CATCH THE BUZZ - Food is back to basics

CATCH THE BUZZ

Honey Fits Right In With Food Channel's Predictions

From Meister Publishing

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Protein feeding pays off with better bee health, better survival, better production, and better wintering.  Learn More.

 

Find out What’s New At Mann Lake right Here

 According to the Food Channel’s top 10 list of food trends for 2010, “back to basics” is in, meaning a focus on home-cooked meals made from basic, healthy ingredients.

The Food Channel’s foodies say it “isn’t about retro, or comfort food, or even cost -- it’s about determining the essentials and stocking your pantry accordingly.” They also anticipate consumers will shop more frequently in order to purchase the freshest ingredients while minimizing waste.

Food vetting is another emerging trend, the Food Channel says, including issues like Fair Trade and organics. Sustainability will remain front and center, too, with consumers adopting sustainable practices such as eating locally sourced and seasonal foods, as well as purchasing products in sustainable packaging.

Another trend will be “food with benefits,” meaning functional foods high in nutrients, which ties into another anticipated trend: bartering for consumables. Farmers markets and CSAs will continue to grow in popularity, and the Food Channel analysts even predict food swaps -- eg a box of tomatoes in exchange for babysitting.

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This message brought to you by Bee Culture, The Magazine Of American Beekeeping. Watch this space, our web page, Brushy Mountain Bee Farm, and thedailygreen.com for registration information on our upcoming webinar on Urban Beekeeping.

  Subscribe to Malcolm Sanford’s Apis Newsletter right here For a comprehensive listing of beekeeping events around the country and around the globe, check out Bee Culture’s Global Beekeeping Calendar

 

 

CATCH THE BUZZ - GM Alfalfa On Trial

CATCH THE BUZZ

Monsanto case against alfalfa ban reaches the Supreme Court

By Guy Montague-Jones, Food Production Daily.com

Protein feeding pays off with better bee health, better survival, better production, and better wintering.  Learn More.

Find out What’s New At Mann Lake right Here

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The Supreme Court has agreed to review a court order that halted the planting of genetically modified alfalfa made by Monsanto.

Back in 2007, a federal district court order overturned approval from the Department of Agriculture and halted the planting of Roundup Ready alfalfa pending an environmental impact statement (EIS) from the USDA.

USDA report

Monsanto has fought this decision repeatedly in the courts and is now taking the case to the Supreme Court even thought the final EIS report is due for publication next month.

Garrett Kasper, a spokesperson for Monsanto, said the company is continuing the legal battle in order to fight for grower rights and set a legal precedent.

The Center for Food Safety disagrees with this assessment. Andrew Kimbrell, the executive director of the organic lobby group, said Monsanto is pushing the case all the way to the Supreme Court even though the USDA analysis is now complete and the US government has actively opposed further litigation.

This, Kimbrell said: “Underscores the great lengths that Monsanto will go to further its mission of patent control of our food system and selling more pesticides.”

Farmer freedom

Monsanto claims the court case is not about patent control but rather the freedom of growers to choose their products.

Kasper said the court injunction failed to establish that the product posed a “threat of irreparable damage,” which he said was necessary to justify a temporary ban.

Citing a case against US Navy about alleged damage to marine life from sonar, the company spokesperson said the Supreme Court has overruled court similar injunctions in the past.

But the Center for Food Safety is confident that the Supreme Court will uphold earlier opinions. “Although we believe a further hearing is unnecessary, we are confident we will again prevail, as the lower courts have already three times determined.”

Irrespective of the outcome, whether planting Roundup Ready alfalfa will eventually be permitted depends most crucially on the conclusions reached in the EIS. Kasper said Monsanto is encouraged by the draft report, which he described as being “pretty favourable.”

The final report is due for publication in February before a court decides on whether the ban on biotech alfalfa should be maintained.

Alfalfa is the fourth most commonly grown crop in the US, and according to Monsanto, 1 percent is currently Roundup Ready alfalfa. Under the 2007 court injunction farmers already using the GM crop were permitted to continue but any further planting was halted.

This message brought to you by Bee Culture, The Magazine Of American Beekeeping. .

 Subscribe to Malcolm Sanford’s Apis Newsletter right here For a comprehensive listing of beekeeping events around the country and around the globe, check out Bee Culture’s Global Beekeeping Calendar

 

 

 

CATCH THE BUZZ - URBAN BEEKEEPING WEBINAR

CATCH THE BUZZ

Free Webinar On Urban Beekeeping

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Protein feeding pays off with better bee health, better survival, better production, and better wintering.  Learn More.

