About Bees, Culture & Curiosity
by Ron Miksha
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From 13 epsHost
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Recent episodes
The American Honey Queen: Bees, Education and Advocacy
Sep 1, 2026
Unknown duration
The End of the Honey Flow means Trouble
Aug 30, 2026
Unknown duration
The 50% Honey Tariff: When a Market Disappears
Aug 27, 2026
Unknown duration
Too Hot for Bees? Arizona Heat, Drought, and Rescuing Bees
Aug 14, 2026
Unknown duration
Sweet Clover: The Best Honey Plant?
Aug 9, 2026
Unknown duration
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| Date | Episode | Topics | Guests | Brands | Places | Keywords | Sponsor | Length | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9/1/26 |  The American Honey Queen: Bees, Education and Advocacy | Season 9 Episode 7: About Bees, Culture & Curiosity Podcast – The American Honey Queen: Bees, Education and Advocacy Delanie Craighead, the 2026 American Honey Queen, joins Ron Miksha on About Bees, Culture, and Curiosity for a conversation about honey bees, entomology, education, honey and American beekeeping. Delanie's route to the American Honey Queen crown is an unusual one. She studied animal biology, parasitology and forensic entomology, served with the Peace Corps in Guyana, participated in the California Master Beekeeping Program, and is now pursuing graduate studies in public health and epidemiology. As American Honey Queen, Delanie travels across the United States representing the American Beekeeping Federation and talking with everyone from elementary-school students to governors and mayors. She explains why honey bees matter to agriculture, introduces people to regional American honeys, and helps connect the public with the people who keep bees. Delanie and Ron discuss what forensic entomologists can learn from insects, her childhood raising alpacas and sheep through 4-H and FFA, life in Guyana, becoming a beekeeper, and what she has learned from beekeepers across America. They also explore the remarkable diversity of honey (from California sage and avocado honey to Florida orange blossom) and the environmental challenges facing bees and beekeepers. Curiosity, insects, bees, public service and the demanding job behind the crown of the American Honey Queen. LINKS: https://abfnet.org/american-honey-queen-program/ This podcast was Recorded August 2026 in Calgary. Please subscribe, like, love, and follow. We live or die by your adulation. Podcast website: https://sites.libsyn.com/540327/site About Ron Miksha: https://about-bees.org/about-ron/ Finally: email your questions, comments, and angst: [email protected] | — | ||||||
| 8/30/26 | The End of the Honey Flow means Trouble | Season 9 Episode 6: About Bees, Culture & Curiosity Podcast – The End of the Honey Flow means Trouble The honey flow is over. The supers have been extracted. We had a nice crop (300 pounds from 2 hives). More than we can eat at one time. Now the trouble begins. Robbing. Varroa. Wasps. Crowding. End of the season blahs. This podcast was Recorded August 2026 in Calgary. Please subscribe, like, love, and follow. We live or die by your adulation. Podcast website: https://sites.libsyn.com/540327/site About Ron Miksha: https://about-bees.org/about-ron/ Finally: email your questions, comments, and angst: [email protected] | — | ||||||
| 8/27/26 |  The 50% Honey Tariff: When a Market Disappears | Season 9 Episode 5: About Bees, Culture & Curiosity Podcast – The 50% Honey Tariff: When a Market Disappears The bees made the honey. Now who will buy it? A new 50% U.S. tariff on Canadian honey arrived just as Prairie beekeepers began harvesting the 2026 crop. The numbers reveal an uncomfortable imbalance: Canadian honey is only about 2% of U.S. honey imports, but the amount we send south is equivalent to roughly 14% of Canada's entire annual honey production. Canadian honey is not that important to American consumers, but American consumers are important to Canadian beekeepers. For some family beekeeping operations, the exposure is much greater. One Manitoba producer has historically sold about 90% of its honey into the United States. I also loook at Saskatchewan and Alberta beekeepers. In this episode of About Bees, Culture, and Curiosity, I look at the people behind the statistics, why the U.S.A. imports so much honey, and whether Canada could absorb more of its own crop by reducing the nearly 25 million pounds of honey Canadians import each year. The bees did their job. The difficult part now is finding a market. This podcast was Recorded August 2026 in Calgary. Please subscribe, like, love, and follow. We live or die by your adulation. Podcast website: https://sites.libsyn.com/540327/site About Ron Miksha: https://about-bees.org/about-ron/ Finally: email your questions, comments, and angst: [email protected] | — | ||||||
