The drones are a hit!

Viva La Pollination! Today we are celebrating national pollinator week, although 2 months late due to rain and flooding on our original date, with a pollinator fair. We have student collections, a craft, information on native pollinators, honey tasting, face painting, wind pollination, a photo booth, hummingbird information, and a drone petting zoo!

This morning I went out to the hive to evaluate their progress and collect some drones for the fair. I was a touch worried that I wouldn’t find any drones, as this late in the season none are needed with mating flights with the queen. Of the three hives, one still had a good number of drones so I was able to capture three dozen! The drones were a hit! It is wonderful to educate the public that only female bees sting. Therefore the males, called drones, are harmless and can be petted and handled without risk of sting. Some of our visitors approached with caution!

Additionally, I took the opportunity to add more supers to the hives. Although it is late in the year and we expect honey flow to be over or wrapping up, there is an awful lot of goldenrod coming into bloom. I made the decision to put supers on the hives and see if we could get any more harvest from them! Check the photograph, the white supers are the new additions. Yes! All three hives were out of room and ready for new honey storage space.