I know, Myrmecos Blog has been horribly boring the last few weeks. Except for the occasional Beetle Blog, that is.
That’s because I’ve been spending most of my time preparing lectures, grading midterms, and other sundry tasks associated with teaching an introductory beekeeping class. I can’t complain, though. The students are a fantastic bunch- and fearless, judging from all the short sleeves. And playing with handfuls of bees is just plain old-fashioned fun. So the blog has languished more than I would have liked.
Anyway. Here are images from the class.
Would you ever consider teaching this course at a location outside the U.S., as a guest lecturer?
No, I wouldn’t. That’s because I’m not really a beekeeper- I’m more of a hobbyist who happened to fall into this particular course as a matter of local circumstances.
Now, I’d be happy to teach a photography course, or a phylogenetics course, or any other area where I actually hold professional expertise. But beekeeping? There are hundreds of people out there more qualified than I.
Not even myrmecology?
AHHHH… so jealous!
Looks like your technological solutions are pretty similar to ours (identical?). I wonder who got it first.
Finding any ants in your hives yet?
A fair diversity. Lots of Camponotus. A few Formica. Tapinoma. Crematogaster.
The ants don’t bother me so much. They’re not raiding the bees, except for the weakest colonies. Mostly seem to like the habitat between the inner and outer hive covers.
Now, tropical ants and tropical beekeeping, that’s another matter. I lost several hives to Eciton when I was beekeeping in Paraguay.
Oh man, no photographs!?
Also careful with Crematogaster, they like to move into the wood I’ve found. Not so much with Camponotus.
This looks like a boatload of fun!
Now that looks like fun.
Great shots, the selective depth of field makes the photos really pop!
Did you end up finding a textbook for your students to work from?
Wow, you wouldn’t wear short sleeves and shorts around my girls!!. Great to see so many with an interest in beekeeping