July 20, 2022 • 51 mins
Space has been all the buzz. There is so much to learn about the universe, and what better place to start than with some of the smallest creatures of our own planet? This week, beekeeper and ethical hive remover Melissa Sorokin brings us the sweetest lessons on all things bees.
Featuring: Melissa Sorokin
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
I have the same let's go to the mission one
ready for rendering the same launch. Oh boy, ladies, gents, germs,
(00:31):
and everything in between. There is an incredible guest here today.
I'm not even gonna b s like I'm just excited
to be here when I'm so excited. So today we
are talking. What are we talking? Baby? You know, I'm
really happy that we're having this conversation because this is
a very important conversation for a tiny little animal on
the planet, and we're talking bees. That's right. We were
(00:54):
lucky enough to come across Melissa's Instagram page back in
September because we bought a house that had not one,
but two beehives and we didn't want to have them exterminated,
which we at that point I thought might have been
the only option. We wanted to find somebody that can
do something better, and then we got the gift of
(01:15):
you and all the lessons and beautiful things that you
taught us in that time. So we thought, hey, maybe
we can share those beautiful lessons with the world. Well,
thank you, Melissa, introduce yourself. Well okay, so yes, Melissa
like the Miami Bee lady, and um my head is
(01:38):
just chock full of bees. So I am super happy
to be here. Started yes and share something I don't know.
I mean, I'm with bees basically seven so so we
can have something to say, you'd have play. Beekeeping is
(02:00):
your day to day, that's all you do? Yes? And
how did you start? Uh? It's I have to always
give credit to my friend Debbie. I know she was
like Melissa because she's just talks like that. Melissa, your
name means honey bee, is like b goddess, like a
(02:24):
honey dripping goddess of beat Um is what my name means.
And her name actually in Hebrew, that's in Greek, and
her name in Hebrew also means honey bee. Debra meant
to be meant to That's what That was her exact point.
That was totally her point. So she um pushed some
(02:48):
hives on me, but just the boxes, not the bees.
And at that point, did you know anything about beekeeping? No? Zero.
I knew the same as everybody else, which is basically
zero nothing. And she was like, I'm giving you these boxes,
be a beekeeper, do it now? And I said, no,
(03:09):
this is like many thousands of stinging insects, and you
know that's a little crazy, so but it it did
actually pique my interest and it got me thinking about
it and I kind of said, yes, I kind of
found my inner in word yes, to look into it.
What was the initial thing that made you say yes?
(03:30):
Do you love animals? Are you interested in the environment?
I'm I'm I've been rescuing animals since I was like
really tiny. Yeah, it's totally that way for me. I
feel like there are certain animals that people say we
need them, but then human reaction is kind of like
(03:51):
fear not prepared, like, for example, oh, get in the water,
there are sharks. Oh bees, Oh my god, there's a bee.
And you are the first person who actually showed me
that when you get to know the animal, you don't
have to be as afraid, and the fear actually impacts
the situation. So that's something else that we may have
all this information. Yes, you know, I bet you a
(04:11):
lot of people say, oh, the bees are dying, what
does that have to do with the environment. I guarantee
you most of those people have no idea why that
connection is made. I don't even know that everybody realizes
that the bees are dying, right, I don't even think
that we've gone that far. So to prepare for for
today because it was an important day for me. I
(04:32):
was reading some literature on bees and I didn't realize thinking, okay,
but I came across a really sad piece of information.
What happened that a bunch of colonies died, like half
of some colonies in the US. I was seeing, we're dying.
What is causing? I mean, other than obviously the environment.
What would you say, is like the number one contributor
(04:53):
to the dying of bees, Okay, people, Okay, that would
be the number one contribut eater is just human beings
and our practice of agriculture and pesticides and monocropp being
and controlling the environment to the extent that bees and
(05:13):
other insects, other beneficial insects don't thrive as they used to.
And they're not like removing bees and killing a hive. No,
like in Iowa and Kansas and stuff. There's just corn
and soy, which is just a waste land for pollinators.
There's no food there for them. And also the mass
(05:36):
use of pesticides and herbicides, um, same thing. And then
the way that we do our agriculture is we do
these massive agricultural events, and so we ship in bees
in trucks to pollinate our blueberries, our almonds are apple
(05:58):
they come from you know, our cheer aries, they come
from commercial beekeepers, and they just get shipped around the
country all year round according to the ginormous crop schedule. Yeah,
so there's not good. Don't like that. Yeah, So it's
like it's really people, it's like it's not the way
it used to be, like to even two hundred years
(06:19):
ago was very very different. You know, it's the industrialization
of beekee beans. So essentially, like in the natural order
of the world, right, bees they we need them because
they pollinate what ends up being our food or everybody's
food everybody. So now if we've gone as far as
to do like factory farming and environments where we're controlling
(06:40):
the food, now they're going as far as controlling the
pollination of that, so that that contributes to it, that's
what you're saying. Yes, So it's a combination of factors
of the way that we have industrialized food complex kind
of mentality the entire thing. And we hear a lot
(07:01):
like you know, if bees die, we die. Why why
is that? Because I don't think people really understand the
importance that bees play in the ecosystem of human beings
and how we really rely on them. Yeah, aren't they
just like a key stone creature on the planet that
(07:21):
too forget they're pulled out of the picture. If they
actually did, like not thrive anymore and die, then we
wouldn't have, you know, at least one third of our
the food that we eat. Okay, so is it true?