| 8/14/26 |  Too Hot for Bees? Arizona Heat, Drought, and Rescuing Bees | Season 9 Episode 4: About Bees, Culture & Curiosity Podcast – Too Hot for Bees? Arizona Heat, Drought, and Rescuing Bees Southern Arizona is beautiful bee country, but it's tough on bees and beekeepers. Temperatures climb above 100°F, water becomes critical, drought can shut down forage, and the ground itself becomes dangerously hot. In this episode of About Bees, Culture, and Curiosity, Ron talks with Arizona beekeeper and Monica King about keeping honey bees alive and productive in extreme desert conditions. Monica describes bees foraging before sunrise, using water for colony cooling, providing water inside weak colonies, modifying hive ventilation, using robbing screens, and waiting for monsoon rains to bring mesquite and other desert plants back into bloom. We talk Africanized bees, nucs, bee removals, a sensational "100,000 killer bees" news story, and the uneasy relationship between managed honey bees and native pollinators. Monica also tells us about a beekeeper tour of a Bayer agricultural research greenhouse in Arizona. It is a wide-ranging conversation about bees, desert ecology, agriculture—and what changes when beekeeping gets too hot to handle. Enjoy this episode of obscene heat, killer bees, weed whackers, and GMOs. Links: Monica King Bee Rescue: https://www.monicamking.com/#/ American Honey Queen Delanie Craighead: https://abfnet.org/american-honey-queen-program/ Monica mentioned the documentary Kiss the Ground about soil, climate and carbon. Here's a trailer, you can find the film on line: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3-V1j-zMZw 100,000 Bees and the Weed Whacker: https://www.yahoo.com/news/science/articles/arizona-man-swarmed-100-000-021300567.html This podcast was Recorded August 2026 in Calgary. Please subscribe, like, love, and follow. We live or die by your adulation. Podcast website: https://sites.libsyn.com/540327/site About Ron Miksha: https://about-bees.org/about-ron/ Finally: email your questions, comments, and angst: [email protected] | — | ||||||
| 8/9/26 | Sweet Clover: The Best Honey Plant? | Season 9 Episode 3: About Bees, Culture & Curiosity Podcast – Sweet Clover: The Best Honey Plant? Sweet clover is the best nectar-producing plant. Best honey quality; best for making lots of water-white mild honey. But not everywhere. Here's its story. This podcast was Recorded July 2025 and August 2026 in Calgary. Please subscribe, like, love, and follow. We live or die by your adulation. Podcast website: https://sites.libsyn.com/540327/site About Ron Miksha: https://about-bees.org/about-ron/ Finally: email your questions, comments, and angst: [email protected] | — | ||||||
| 8/5/26 |  No Bugs on the Windshield. Is it the Insect Apocalypse? | Season 9 Episode 2: About Bees, Culture & Curiosity Podcast – No Bugs on the Windshield. Is it the Insect Apocalypse? A summer drive from Calgary to Banff used to leave my windshield covered with insects. A few days ago, the same 250-kilometre round trip left just three bug splatters. Three. It used to be dozens. Is this simply better automobile design, or is it ssigns of an insect apocalypse? In this episode of About Bees, Culture, and Curiosity, I explore the science behind what researchers call the windshield phenomenon. Beginning with observations from the Rocky Mountains, we examine decades of insect monitoring, including the famous Krefeld study from Germany, Britain's Bugs Matter citizen science project, and recent research on long-term insect declines across Europe. Along the way we check on alpine wildflowers, bumble bees, hoverflies masquerading as bees, Marilyn Monroe in Banff, and even a look back at my 2016 Bad Beekeeping Blog proposing some rather unorthodox solutions to insect roadkill. Are insects really disappearing? What does science actually say? And why should beekeepers, birdwatchers, and anyone who enjoys the outdoors care? Links 1. Original Krefeld Study (PLOS ONE, 2017) Hallmann, C.A. et al. (2017) More than 75 percent decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0185809 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0185809 2. Krefeld Statistical Rebuttal (Nature, 2025) Hallmann, C.A. et al. (2025) Weather anomalies cannot explain insect decline https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-08528-0 This is the response to the statistical reanalysis that argued weather explained much of the observed decline. 