 Find out What’s New At Mann Lake right Here

We will hear from 3 experienced Urban Beekeepers. Learn from these people and issues they confront and mistakes they have make.

Toni Burnham has been an urban beekeeper for 5 years, starting with 2 still-thriving hives on her Capitol Hill rooftop. She now manages 10 hives in the city and the suburbs, mentors about a dozen other urban beekeepers, participates in teaching at several local short courses, and is Vice President of the Maryland State Beekeepers Association. One of her great privileges in 2009 was an invitation to inspect the beehive managed by Charlie Brandts at the White House. She has blogged her beekeeping experiences at http://citybees.blogspot.com

Cameo Wood currently owns a beekeeping supply & honey shop in the Mission district of San Francisco, California called Her Majesty's Secret Beekeeper. I enjoy this a great deal, as I'm helping to create food, pollinate flowers and fruit trees in my city, and I am contributing to making the world a little better. She keeps a few hives in the Mission and Castro districts of San Francisco, and is working on putting up new hives all the time! She has only been working with bees for the last year, but this has been her life and full time job since she started building her store in October of 2008.

Cindy Bee (yes, it’s really her last name) is a beekeeper near Atlanta, Georgia. She is a past President and currently on the Board of Directors for the Metro Atlanta Beekeepers’ Association. They meet in the heart of downtown Atlanta where there are a good number of beekeepers who have their hives in small backyards there. As a club, they’ve had beehives at the Atlanta Botanical Gardens, Zoo Atlanta, and other inner city locations. Cindy has a fulltime business removing bees from within structures for the past 14 years, and most of her removals are in the Atlanta area neighborhoods.

Register Online: https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/153470658

This message brought to you by Bee Culture, The Magazine Of American Beekeeping. Watch this space, our web page, Brushy Mountain Bee Farm, and thedailygreen.com for registration information on our upcoming webinar on Urban Beekeeping.

  Subscribe to Malcolm Sanford’s Apis Newsletter right here For a comprehensive listing of beekeeping events around the country and around the globe, check out Bee Culture’s Global Beekeeping Calendar

 

 

CATCH THE BUZZ - Langstroth Planning Party Planned

CATCH THE BUZZ

National Honeybee Bicentennial Kicks Off Jan. 21

 

Celebrates Philly-born “Father of American Beekeeping” 

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Protein feeding pays off with better bee health, better survival, better production, and better wintering.  Learn More.

 Find out What’s New At Mann Lake right Here

 

 

Philadelphia, PA - Science Friday Initiative’s Carl Flatow comes to town Thursday, Jan. 21, to kick off national celebrations of the Father of American Beekeeping, Philadelphia’s own Lorenzo Langstroth.  

The occasion is the 200th anniversary of Langstroth’s birth. Raised on

Front Street, educated at Yale, Langstroth invented the movable-frame beehive in Philadelphia. It allows for the study of bee science and the extraction of honey from a hive, without damaging the colony and relies on a unique insect instinct called “bee space.”

“Without Langstroth's invention of the movable-frame hive...the honey bee would not have become the best studied insect on the planet. “ - Thomas D. Seeley, PhD., Professor of Biology, Cornell University Dept. of Neurobiology and Behavior

 

Given the critical role honey bees play in pollinating a full one-third of our diet and the current worldwide “colony collapse” crisis, Langstroth’s importance looms especially large today. The Langstroth Bicentennial events will finally bring recognition to a true, unsung American Hero, and to Philadelphia’s distinction as the birthplace of the most important events in beekeeping history.

 

The gathering in Mt. Airy will be the first of many events throughout the United States.  Locally, the inaugural event at the Unitarian Society of Germantown, in Mt. Airy, will feature presentations by Carl Flatow, Barbara Ceiga, and Marc Hoffman.

 

The evening’s hosts, the Philadelphia Beekeepers’ Guild, Montgomery County Beekeepers’ Association and the Chester County Beekeepers’ Association will use this opportunity to further plans for the 1st annual Langstroth / Philly Honey Fest, September 2010, and other Langstroth-centered events at regional institutions.

 

Carl Flatow, Director of the Science Friday Initiative’s Down to Earth program will talk about the scope of the national Langstroth bicentennial project, centered around bee science and the Rev. Langstroth as the quintessential “citizen scientist.”

 

Marc Hoffman is a Langstroth historian, Bee Culture contributor and performer of a one-man show as the “Bee Man” --the Rev. Lorenzo Lorraine Langstroth, that will be performed, locally, later this year. He will talk about the man and his accomplishments.