I read this, but you know the internet, is it
(07:44):
true that bees are responsible for like of pollination? This
is what I read it be at least in the
US eat bees are responsible for the pollination of all
of our vegetation. So it's so tough, Melissa, because I figured, Okay,
you know, in twenty fifty or whatever year, right, like,
could we simulate what bees do? I have an arrow
(08:06):
garden at home, and this got me thinking, Um, it's
an indoor hydroponic garden where you can grow herbs or whatever.
And they sell this little handheld pollinator which is very
cute and even looks like a bee, and it just
vibrates and you're supposed to go to each flower and
kind of like hand pollinate. No, obviously that's not sustainable,
(08:27):
large scale. It's it can't write like there's just no replacement.
So okay, throw out the pollinating, get rid of it.
I mean people try. I think people even have like
we think we're so like technologically hip nowadays that we
(08:50):
can do anything and invent anything, you know, so people
actually try. I mean they try these little of fake
bees that can you know, like tiny um, Yeah, they fly,
you know, root robot be you know, or what you're
talking about, which is kind of like a little build
(09:12):
thing or yeah, but it's nothing is efficient like be.
And it's not just that. The magic of what bees
do is beyond people. So it's hard to describe because
what they do is they're attracted to the flowers that
are in their perfect prime of producing nectar. So bees
(09:33):
and flowers have evolved together. And how presumptuous of people
to think that a hundred thirty million years later we
can come up with a fake b and some hand pollination.
And also people have recently come up with honey, but
(09:58):
not made by be what did that just be syrup? No,
they actually looked at the components of honey and recreated
it in a lab. How do you feel about that?
I don't feel so good about that, because again it
gets back to like the genuine, real magic of bees
(10:18):
and are and the genuine magic of our world. Yeah,
isn't honey one of the only like food ingredients in
the world that doesn't actually expire? That they found honey?
I read somebod they found like honey in the pyramids.
That was still I mean, there's that has antibacterial problem,
doesn't at all, like it has so many, so many
healing properties for the body. But honey is another part
(10:42):
of this conversation. And I learned this through you. You're
not supposed to take the bee's honey. That's their food,
that's their reservoir, you be. I mean, I guess it's
not surprising, but it's still it kind of surprises me
that people don't understand that honey is be food. Right,
we think of it as something for us. Well, we
think of everything is something something for us. Yeah, but no,
(11:05):
honey is not for us, all right? So okay, on
the top of these in space, Oh no, okay, I
(11:27):
love that. Maybe we need to take the best to
space to save them. Maybe that's what we gotta do. Yeah, okay,
So honey, I want to understand this too, because oh honey,
you know you like me, We need the sound. Love
(11:48):
you more. Hastag save the bees, okay, um, honey. Explain
to people that because not only do we think that
all animals produce things for us, but I feel like
he is one of those things that goes by the
wayside because again, people are scared of bees. People don't understand. Yeah,
the weird thing about being someone who removes bees, you know,
(12:10):
because people go honey, and then there's an equal sign
and then there's bees or bees equal honey. So that's
what they're here, that's what they're here for, and there's
no other purpose. Maybe people know about pollination. I don't know,
but generally speaking, if I say be, you say honey
(12:32):
or ouch. Yeah, yeah, I'm scared runaway. So with that
and um removing bees. Often when I remove bees, people
are like can I have the honey? Or what are
you going to do with the honey? Or like this
is the biggest deal is you know? Yeah, Like they're like,
(12:55):
get these creatures out of here. But I want what
they make. I want what they make, right, I know? Um,
And most of the time when I remove bees, they
don't come with excess honey. And you know, I mean,
unless you're a beekeeper, you wouldn't understand this. So it's
it's totally I fully get it. But sometimes it takes
a year or two if ever, for a hive that
(13:17):
I keep, you know, to grow to a size enough
that they make excess honey that I feel comfortable taking.
So you do ethical you know, what is the function
of honey for bees? So it's just their food source.
So they have two things that they get from the flowers.
When they get nectar, and then they also get pollen,
(13:40):
which is how they pollinate because they're collecting that pollen,
rubbing it on themselves, keeping it in their little legs
at and then they go to the next flower and
you know, so they're providing that pollination, but they're also
collecting the pollen to take home to the baby bees.
Let's do this, Let's run it back the way. Like
Jim mentioned that, we met Melissa, which I'm going to
(14:03):
call you're the first one ever no way that Yeah,
I love it so sweet. Literally, so we this is
a big problem that people have. We had bees in
our home. Yeah, and we had to call probably five
six seven peoples before we found someone that was not
(14:24):
adamant about killing the colony, oh right, and their reasoning
Oh no. Some people were like, either way, they won't survive.
You know, whatever runaround they'll give you to not save
the bees. So that was not an option for us.
Luckily we found you and we had one outside, a
hive outside, and we also had a hive inside. It
was kind of like in the how would you describe
(14:46):
off it? It was of our house, I guess, which
is like, I don't know. The one outside was remarkable though,
that is that was like a personal experience with the
architecture of the bees because it was on a decaying
pomp under the that was already and it was massive.
It was massive. I don't know how that didn't fall
I don't know either. They picked the right type of
(15:06):
palm tree. They're so smart because it's not the kind
it's the kind we have to cut the palm front off.
It's not the kind fall off. Something that was incredible.
