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| Every season brings its surprises and the biggest surprise here this season is the huge boom of apparently wild honey bees on my property- I don't think they've been as numerous here since I bought the place about 25 years ago. What is really strange is how they are spending most of their time tearing up my peaches and nectarines while the bumble bees concentrate on the many open blossoms around the place. I'm not saying they are breaking the skin, although if I hadn't been schooled here on their lack of chewing mouth parts I might assume they were. Apparently they are exploiting any cracks, pecks or other openings and then burrowing in somehow, chewing mouth parts or no, they seem to be rapidly consuming large chunks of the peaches even if they may only be slurping up juice. It isn't a huge problem because I have way too many peaches to use anyway, and even harvesting and giving them away is hard to keep up with. At least they aren't just going after the very biggest and best of the fruit the way squirrels and raccoons do. But it does mean I have to be careful while I pick the fruit, in case the side I can't see has a cavern full of honeybees in it. Oh, and I do know the difference between the appearance of a yellow jacket and a honeybee, and most seasons it is the yellow jackets that are the culprits. This year their numbers are limited and the honeybees have assumed their role. My neighbor and friend, who is a beekeeper, has also been here to observe this phenomena, and tells me that many hives were lost last year to swarming- when the bee colonies just pick up and leave home for the "wild life". He was actually afraid that I might choose to try to poison them because they've become a nuisance. The idea of intentionally poisoning honey bees seems pretty funny to me. |
Follow-Up Postings:
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- Posted by plumhillfarm 4b (My Page) on Sun, Aug 24, 14 at 7:43
| I was just thinking about this topic the other day. Last year honey bees tunneled into massive quantities of fruit here starting at the very bottom of the fruit where the skin is the thinnest. THere was considerable discussion as to whether the bees were just enlarging holes made by yellow jackets. THis year the honey bees are staying away from the fruit, either because they have other better food sources or due to a population decrease (the hive on the edge of my field still has bees in it but it is untended so I do not know the strenght of the hive). This year the yellow jacket population has exploded. I am noticing yellow jackets do not care where they tunnel in, most of the holes are on the top or side of the fruit with very few in the bottom. This leads me to believe last years damage was indeed caused by honey bees tunneling into good undamaged fruit to eat the sugary flesh. Since we all know honey bees mandibles are strong enough to shape wood, an argument cannot be made they they are incapable of doing this, they only need a reason to do it, a shortage of better feed, or overpopulation in a limited area exhausting the food sources within flying range. Honey bees are a situational pest of fruit, if there is other better food sources they don't bother fruit, if not they are just like yellow jackets. |
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| Interesting. Thanks for sharing that with us. |
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- Posted by harvestman 6 (My Page) on Sun, Aug 24, 14 at 9:07
| Thank you. Coming from a professional grower I feel validated by your words. BR enjoyed ridiculing me when I first observed honeybees that seemed to be making their own entrance ways into plums. I still can't be sure if they were the original instigators but you make me consider it entirely possible. I don't see how there should be a shortage of food for honeybees here. They were foraging my flowers up until about two weeks ago and there hasn't been any great reduction in available food there, but maybe the bumble bees and others have become more competitive. Maybe the honeybees are really coming back. |
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| I wonder if the honeybees are like the wasps, preferring the fallen fruit on the ground. The rotting process seems to make it more attractive. Normally, I make a regular practice of picking it up, but if it keeps the pests out of the ripening fruit, it might be a good idea to leave some. If not for the curcs. |
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| I was curious about that so I researched it on BeeSource, I,m also a beekeeper. A few people agreed about the bees eating peaches when most of the other nectar sources were light or gone. They also said that maybe the newer varieties had higher brix and were more attractive as a sugar source. Did you notice if they were after any variety in particular? Thanks for sharing this with us. |
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- Posted by harvestman 6 (My Page) on Sun, Aug 24, 14 at 12:12
| They seem to like them when they are wetter and softer, so maybe they are also after water or maybe those are easier for them to put to use. They weren't as interested in my TangO's although they got very sweet but are firmer than any other I grow. All but my earliest peaches are very sweet, and I can't say they focused on the few low acid varieties. They also like the plums, even when not soft ripe (but already quite sweet). I did notice that they are also in selected blossoms today- the more cup-shaped ones like my perennial arugula flowers seem more attractive to them. Or maybe they are less attractive to all the bumble bees. Do honey bees have longer "reach" than bumble bees? |
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- Posted by konrad___far_north 3..just outside of E (My Page) on Sun, Aug 24, 14 at 12:14
| It's getting near the end of season on good nectar source for honey bees,..your fruits are getting ripe and high on sugar, nice dry weather helps this process,...bees take advantage! |
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- Posted by copingwithclay 8B (My Page) on Sun, Aug 24, 14 at 12:21
| Each April when the Pakistan mulberries are getting fat and dark, the overabundant juice inside each cell is beginning to permeate through the "skin" to the outside world, and thus making the fruit sticky to the touch. That is the time that honeybees converge on the whole berries and gather all the hyper sweet stuff that they can to shuttle back to an active hive. Before then, they gather at the bottoms of the berries that various wasps have already debottomitated and harvest from there. The discerning bees leave the smaller,, externally drier Shangri La and IL Everbearing berries totally alone. In July, the honey bees gather with equal excitement around the eyes of yellow Kadota figs to harvest the thick amber drop of fig syrup that forms when they are ripe. As some of the liquid-filled figs get punctured by wasps, woodpeckers, Mocking birds, etc., the honeybees gather as a group at those opened up figs to harvest the clear syrup. Meanwhile, they leave other less liquidy/less sugary figs alone. Later in Fall, when the fully ripened, sweet Suruga persimmons are busted open by woodpeckers and squirrels, the honeybees gather as a group at those opened up fruit to harvest the cinnamon-flavored, sugar cane sweet, sugar cane tasting Suruga flesh. They leave unpunctured persimmons alone.I sure would like to get to taste their honey......A local, rural area beekeeper just told me that a fellow beekeeper sadly lost the bees in his urban area hives. He blames the piles of now-dead bees on city officials responding to the mountains of mosquito complaints during mosquito overload season. They send out the insecticide spraying trucks in the middle of the night to decrease the population of the blood-loving female skeeters. The news media cite disease potential, phone calls come in, phoners are voters....you get the picture. |
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