 

Barbara Ceiga, vice president at the Academy of Natural Sciences, will put it all in context, describing Philadelphia’s central role in American science in Langstroth’s day.

 

Joel Eckel of the Philadelphia Beekeepers’ Guild will introduce the program for the evening.  

 

The evening will also include a raffle of a Brushy Mountain Hive Kit and several subscriptions to Bee Culture magazine.  Haagen-Dazs is providing ice cream for dessert.  

 

This event is free. 

The public is invited to this evening of celebration, entertainment, enlightenment (and planning), Thursday, Jan. 21, 7 PM, at the Unitarian Society of Germantown,

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This message brought to you by Bee Culture, The Magazine Of American Beekeeping. Watch this space, our web page, Brushy Mountain Bee Farm, and thedailygreen.com for registration information on our upcoming webinar on Urban Beekeeping.

  Subscribe to Malcolm Sanford’s Apis Newsletter right here For a comprehensive listing of beekeeping events around the country and around the globe, check out Bee Culture’s Global Beekeeping Calendar

 

 

6511 Lincoln Drive,  Philadelphia

. see: http://www.usguu.org/pages/Directions  for directions, public transportation and (free) parking info.

ABF Convention; Urban Beekeeping Webinar

Dear Subscribers,

The mega beekeeping meeting in Orlando is drawing to a close.  The range of information presented was astounding and the American Beekeeping Federation  can be proud of producing a quality convention.  No doubt we will see publication of much of the information presented in the general session and the American Bee Research Conference  at other venues and in industry publications, but attendees will be able to say they heard it first in Orlando.

The next convention is scheduled to be held in Galveston, Texas January 4-8, 2011 and will be held in conjunction with the American Honey Producers Assocation. 

Urban Beekeeping Webinar:  As published in the January 2010 issue of Bee Culture, Brushy Mountain Bee Farm will sponsor a urban beekeeping webinar On January 24 at 4:00 p.m.  This will feature three beekeepers experienced in the challenges of urban beekeeping.

Here's the rundown on the program:

    
Urban Beekeeping: Ins and Outs - Dos and Don'ts
Sunday, January 24, 2010 4:00 PM - 5:00 PM EST
    Webinar Registration        


We will hear from 3 experienced Urban Beekeepers. Learn from these people and issues they confront and mistakes they have made.

Toni Burnham has been an urban beekeeper for 5 years, starting with 2 still-thriving hives on her Capitol Hill rooftop. She now manages 10 hives in the city and the suburbs, mentors about a dozen other urban beekeepers, participates in teaching at several local short courses, and is Vice President of the Maryland State Beekeepers Association. One of her great privileges in 2009 was an invitation to inspect the beehive managed by Charlie Brandts at the White House. She has blogged her beekeeping experiences at http://citybees.blogspot.com

Cameo Wood currently owns a beekeeping supply & honey shop in the Mission district of San Francisco, California called Her Majesty's Secret Beekeeper.    She keeps a few hives in the Mission and Castro districts of San Francisco, and is working on putting up new hives all the time! She has only been working with bees for the last year, but this has been her life and full time job since she started building her store in October of 2008.  She concludes: "I enjoy this a great deal, as I'm helping to create food, pollinate flowers and fruit trees in my city, and I am contributing to making the world a little better."

Cindy Bee (yes, it’s really her last name) is a beekeeper near Atlanta, Georgia.  She is a past President and currently on the Board of Directors for the Metro Atlanta Beekeepers’ Association.  They meet in the heart of downtown Atlanta where there are a good number of beekeepers who have their hives in small backyards there. As a club, they’ve had beehives at the Atlanta Botanical Gardens, Zoo Atlanta, and other inner city locations. Cindy has a fulltime business removing bees from within structures for the past 14 years, and most of her removals are in the Atlanta area neighborhoods.

Perhaps we will also hear from the folks in New York City concerning their bid to make beekeeping a legal activity again.

To register access: https://www2.gotomeeting.com/register/153470658.  A list of previous webinars is also available.

Sincerely,


Malcolm T. Sanford
beeactor@apisenterprises.com
http://apis.shorturl.com

Bee sure to subscribe to Catch the Buzz, Bee Culture's latest releases of importance to beekeepers.  Also access the Apis Information Resource Center , which contains archived articles, listing of  posts on blogs, web sites, and links to related materials.  .