I was observing how you were interacting with both hives,
and I was keeping my distance and you know, nervous
and resonating that energy, but you were singing to the bees,
(15:28):
you had them in your hand, you were overjoyed, and
I wanted to know more about how you got to
that energetic place. So you started to talk to me
about something, and I remember, this is what initially really
sparked my giant love. You started it for bees. So
if it's cool with you, you can tell that story
again about how the hive works and you know, the
(15:50):
recycling of the queen and everything like that. Oh, there's
so much. There's so much because they're a super organism.
So I get all x sited. We share the excitement
with you. By the way, go full weird, right exactly. Yeah,
So yes, bees crawling on me. They're they're really really soft.
They're soft like feathers, you know. And uh and most
(16:14):
of the time bees are not into stinging anybody because
they do lose their lives. It's the female bees that
sting because the males can't write. The males are just
big flying. They don't really do much for the for
the high. Do they do? Yeah, they procreate with the queen.
They procreate with the queens, so they pass on the genetics,
which is thing number one. And then but they also
(16:37):
create this gorgeous sense of well being with the high. Yeah,
because they're like they're only about ten percent okay, as
should be totally. They're they're they're really flying teddy bears.
They're just like love buckets flying around the drones. The boys.
(16:59):
I love you tell I mean, because I was like, Melissa,
I'm scared of getting stuck. You're like, that's a boy
bee okay, And I really you you wanted me over
from probably even before I met you, but you really
want me over at one moment when you were like,
look at her, She's such a sweet little girl. And
I was like, because sometimes when you speak that way
(17:21):
and you make that emotional connection to things, it changes
the relationship to it. And I was like, this is
just a little, sweet little girl, and she maybe one
of a thousand in here, but she's special, I want
to hear. So the overall is that they have this
incredible unity between all of them in a particular colony,
(17:45):
and the cement of the colony is the smell, the pheromone,
and that's the queen. So the queen has this very
powerful scent that keeps them together for years until you know, eventually,
at one point, you know, she uses up her fertility
(18:06):
and she starts to go on the wax singes side
of the waning side, I should say, over the hill,
over the hill for a baby, and so so they
will replace her. What do you mean by that? Do
they eat her and kill her? Well? Honestly, honestly, okay.
These bees are also can be brutal because they're not
like us, all mushy and emotional like that. They really
(18:29):
believe in in the greater good of all, all of
them together, and if it's best to have a new
queen to continue for all, then they just murder her.
And why don't they could harm her or put her
like the ball? Yeah, why can't they take that ball
to Palm Springs and drop her killer? No, Sometimes they
(18:52):
do actually have two queens at one time, so they
do allow the retired queen to kind of live out
for a while as the new queen begins. They do. Sometimes,
you've also told me when there's more than one queen,
the colony has the ability to split, yes, which is
really cool, which is reproduction, but at the superorganism level
(19:13):
of the whole. So when they split in two, people
think it's scary to see a swm of bees. To me,
it's like the music of the universe. Because they're they're
at their most docile when they split into two and
half the bees or maybe a little bit more leave
with the old queen, the old matriarch or mother, and
(19:36):
they leave with her, and it's such a moment of
hope and like blind faith because they don't have a body,
which is the calm anymore. They don't have the food.
They're not taking it with them except for what they
put in their little stomachs, and they're just flinging themselves
out to the world and saying, Okay, we're gonna maybe
(19:59):
start over, maybe find a home. How how long will
it take hive like a mist scenario, to land somewhere
and set up shop. Well, it's usually a matter of days. Wow,
But that's a long time. And they're flying around the
whole time in a swarm. Well the swarm lands where
the queen lands. So they usually pick a tree or
(20:20):
you'll see them like on a fence or something, you know,
or on the side of a house or under a
balcony or something, and they're in a they're in a
like a shape all together, like a size of a
I don't know, football, and the queen is in the middle.
There somewhere. So again it's her scent that keeps them
all glued and hanging together and holding onto each other.
And then they have Scout bees. She goes around and
(20:45):
she scouts for a new home, and then she comes back,
and then she comes back and you know how she
reports about it. Hey girl, I found a house. So
the way I know this, I kind of I know
this because it's kind of like that, except not singing.
I but she could be buzzing, which she could be.
But isn't it a dance? Aren't they be communicate like
(21:09):
through physical moves, shaking her booty, the she's doing a
little figure the infinity sign on the swarm itself, and
she's communicating to all her sisters who are paying attention.
But pretty much you know the whole thing, and uh,
whether the place she found is spectacular, mediocre or poor,
(21:34):
and if it's spectacular, more and more of her sis
scout sisters will go check it out. And when they
check it out, look, there's actually books on this research.
People have researched this and discovered this is what bees do.
I don't know how we be. Researchers are amazing people.
But when they go and they find a cavity, whether
(21:55):
it's your soft it or inside a tree or something
like that, they take measurement. The bees take measurements. They
walk it. They walk it, and also by the sound
vibration within the cavity, like the reverb, yeah, the reverb.
And then they are also checking for the holes. They're
like access like a whole bunch of different things. And
(22:20):
and this is the hard thing for homeowners when when
they sent that a previous hive has been in that space,
they automatically favor it, which is why, which is why
bees keep coming back unless you really really block it up.
Oh wow, So if you see a bee on their own,
they're either scouting or away from like from what I'm gathering.
