Just saw a commercial for this new mascara by Cover Girl that uses BEESWAX “instead of heavy synthetics”. Haven’t tried it yet… but it looks pretty cool <3
White House Bees Create Record Honey Crop
“Michelle Obama was criticized when she announced in 2009 that she wanted the White House to be home to a vegetable garden and honey bees. Her idea was to add an area for bees on the South Lawn which would then provide pollination for the garden. Nearly three years later, her home gardening movement has taken off.
In fact, the White House garden produced almost a ton of food in one year. That’s a pretty big fete for a space that started with a $200 start up cost. The White House can now also boast that a record honey crop has been produced in its third year of production. A massive 225 and a half pounds of honey!
The number seemed to startle staff beekeeper, Charlie Brandts, who claims that most hobby hives produce 60 pounds of honey or 5 gallons annually.
He told U.S. News, “It’s just craziness. They did really well this year.” The honey bees have been considered over producers since they began creating honey at the White House. The first year the bees created 134 pounds of honey and in the second year the buzzing creatures created 183 pounds of syrupy goodness.
According to Bee Culture’s Kim Flottum, the Obama’s honey bees are in “honey bee heaven” because they are in the perfect location with lots of water, nectar from the garden and, “no pest pressure”.
The White House uses the honey the bees create to give gifts to friends, family, and other famous folks, as well as a replacement for sugar and in food and drink products like cookies, salad dressing, and beer.
It is possible that with the record number of honey produced at the White House on the South Lawn that others will catch on to bee keeping. After all, Michelle Obama’s plan to create a White House garden did lead others to create gardens of their own for their homes and help kids learn to create them at their schools all across the country.
What do you think? Ever given any thought to keeping bees?”
Los Angeles Councilmember Bill Rosendahl addressing the crowd last Saturday at HoneyLove’s National Honey Bee Awareness Day Event!!
What are you doing tomorrow? OH THAT’S RIGHT!! YOU ARE COMING TO MAR VISTA TO CELEBRATE NATIONAL HONEY BEE AWARENESS DAY!!
Everyone is invited to come take a walk down HoneyLove’s sustainable yellow carpet dressed as a bee, or a beekeeper, or just wearing yellow and black and see a FREE FILM SCREENING of the new documentary Vanishing of the Bees. The event is TOMORROW (Saturday, August 20th) and runs 2-5:30pm at the Mar Vista Branch Library, 12006 Venice Boulevard, Los Angeles CA 90066
For more information, contact HoneyLove at:
424.625.8 BEE (8233) or by email: info [at] honeylove [dot] org
Beekeeping: Eco-Friendly, Healthy, and Completely Illegal in L.A.
“Urban beekeeping is the hobby du jour in cities across America. And why shouldn’t it be? Through pollination, bees are responsible for producing about one-third of the country’s food supply. Raising bees in cities and towns, then, helps ensure food security, produce local honey and honey-based products, and help conserve honeybees, which are rapidly dying out due to Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD).
Despite the multitude of benefits of urban beekeeping, the practice is totally illegal in many cities, including Los Angeles. Groups and citizens that raise their own bees — like L.A.’s Backwards Beekeepers — have to do so on the sly.
To help better understand why cities should legalize beekeeping, I caught up with Max Wong, a Los Angeles beekeeper and member of Backwards Beekeepers, an organic bee club. The group considers itself backwards because members practice sustainable beekeeping and do not treat their bees with chemicals or medications. As of last month, the Backwards Beekeepers boasted 400 members. Wong gave me the buzz on why beekeeping is so controversial and how the practice can revitalize communities throughout the country.
Why has legalizing beekeeping across Los Angeles faced obstacles while other cities like New York have had success?
L.A. is just more complicated than most cities because the laws are super confusing and made up of many municipalities that morphed over the years into the greater L.A. area. We want a blanket law that makes all areas of L.A. the same. There are many communities throughout the country where beekeeping was never made illegal, even as cities grew.
Why is urban beekeeping so important, and how will legalizing beekeeping benefit the city and its residents?
1. A sustainable, local job in the green sector
At a time when the economy is so shaky, I feel lucky that I’ve created a valuable service job for myself that cannot be outsourced beyond the community, doesn’t have to be subsidized by the government or a private financing source, generates next to no trash, doesn’t rely on the exploitation of animals or people, and has such a positive impact on the environment.
2. Better food security
One-third of the human diet is derived directly or indirectly from honeybee-pollinated plants. Many food plants — such as nuts and stone fruit — are exclusively pollinated by honeybees. It takes half the honeybee population in all of North America just to pollinate the spring almond crop in California!
Honeybees are also an important tool to fight hunger. Honeybees are such good pollinators that they improve crop yields by 30 to 60 percent. Thirty-seven million Americans are currently facing hunger. A 30 percent increase in crop yield in a home garden can mean the difference between a family feeding itself and a family relying on food assistance. And, because honeybees forage for nectar in a three-mile radius of their hive, they spread the love to the entire neighborhood. Even trees in the parks stay healthier because of bee activity.
3. Greater Biodiversity
Honeybees are dying off at an alarming rate — six percent a year globally. Contrary to most stories in the media, most of this die-off stems from unsustainable farming and animal husbandry practices. By keeping feral bees that have adapted to our local ecosystem and refusing to dose my bees with chemicals or medications, I’m helping maintain a healthy, disease-resistant gene pool that will help ensure the survival of an entire species.
What are some urban beekeeping myths that need to be dispelled?
Bees are way smarter than humans. They will not out-breed their food supply, so urbanites won’t have to worry about living next to a commercial bee yard with 1,000 hives inside city limits. There’s just not enough forage to support that many bees on one small patch of land. That said, most people will be surprised to learn that there are, on average, eight wild honeybee colonies per mile already living in Los Angeles without any human involvement! Legalizing beekeeping in Los Angeles would enable better bee management, control, and public safety as compared to only having wild hives, which is the current situation. More beekeepers actually means fewer swarms, fewer feral bee colonies taking up residence where they aren’t wanted, and fewer grumpy bees.”
IF YOU HAVEN’T DONE SO ALREADY – PLEASE CLICK HERE TO SIGN OUR PETITION TO LEGALIZE BEEKEEPING IN LOS ANGELES!!
HOW TO MAKE A BEEKEEPER COSTUME- from MarthaStewart.com
Tools and Materials
White wide-brimmed straw hat (or spray-paint a regular straw hat)
White spray paint (optional)
Black tulle netting
White seam binding
Metal bucket with handle
Yellow paint pen
Pair of painter’s coveralls
Pair of cotton work gloves with yellow accents
1. Cut a piece of tulle 16 inches wide and as long as the circumference of the brim of the hat. Hot-glue seam binding to one long edge of the tulle. Glue tulle to underside of hat brim, and cover with seam binding (to keep glue from seeping through).
2. Remove wires from most of the bees. Glue wireless bees to tulle. Poke a few wired bees through the top of the straw hat from the outside; bend the wires at a right angle, and glue to inside of hat.
3. Using letter stencils and paint pen, stencil “HONEY” on bucket; let dry. Tape more wired bees to inside of bucket.
4. Wear hat with shirt, coveralls, and work gloves.
Help us save the honey bees!!
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