3. Bugs Matter (United Kingdom) Official website: https://www.buglife.org.uk/bugs-matter/ Survey information: https://www.buglife.org.uk/get-involved/surveys/bugs-matter/ This includes: annual reports the smartphone app methods volunteer instructions published results 4. Swiss 90-Year Study (Nature Ecology & Evolution, 2026) Neff, F. et al. (2026) Twentieth-century insect declines and partial recoveries driven by changes in land use and climate Abstract (PubMed): https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/42231010/ A freely available PDF (author repository): https://digital.csic.es/bitstream/10261/437414/1/Ninety-year_trends_reveal_sharpest_insect.pdf Dave Goulson Silent Earth: Averting the Insect Apocalypse https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/677807/silent-earth-by-dave-goulson/ One of the best popular science books on insect decline. Brooke Jarvis The Insect Apocalypse Is Here The New York Times Magazine (2018) https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/27/magazine/insect-apocalypse.html Probably the best long-form magazine article introducing the subject to the general public. This podcast was Recorded August 2026 in Calgary. Please subscribe, like, love, and follow. We live or die by your adulation. Podcast website: https://sites.libsyn.com/540327/site About Ron Miksha: https://about-bees.org/about-ron/ Finally: email your questions, comments, and angst: [email protected] | — | ||||||
| 7/22/26 |  What if a Part of Canada Leaves? Who gets the bees? | Season 9 Episode 1: About Bees, Culture & Curiosity Podcast – What if a Part of Canada Leaves? Who gets the bees? What if part of Canada separates from the rest of the country? I take a deep dive into this subject because the province of Alberta has a hearty band of separatists who have been arguing for Alberta to leave Canada and either be a separate country, or more likely, become part of the USA. Mostly, I look at what this would mean for beekeeping and beekeepers in Alberta. But the first half of today's podcast looks at a few recent bee news stories, a recap about my backyard colonies, and then a look at the effects that becoming the 51st American state would mean for Alberta. Recorded July 2026 in Calgary. Please subscribe, like, love, and follow. We live or die by your adulation. Podcast website: https://sites.libsyn.com/540327/site About Ron Miksha: https://about-bees.org/about-ron/ Finally: email your questions, comments, and angst: [email protected] | — | ||||||
| 7/9/26 | beekeepingherbalism+4 | — | The 3-in-1 Bee Tree: Linden, Lime, and Basswood | CalgaryScotland+1 | basswoodlinden+8 | — | 1h 39m 18s | ||
| 6/27/26 | beekeepingfamily business+3 | Joe McShaw | Honeymoon Acres | New Holstein, WisconsinCalgary | beesgreenhouse+5 | — | 1h 43m 16s | ||
| 6/20/26 | honey bee swarmingqueen bee development+4 | — | NatureUC Riverside News+2 | — | honey beeswarm+5 | — | 1h 07m 27s | ||
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| 6/5/26 | beekeepingtravel+3 | — | heather honeyhaggis | ScotlandEdinburgh+4 | Scotlandbeekeeping+3 | — | 32m 02s | ||
| 5/24/26 | beekeepingblack locust+4 | — | Robinia pseudoacaciablack locust+2 | Appalachian MountainsFrance+3 | black locustbeekeeping+5 | — | 34m 51s | ||
| 5/18/26 | beesWorld Bee Day+4 | — | — | — | beesWorld Bee Day+5 | — | 46m 39s | ||
| 5/14/26 | tupelo honeybeekeeping+4 | — | tupelo honeyOgeechee tupelo tree+1 | FloridaGeorgia+2 | tupelo honeybeekeeping+7 | — | 42m 31s | ||
| 5/8/26 | native beesspring care+3 | Ilan Domnich | Alberta Native Bee Council | Alberta | native beesspring cleanup+3 | — | 43m 28s | ||
| 5/2/26 | honey beeselectromagnetic fields+4 | — | Can Magnets Help Honey Bees Survive Winter? | Calg | honey beesmagnets+5 | — | 57m 16s | ||
| 4/25/26 | beekeepinghive installation+3 | — | About Bees, Culture & Curiosity | — | beeshive boxes+3 | — | 33m 51s | ||
| 4/18/26 | beesdandelions+3 | — | Dandelion: The Bee Plant That Doesn't Need Bees | Calgary | dandelionsbees+3 | — | 49m 13s | ||
| 3/30/26 | apitherapybee stings+3 | — | — | — | apitherapybee stings+5 | — | 35m 36s | ||
| 3/28/26 | beekeepingAI+3 | — | Bee brain modelSocial encapsulation of parasite eggs+3 | SwedenSpain+1 | beesAI+5 | — | 58m 16s | ||
| 3/23/26 | March is Orange Blossom Month | Season 7 Episode 12: About Bees, Culture & Curiosity Podcast – March is Orange Blossom Month Orange Groves, Honey Bees, and a Vanishing Industry Orange blossom honey begins in the groves—but those groves are disappearing. In this episode, beekeeper and writer Ron Miksha explores the history, biology, and quiet decline of North America's citrus landscape. From Florida's once-million acres of orange trees to today's shrinking groves, this is the story of bees, nectar, and a changing agricultural world. We begin with a simple question: why do oranges grow in groves, not orchards? From there, the episode moves into the ecology of citrus flowers—how they produce nectar, how bees detect scent compounds like linalool and geraniol, and how entire colonies mobilize during bloom. Along the way, we examine the numbers behind orange blossom honey production, including how a single acre can produce enormous nectar potential—but rarely does. We also look at the realities facing modern citrus: urban expansion, climate pressures, and the devastating effects of citrus greening disease spread by the Asian citrus psyllid. This episode blends personal experience, ecology, and history—from 1970s Florida bee yards to today's fragmented groves. It's a story about honey, yes—but also about landscape change, risk, and the uncertain future of beekeeping in citrus country. Recorded in Calgary, Alberta, Canada in March 2026. orange blossom honey citrus groves Florida honey bees citrus pollination how orange blossom honey is made citrus bloom beekeeping Please subscribe, like, love, and follow. We live or die by your adulation. Podcast website: https://sites.libsyn.com/540327/site About Ron Miksha: https://about-bees.org/about-ron/ Finally: email your questions, comments, and angst: [email protected] | — | ||||||