(22:43):
Bees kind of work as a unit if they don't
have honey, if they don't have a home. About what
about when they go to like feed or pick up nectar?
Do they do that in groups as well? Are they
kind of they tell each other. They communicate a lot.
So they'll say, oh, look lavender flowers over there. They'll
communicate that with their sisters. They tork it. They totally
to it. Yes, we have much in common with bees.
(23:21):
How long can a bee survive without like a hive
or a queen or a home not very long, maybe
a day or two. That's no time at all. And otherwise,
what's the lifespan of a bee? Um Around six to
eight weeks depending on how hard she works or you know,
a bunch of conditions. So a queen also six eight weeks.
(23:44):
No queen can live for years. I actually saw in
my research, I saw beekeepers that use these markers. I
hope they're safe for the bees. I assume they are
where they mark their little like bodies so they know
with the beer is a year old queen? Sorry, queen
is a year old? Or or two years old? Or
(24:06):
I don't understand that. How can be last a few weeks?
And then like how is the queen born? They look different? Right? Well,
this is why people have often over the millennia thought
that royal jelly, right, which is what the queen's diet
is exclusively, that's what she eats in her lifetime. Royal
(24:26):
jelly is an excretion from young bees. That's like a
special food. What they excreted I think from their heads
and their eyes and and that and it and it
gives that longevity to the queen and that's why it
is believed. I don't know if it's true that it
(24:46):
has the same effect on any people, but people think
that royal jelly give you, gives you longevity, a fountain
of you? Right? Is that what the queen eats? That's
basically like within her own you know? So I'm here
wrinkling and aging. When I excuse me, can I just
(25:08):
call Bolgia that? Do you mind? Now? I come home
and Emily has emptied out an entire cabinet. It's all
royal jelly. Yes, I actually just ordered something. No, I
would never take. Wow, that's incredible. So she eats this
(25:31):
royal jelly and she survives longer. And why does she
look different? Doesn't she have like different wings or something. Yeah,
So when she's a little egg and she bursts from
an egg and the eggs are like smaller than a
sessame seat, They're really tiny. Yeah, And so that bursts
open and at that point they feed all the little
tiny baby larva bees royal jelly for the first couple
(25:55):
of days. But with the if they if the bees
choose their queen and they're going to grow a queen,
right as opposed to a regular worker bee or bees determines.
I thought like a queen had to give birth to
a queen or something. Well, there's a little bit of both.
It depends on the situation that they gets a little complex.
(26:20):
You let me get into it. So, um, in a
normal healthy hive, they have a queen cup, which is
like a ready room for a baby queen. Right, so
it looks like the top of an acorn, and it's
empty most of the time, and they're normal and nothing
to think about. But once it has an egg in it,
that means the queen has come along. The hive is
(26:42):
decided it's pretty much time to swarm. So because she
knows and everybody knows that we're prepping now to swarm,
she'll go and she'll put an egg in that cup. Queen.
The queen will do it. So she's like kind of
picks at that point, Well, she knows they're gonna she's
gonna swarm, she's gonna leave, right, so she puts the
egg in there, so she kind of picks. She kind
(27:04):
of places the egg. In other emergency situations or what
they call a supersedure, which is when they're gonna off
the old queen and create a new queen because she's fading.
So in those situations, the bees themselves can pick it,
can pick the egg, and then I'm guessing they will
give it more royal jelly. Yeah, so then what they
(27:26):
the a normal maiden b or female be whatever worker
be um. They feed her after a little bit more
like bee pollen and honey mixed. You know, they take
her off the royal jelly to create a queen. They
keep her on the Royal jelly and then she genetically Okay,
so there really there's something to the Royal jelly. I
(27:46):
mean really, when our Amazon order gets even oh my gosh,
we have an episode on bees and when order royal jelly.
You guys heard of the black market? What about the
b market? There's so many bee products, it's insane the
amount of products that bees make. So royal jelly is
one of them. When everyone had their own hives that
(28:08):
we're pollinating their own food crops in their area, and
everything was local because there was no container ships and
semi trucks and YadA YadA shipping bees to pollinate, shipping
bees to pollinate. That was like, it's so bizarre, it's
really so you know, this whole thing where people are
getting back to beekeeping and backyard beekeeping and stuff. I
(28:31):
think is very hopeful and positive because it goes back
to a way of being with bees and learning and
and like understanding not just bees, but like the whole
cycle of bees, weather, seasons, solstices, you know, the natural
cycle of a year when because because people don't know,
(28:55):
they think bees make honey all the time, they do not.
I didn't know that, right, They make it in accordance
with the cycles of um, the weather wherever they are. Yeah.
And and you know the bloom of the flowers correct,
and especially of the trees. Yeah. I feel like we're
(29:16):
always trying to evolve. That's the wrong word to use
because it's not what's really happening. But like society moves
forward technology and how people can make more money and
you know, get the masses to do whatever they want
them to do. But for me, a lot of it
is going back, you know, going to back and reading
(29:38):
and understanding the people that were here when we didn't
have internet, when we didn't have those things. Because we're
growing in a completely different direction. I think that people
way way way before us. We're far more advance right,
Like when it comes to communication. I even think there
might have been potential for telepathy and things like how
(29:59):
be is communicating? Really what bees represents the interconnectedness, the
symbiotic relationship between us and everything around us that we
as human beings oftentimes forget or don't even realize that
that exists. So bees not only are just a gateway
bug to learn more about bugs in the world, but
they're also a gateway bugs spiritually. Yeah, okay. In be mythology,
(30:23):
bees are considered in a variety of more ancient cultures.
