has destroyed thousands of beehives. Thankfully dedicated beekeepers have worked to improve numbers of honeybees and bee populations are on the rise. 

We still have a long way to go to create a sustainable balance of honeybees and native pollinators. Now pollinators matter and need our help because without them the world would be in trouble.

Colony collapse disorder (CCD) is when honey bees in a colony will leave the hive for no apparent reason according to the EPA. This causes the death of the hive. Over the past five years the number of hives lost to CCD is decreasing but it is still a threat to millions of bees. 

Other causes of bee deaths can be pests like varroa mites, and small hive beetles. Pesticides can be tracked into a hive from foraging bees and kill the bees. 

To help pollinators, like honey bees, avoid using pesticides in yards or plants. Planting native flowers to your area gives all the pollinators access to food. Supporting local beekeepers like Bees and Bows helps honeybees get what they need.

When Bees and Bows harvests honey from a hive, we do our best to protect the bees and not hurt the hive. Harvesting honey is an essential part of beekeeping or the hive will become honey bound and swarm, leaving the hive weaker. That is why we only take the extra honey the bees make and always make sure that the bees have plenty of food left.

The first part of the harvest is to check for capped honey. The frames in the top boxes will have honey and we take the honey with white wax over the honey. Capped honey means that the bees have put that honey in storage. We check to make sure that the queen bee is not on the frame and there are not any brood cells (baby bees) on the frame. We remove the frames with the honey from the hive and get the bees off of the frame by hitting the edge of the frame against the hive to shake the bees off. We then put the frame into a box with a lid so that the bees can't get to it. After collecting the extra honey frames we go to the extractor. 

Next we remove the caps from the honey using a hot knife. The frame goes into the extractor where it spins the frame around really fast so that the honey comes out of the frame . Then we turn the tap on the extractor and let the honey pour out into a food grade bucket with a paint strainer. We strain the honey and the wax to remove anything that isn't honey. The wax is brought out to the bees to be cleaned of any extra sticky honey. The dry wax is then used in candles and lotion bars. The honey is transferred into jars for people to enjoy. Find out more about requesting honey or products on the 'honey' page.