| 3/8/26 | Bee Poop, Yellow Rain, and the Bee Gut | Season 7 Episode 11: About Bees, Culture & Curiosity Podcast – Bee Poop, Yellow Rain, and the Bee Gut Honey bees refuse to defecate inside their hive all winter—and when the first warm day arrives, thousands of bees take a sudden cleansing flight. In this episode, we explore one of the stranger realities of beekeeping: the honey bee digestive system and the dramatic spring event known as the cleansing flight. From my snowy backyard apiary in Calgary, Alberta, we begin with the subtle signs of early spring. The sun is higher, the hive entrance warms, and a few brave bees take flight—even when temperatures hover just above freezing. Honey bees spend the entire winter confined inside the hive, eating stored honey but refusing to defecate indoors. Instead, they store waste in their hindgut until a warm day finally arrives. When it does, thousands of bees launch into the air to relieve themselves in spectacular cleansing flights. Today, we'll explore the biology of the bee gut, why hive hygiene is critical to colony health, and what happens when digestion goes wrong through dysentery or Nosema infection. We even take a detour into Cold War history, when mysterious "Yellow Rain" falling over Southeast Asia was eventually linked to mass defecation flights of giant Asian honey bees. Yes, really. Recorded in Calgary, Alberta, Canada in March 2026. Please subscribe, like, love, and follow. We live or die by your adulation. Podcast website: https://sites.libsyn.com/540327/site About Ron Miksha: https://about-bees.org/about-ron/ Finally: email your questions, comments, and angst: [email protected] | — | ||||||
| 2/27/26 | February means Almonds | Season 7 Episode 10: About Bees, Culture & Curiosity Podcast – February means Almonds Most California almond pollination takes place in late February and earlier March. In this episode, we look at the world's largest mass migration of livestock and the problems honey bees encounter during pollination season. We also examine how almonds are pollinated (looking closely at the flowers) and why honey bees remain essential to get the job done. Recorded in Calgary, Alberta, Canada in February 2026. Please subscribe, like, love, and follow. We live or die by your adulation. Podcast website: https://sites.libsyn.com/540327/site About Ron Miksha: https://about-bees.org/about-ron/ Finally: email your questions, comments, and angst: [email protected] | — | ||||||
| 2/22/26 | The Apiary in a Box | Season 7 Episode 9: About Bees, Culture & Curiosity Podcast – The Apiary in a Box I had a great chat with Herman van Reekum of Beekeeping Innovations and BeeCube. BeeCube is what it sounds like, a cube of bees, an apiary in a box. We discuss the advantages of the BeeCube as well as new developments that Herman is involved in - a beekeeper's app (Bee the Bee) for recording and analyzing bee colony health and management, and also Global Bee, Digest a Substack newsletter that aggrandizes current news and research in bees and beekeeping. Links for Herman Beekeeping Innovations: https://www.beekeepinginnovations.ca/ BeeCube: https://www.beecube.io/ The Global Beekeeping Digest: https://globalmobility.substack.com/ Recorded in Calgary, Alberta, Canada in February 2026. Please subscribe, like, love, and follow. We live or die by your adulation. Podcast website: https://sites.libsyn.com/540327/site About Ron Miksha: https://about-bees.org/about-ron/ Finally: email your questions, comments, and angst: [email protected] | — | ||||||
| 2/17/26 | Wintering at minus 50 in Singles!! | Season 7 Episode 8: About Bees, Culture & Curiosity Podcast – Wintering at minus 50 in Singles!! Let's go way up north to the Yukon with beekeeper Etienne Tardif. He experiments with wintering - in single storey hives - through minus 50 temperatures. His secrets, which he is happy to talk about, include carbon dioxide control guided by sophisticated monitoring. If you don't know how important tight space and excess CO2 can be to success wintering, you need to listen to this podcast. Etienne's North of 60 Beekeeping: https://www.northof60beekeeping.com/ Hypoxia-Controlled Winter Metabolism in Honeybees https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0300962996000825 Recorded in Calgary, Alberta, Canada in February 2026. Please subscribe, like, love, and follow. We live or die by your adulation. Podcast website: https://sites.libsyn.com/540327/site About Ron Miksha: https://about-bees.org/about-ron/ Finally: email your questions, comments, and angst: [email protected] | — | ||||||
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