Be that takes you between life and death to accompany yeah,
you and the transition the soul to the next you know,
life time or whatever and so um. Yeah. So I
think that the reason that is is because bees are
so intimately in and out of death and life and rebirth.
(30:47):
My personal belief, you know, because I believe in reincarnation,
is that bees, for millions of years, they cycle, even
though it's only six weeks or eight weeks, they cycle
most highly in their own high so they don't for them,
it's like nothing transition, yes, exactly. So you know that's
(31:08):
kind of how I have to see it, because it's
a bit brutal to be a beekeeper. Not only that,
but a be remover because I end up having to
cut through brood and I always end up killing some bees.
And you know, as people like us who are so
sensitive to animals and their suffering, UM, I give myself
(31:29):
solace by thinking, well, you know, I always say I'm sorry,
and I always wish them well. But I do think
that they're recycled and they're just so much more in
tune with you know, the life and death as being normal. Yeah,
everybody's afraid of them. We fear it. That made me
(31:50):
think this is maybe going to be the somber part
of the conversation within their own hives. Obviously bees go
through the cycle of death and birth and perhaps we wraarth.
But as a hive on a larger scale, we understand
like what might cause a hive to die? But like,
what are some of the reasons why a hive might
(32:11):
perish when they have all of these systems and all
of these practices like swarming that could essentially keep down alive.
I mean, how long does the hive even last? Does
the hive have like a expiration data? Yeah? I have
found hives to be super Okay, the colony, the hive itself.
The superorganism is like very individualistic in a way. It's
(32:34):
almost like a person, you know, And in that sense,
sometimes they live long, robust lives for ten or fifteen
or who knows how long, you know, some iteration of
the same because they obviously changed queens over time, and
they cycle through so many you know, bees constantly, because
(32:55):
every single day a thousand bees are born and a
thousand bees die plus you know, yeah, so they're constantly
cycling and changing. How many piece is there in the
average quality like total? I think the average is like
twenty to to be healthy, you know, to be like yeah,
(33:21):
because if you're too small, it's there's so many jobs
in a hive. There's so many variety of jobs that
if you're really tiny, it's it's harder for you to
you know, to get up to that other size. You
have to be a certain size to kind of make
it in a way, you know. But this is where
beekeepers come in, because it's like, well, what's the point
(33:41):
of being a beekeeper? Why not just let them be
in the wild, you know, why collect them and force
them to make honey for us is one way you
could think about it, which is not my perspective whatsoever.
I don't even really take honey much for these um
But what my job is is to be a tune
to where they're at and maybe what they're struggling with.
(34:03):
What your question? Back to your question. You know, so
they could be struggling with um pests. They have beetles,
they have moths, they have mites. Yeah, in the hive,
they have viruses, they have bacteria. Yeah, I got up.
You know, Wow, that's their version. Yes, what is the
(34:26):
bees predator in the animal world? Yeah, that's the Thing's
not like I mean there's a bear or a honey bag.
You know, there's some mammals that go after them. What
about insects? Because once I saw a video maybe you
even showed me this video of a wasp trying to
get into a hive and these like awesome girl bees
(34:47):
came out. They also ball them, sometimes to death, the
same thing where they just heat them up and then
kill the wasp. Why would a wasp want to enter
a bee hive because aren't they predatory? Yeah, but everybody
wants to enter a bee hive, I know, people and
everybody else because it's got the honey, which is you
(35:07):
know carbohydrate, it's got the protein, which is you know,
both the bees themselves their protein and the larva especially,
and then also the be bread, which is the pollen
that they ferment. Once you told me it's just chock
full of food for all kinds of creatures, and once
you told me that there's a belief that at one
(35:30):
point in the world maybe bees and wasps were the same. Yes,
what will you? I just you know, what I'm so
impressed about is that you guys remember all these things
you think I just rambled on as I was removing
your bees, I was we were like taking goes practically
(35:50):
back and they were like, oh my god, this is incredible.
This woman is a freaking fatoin of knowledge. We love
what you do. Well. This is why I love removal,
is doing movals from people too, because often people are
super curious, and I do get to teach, it's all
teachable moments whatever, But you really like so good you know,
I can tell you that we really should be a
(36:12):
testament to the When you do what you love, and
you actually you love what you do, and you have
intention and what you do, it is infectious and that's
how we change the world. You're man with your bee
stickers in your car. You're wearing bee earrings right now.