Central Beekeepers Alliance : Central Beekeepers Meet 9 February 2010

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Central Beekeepers Meet 9 February 2010 Posted: 13 Jan 2010 07:52 AM PST Central Beekeepers will hold our regular monthly meeting on 9 February 2010 at the Agricultural Research Centre (see map). Tuesday, 9 February 2010 Central Beekeepers Alliance Meeting Agricultural Research Centre, Fredericton, NB 7:30 p.m. Visitors and new beekeepers are welcome. Central Beekeepers Meet 9 February 2010 comes from the Central Beekeepers Alliance of New Brunswick, Canada. For more information on Honey Bees and Beekeeping, please: * Visit http://cba.stonehavenlife.com * Subscribe to our RSS feed * Get free updates by e-mail Thank You to Local Businesses Central Beekeepers Meet 12 January 2010 Central Beekeepers Christmas Dinner 2009

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Central Beekeepers Alliance : Irish Honey Lore for St. Patrick’s Day

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Irish Honey Lore for St. Patrick’s Day Posted: 12 Mar 2009 04:31 PM PDT Just in time for St. Patrick’s Day, Irish Culture and Customs remind us that honey holds an important place in the history and traditions of the Emerald Isle: Ireland has been described by many poets and story-tellers as the land of milk and honey, and there is little doubt that there was milk and honey in abundance in earliest times… Honey was so important in early Ireland that a whole section of the Brehon Laws was devoted to bees and beekeeping. Tributes were paid in honey and no banquet table was complete without honey and mead, the legendary drink made from it. Honey was used not just for cooking, but also for basting, and as a condiment in which to dip meat, fowl and fish at the table. The Sacred Bee in Ancient Times and Folklore by Hilda M. Ransome (first published in 1937) explains that there’s a whole section about honey in the Brehon Laws, which date back to somewhere around 600 AD and probably much earlier — the “Bee-judgments” as the laws about beekeeping were called. For example, under those old laws, anyone who kept bees was obligated by law to share the honey harvest with land-owners of the four adjacent farms, as that’s where the bees gathered nectar. And if a man found a swarm in the faithche (the green surrounding and belonging to a house), three-quarters of that colony’s honey harvest at the end of the year was owed to the owner of the house. It certainly speaks to the value placed on honey! We can guage what abundance of honey there was by the size of the vessels in which it was measured. The Brehon Laws mention four sized of vessels used when measuring honey in large quantities. A milch-cow measure was one which, when full, an ordinary person could lift as far as his knee; a heifer, one he could life to his waist; a small heifer to his shoulder; and a dairt or still smaller heifer vessel which he could raise over his head. It was a quaint way of measuring! You can read more about the Brehon Laws on a fascinating website called Library Ireland, dedicated to sharing Irish culture and folklore. For those who’d like to enjoy their honey in Irish culture with a bit of a “kick” to it, David Lee of the Federation of Irish Beekeepers’ Associations explains how to make your own mead. The potent honey-based beverage might go nicely with this gourmet menu from the Institute of Northern Ireland Beekeepers, drawn from the old legends of County Tipperary: Appetiser: Wild Irish Rabbit Terrine, accompanied with hedgegrown brambles, Mead Chutney, garnished with Armagh Apple Crisps, accompanied with Guinness wheaten bread. Main Course: Crystallized pan fried Wolf fish, served with Colcannon potatoes served with a white butter sauce, infused with Field Nettle emulsion, garnished with Irish streaky bacon and deep fried leeks. Dessert: White Chocolate Beehive, filled with a Hazelnut & Irish Mist parfait, served with a rich raspberry & thyme compote, and a splash of fresh cream, garnished with Ling honey comb. If that’s a bit much, just take a page from A Smaller Social History of Ancient Ireland, by PW Joyce (first published in 1906), which says: A mixture of milk and honey was sometimes drunk; a mixture of lard and honey was usual as a condiment. Honey was sometimes brought to table pure, and sometimes in the comb. Often at meals each person had placed before him on the table a little dish, sometimes of silver, filled with honey; and each morsel whether of meat, fish, or bread was dipped into it before being conveyed to the mouth. Or what about a broiled salmon steak, basted with honey, like the meal that was served by Ailill and Maive, king and queen of Connaught, to the young chief, Fraech, according to the old Irish tales. That sounds like a St. Patrick’s Day meal that would go down just fine here in New Brunswick! Irish Honey Lore for St. Patrick’s Day comes from the Central Beekeepers Alliance of New Brunswick, Canada. For more information on Honey Bees and Beekeeping, please: * Visit http://cba.stonehavenlife.com * Subscribe to our RSS feed * Get free updates by e-mail No Related Post

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