They don't know, but your purse has bees on it. Like,
I love you for that. I love I even brought
(36:34):
honey and I can for you know, my hives, which
I figured. I know you're vegan, but you know it's
from my hiven't think about that's the whole other thing. Yeah,
that's so a hundred thirty million years ago, they they
went in two different directions. So somehow bees were born
(36:57):
out of this symbiotic relationship with flowers where they decided
to go vegan. They went because wasps are carnivores or omnivores,
so vegans started the world. So imagine that many years
ago they decided we're gonna go this way and just
(37:20):
eat from the flowers alone. And that's where they diverged
and make magical honey that keeps the queen alive. Okay,
that's incredible, It's incredible. And I also wanted to say
another point, so many somebody there is a school of
(37:42):
thought now that one of the things, in addition to
like one of the things that contributed to Homo sapiens
right developing, Um, you know diverging ourselves was that we
started to eat from hives and that that helped our
(38:03):
brain development to a major extent, to diverge into modern
day humans. It's a thought, what did we eat to
go from homo sapiens to homosexuals? That is a what
(38:23):
do you think? What is the answer to that? I
can answer. But I'm a lady, so that changed as much. No,
that is amazing. I'm sorry. Oh thank god, my Grandma's
in heaven. Okay, it just gets better. Oh well, look
(38:50):
spot on the shelf, honey. Right, No, that's amazing. Bees
just get cooler and cooler. That's something else. We don't
actually here to do research or care about the world
around us. I mean, for me, I'll tell you, like
my smallest change that was super impactful after meeting you
and learning this information. I can't kill a cockroach, She'll
(39:13):
tell you that. And I save bees all over but
with fear. Now I will have a bee walk on me.
I'll pick it up. I will admire a hive like
as opposed to being afraid of it, and even that,
I feel like it's a positive change, Like if you
walk by bees to check your own emotions, even if
(39:34):
you don't want to be beekeeper cool, but like informed
people don't be afraid. Look, they're actually pretty chill or like,
you know, it's not what you think it is, you know,
or whatever the case would be. So that's been a
big change for me. I really I'm not nervous about this.
So the only time, and this is really important just
for everybody to know, the only time that bees are
(39:54):
stinging people is that obviously if you step on them
or squish them or something like that, you know, startle them.
But they're defending their home. So that's why when they're
swarming and they're homeless for a period of time, they're
very docile. You can take your hand and put it
through that swarm of and they won't sting you. You
(40:14):
can literally like hold a whole your hand full of
bees and they have no interest in stinging you. So
if they're defending something like honey bee, bread babies, queen,
you know if but even then they still don't sting
all that much. It's such a misnomer that you're going
(40:35):
to get like thirty or sixty stings. I have, you know,
own it right here in front of both of you.
I have a big fear of being stung by be.
How many bee stings do you think, like on your
average day do you get because of course I'm sure
it happens, mistake, Okay, on average, No, it does happen. Yeah,
And and then sometimes you get a little kama kaze
(40:57):
be and she's like making it all her business to
get rid of you. But that's not like I thought
they could sting you once and then their intestines get
pulled up to I know, it's so true. Yeah, I
always feel bad. I'm like, I'm sorry, ouch, ouch, I'm sorry,
you know, and I try and get this thing around.
I usually get stung um if I'm working, which is
(41:20):
most days, like maybe three times in a day. And
and you were like, oh yeah, I just got stune
twice and we were like nothing, yeah, is it. Do
you think that you've built to resistance or does it
just like not hurt as much as we think it does. No,
it does hurt. It does hurt. It also depends on
where if I get stung, like in my little fatty
(41:41):
bits and stuff, no problem for whatever reason, Like I
can I can be done with that quickly in like
a minute, you know, no big deal. But if I
get stung on the ear right like the orf or
I don't know why bees no, Like I chew my
nails right and so right, and so they will sing
(42:01):
my cuticles, which I'm already like, and they always go
for my cuticles like they know somehow. They're like, I
gotta get you some gloves. So I'm sure she has
plenty of protective agreement, I know, but I don't like
wearing glass. I know, for the most part, I love
the feel of bees and bee hives and combs and
all that. So what's the beekeeper's secret to be stings?
(42:23):
Is there like a poultice or something? No, no, I mean,
I'm not, I'm hardly just so cool. I was gonna
say what's actually in the sting because I've even heard
that they're like medical benefits to the things. So if
you're not allergic, so sorry, because that's also that's I
feel like that's a big contributor to why people are
really afraid of bees, because the people who will go
(42:43):
into anaphylaxic shock. You know, that's a big thing. If
you get stung by a bee, that could be in
your life. If you don't have a ne EPI pen
so I get that, you know, but what is actually
in there? Same like, what are they putting in you?
It's a venom? My acupuncturist friends will then say, oh,
that's such and such a point. I mean, we know
that there's meridians and points and all that kind of
(43:06):
stuff that can create health or you know, balance. So
bee keepers in theory, should be real healthy. And there's
some anecdotal evidence. I don't know if it's proven though,
that we get beekeepers get less arthritis and cancers royal
(43:27):
jellier people. Okay, I have one more beekeeper question. I
know that, like sometimes a lot of people, even when
you're humanely moving hives, you have some kind of smoke, right, Yeah,
what is that? It's any kind of smoke. It's just smoke.
Doesn't matter what's in it, not particularly. It has to
(43:47):
be natural, that's the only thing. What does it do
to them? Um? It has a Calman effect and it
it helps mask that alarm pheromone. The alarm pheromone smells
like ben on us. Yeah you smell it, Yeah, I've
smelled it. It smells like bananas. They give off that
smell when they want their sisters to know. We need
(44:10):
to defend so to mask that smell, especially when you
first crack open a hive, because you're letting the light
in and it's like this, you know, you're letting the
outside world into a like a very wombic, very safe,
very dark environment where their babies are being born, right
and they're just going about their thing and suddenly you're
(44:31):
like hello, you know, and so you use that smoke
to to uh calm everybody down. Um, it's you don't
want to overuse it, but it definitely works. Like you
can literally pet bees because you know, they're in this
big sisterhood, right, So they're from the moment they're born,
(44:53):
they're jostled and moved and they're in this like hive
situation where they're always being touched forever, you know, their
whole lives until they you know, until they pass away. Um.
And sometimes they just you'll see them crawling around on
the ground and they're they're going to pass away alone
because they don't want to um solely the hive with
dead bodies. So when they know they're gonna die, they
(45:16):
leave the hive. That's what I mean. They're all about
just the unit. Yeah, totally, it's their time and that's that,
you know, but um or they're like these noisy But
you know, you can take your finger and you can
move a bee, and they're so used to being moved
and jostled around that you can just you can just
(45:38):
pet them and move them and like, you know, as
long as they're picking up that you're not doing it
to harm them. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. And also bees
move a lot faster than we do, so if you
slowly move in on a bee and don't startle it,
it hardly sees you. And most bees are solitary bees.
They don't live in a hive. Wait what you just
(46:05):
you just flipped everything. I love that moment. Bees work
at immunity. What about the infinity? Simple, Melissa, very simple,
start over, erase it. That's why honey bees are special though,
But there's all these thousands of other species of bees,
(46:26):
and most of those bees, not all, but most of
them are solitary bees, meaning they just handle their own
brood for the year or babies. And do they live
in a hive and they live usually in a tiny cavity. Yeah,
what about the real estate agent b does that one
live in the hive or live on its own? It
(46:47):
lives in the hive. The real estate agent B that
goes out to sign the house scouting stuff, the one
who does all those list e as tries to get yes.
Um so that be is that's just her job. So
she lives in the hut. She lives in the high
I got it. Yeah. Yeah, so there's solo dolo be.
(47:10):
Well that's another thing. It's the bees that we see
is because we see them, but there are tons of
hives around us. We just don't see that. I kind
of wanted to tie things into the cosmos, please, because
we're on a ride together obviously orbiting space. This is
an illusion. Yeah. We did this so that you would
(47:31):
feel more comfortable, because sometimes people first get to space,
they're a little freaked out by the nothund good, good god, homie,
I love it so. Um So they're in mythology, you know,
the seven Sisters, the Pleiades, those are also considered the
seven bees or Melissa. I know in ancient mythology. L
(47:59):
I like the letters, that's seven. I don't know about
that is it isn't it seven letters? Oh? My god?
I s so it's six bees and one queen. So
it's seven. Yeah. So there's this all this ancient mythology
around that. By the way, I just wanted to bring
(48:20):
that in at some point. That's not a coincidence. That's
not a coincidence. Gems introduced a lot of beautiful things
in my life, but thank you. One thing, that one
thing that Gem and I often talk about, which is like, yeah,
we love outer space. We're obsessed with space, you know,
wanting to know what's out there, what was before, what's
going to be later. However, just like bees, we're here
(48:41):
for a short time, and where we are is this planet.
So as much as we want to focus on what's
out there, we really need to turn inward and like
fix what's here, you know, like not worried about going
to go have a wedding on the moon, but trying
to figure out that if we don't do things like
educate ourselves about the bees and change the infrastructure, then
(49:05):
we might not even be able to get there, you know.
So no man is an island. We're all connected. We're
all connected. And then like not just humans, the bees
are very very well connected. They just are They're plugged in.
They're totally plugged into the source, and that's where they function.
From fully like fully, which is, you know, we strive
(49:29):
for it, they function in it, so you know, I know,
I know, I love that. Yeah, because bees, bees make
them the brummery sound. It's like the it's like they
believe that's the sound of the Yeah. Yeah, but home
is more like a dive, dive into the inner source.
(49:49):
Bees are more like they're already there. So we're just
sharing it. We're just sharing that home with the world. Yeah. Wow,
you know that that it's believed that that home was
the sound of the creation of the I have a
lot of respect for bees. I have a lot There's
(50:11):
just so much to learn, not just about bees. Through
learning about bees or the environment, just life. You know,
Like we were talking about cultures earlier, spirituality, Like you're
saying bees, it comes from within them, is a place
that they already are in. In in Western culture, we
(50:31):
approach the spiritual element of our life is like an
external thing. A lot of times it's a place we
go to on a Sunday or on a holiday. And
in Eastern cultures, a lot of these cultures that actually
keep these practices that we three of us admire, it's
a part of every aspect of their life the way
it would be for bees. So it's really a privileged
(50:52):
to be keep, to be a beekeeper, and to be
with them all the time. Thank you for talking about
the best today so much. This so sparkly and wonderful.
Thank you so much. I feel the bees in the
air around. Thank you for listening and caring and joining
us on this journey. And we hope you do something
(51:12):
with this information. Love you, see you next week, Love
you by. This podcast is brought to you by boon
Flower Productions in partnership with I Hearts Michael da podcast Network.
For more podcasts, visit the I Heart Radio app or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
I have the same let's go to the mission one
ready for rendering the same launch. Oh boy, ladies, gents, germs,
(00:31):
and everything in between. There is an incredible guest here today.
I'm not even gonna b s like I'm just excited
to be here when I'm so excited. So today we
are talking. What are we talking? Baby? You know, I'm
really happy that we're having this conversation because this is
a very important conversation for a tiny little animal on
the planet, and we're talking bees. That's right. We were
(00:54):
lucky enough to come across Melissa's Instagram page back in
September because we bought a house that had not one,
but two beehives and we didn't want to have them exterminated,
which we at that point I thought might have been
the only option. We wanted to find somebody that can
do something better, and then we got the gift of
(01:15):
you and all the lessons and beautiful things that you
taught us in that time. So we thought, hey, maybe
we can share those beautiful lessons with the world. Well,
thank you, Melissa, introduce yourself. Well okay, so yes, Melissa
like the Miami Bee lady, and um my head is
(01:38):
just chock full of bees. So I am super happy
to be here. Started yes and share something I don't know.
I mean, I'm with bees basically seven so so we
can have something to say, you'd have play. Beekeeping is
(02:00):
your day to day, that's all you do? Yes? And
how did you start? Uh? It's I have to always
give credit to my friend Debbie. I know she was
like Melissa because she's just talks like that. Melissa, your
name means honey bee, is like b goddess, like a
(02:24):
honey dripping goddess of beat Um is what my name means.
And her name actually in Hebrew, that's in Greek, and
her name in Hebrew also means honey bee. Debra meant
to be meant to That's what That was her exact point.
That was totally her point. So she um pushed some
(02:48):
hives on me, but just the boxes, not the bees.
And at that point, did you know anything about beekeeping? No? Zero.
I knew the same as everybody else, which is basically
zero nothing. And she was like, I'm giving you these boxes,
be a beekeeper, do it now? And I said, no,
(03:09):
this is like many thousands of stinging insects, and you
know that's a little crazy, so but it it did
actually pique my interest and it got me thinking about
it and I kind of said, yes, I kind of
found my inner in word yes, to look into it.
What was the initial thing that made you say yes?
(03:30):
Do you love animals? Are you interested in the environment?
I'm I'm I've been rescuing animals since I was like
really tiny. Yeah, it's totally that way for me. I
feel like there are certain animals that people say we
need them, but then human reaction is kind of like
(03:51):
fear not prepared, like, for example, oh, get in the water,
there are sharks. Oh bees, Oh my god, there's a bee.
And you are the first person who actually showed me
that when you get to know the animal, you don't
have to be as afraid, and the fear actually impacts
the situation. So that's something else that we may have
all this information. Yes, you know, I bet you a
(04:11):
lot of people say, oh, the bees are dying, what
does that have to do with the environment. I guarantee
you most of those people have no idea why that
connection is made. I don't even know that everybody realizes
that the bees are dying, right, I don't even think
that we've gone that far. So to prepare for for
today because it was an important day for me. I
(04:32):
was reading some literature on bees and I didn't realize thinking, okay,
but I came across a really sad piece of information.
What happened that a bunch of colonies died, like half
of some colonies in the US. I was seeing, we're dying.
What is causing? I mean, other than obviously the environment.
What would you say, is like the number one contributor
(04:53):
to the dying of bees, Okay, people, Okay, that would
be the number one contribut eater is just human beings
and our practice of agriculture and pesticides and monocropp being
and controlling the environment to the extent that bees and
(05:13):
other insects, other beneficial insects don't thrive as they used to.
And they're not like removing bees and killing a hive. No,
like in Iowa and Kansas and stuff. There's just corn
and soy, which is just a waste land for pollinators.
There's no food there for them. And also the mass
(05:36):
use of pesticides and herbicides, um, same thing. And then
the way that we do our agriculture is we do
these massive agricultural events, and so we ship in bees
in trucks to pollinate our blueberries, our almonds are apple
(05:58):
they come from you know, our cheer aries, they come
from commercial beekeepers, and they just get shipped around the
country all year round according to the ginormous crop schedule. Yeah,
so there's not good. Don't like that. Yeah, So it's
like it's really people, it's like it's not the way
it used to be, like to even two hundred years
(06:19):
ago was very very different. You know, it's the industrialization
of beekee beans. So essentially, like in the natural order
of the world, right, bees they we need them because
they pollinate what ends up being our food or everybody's
food everybody. So now if we've gone as far as
to do like factory farming and environments where we're controlling
(06:40):
the food, now they're going as far as controlling the
pollination of that, so that that contributes to it, that's
what you're saying. Yes, So it's a combination of factors
of the way that we have industrialized food complex kind
of mentality the entire thing. And we hear a lot
(07:01):
like you know, if bees die, we die. Why why
is that? Because I don't think people really understand the
importance that bees play in the ecosystem of human beings
and how we really rely on them. Yeah, aren't they
just like a key stone creature on the planet that
(07:21):
too forget they're pulled out of the picture. If they
actually did, like not thrive anymore and die, then we
wouldn't have, you know, at least one third of our
the food that we eat. Okay, so is it true?
I read this, but you know the internet, is it
(07:44):
true that bees are responsible for like of pollination? This
is what I read it be at least in the
US eat bees are responsible for the pollination of all
of our vegetation. So it's so tough, Melissa, because I figured, Okay,
you know, in twenty fifty or whatever year, right, like,
could we simulate what bees do? I have an arrow
(08:06):
garden at home, and this got me thinking, Um, it's
an indoor hydroponic garden where you can grow herbs or whatever.
And they sell this little handheld pollinator which is very
cute and even looks like a bee, and it just
vibrates and you're supposed to go to each flower and
kind of like hand pollinate. No, obviously that's not sustainable,
(08:27):
large scale. It's it can't write like there's just no replacement.
So okay, throw out the pollinating, get rid of it.
I mean people try. I think people even have like
we think we're so like technologically hip nowadays that we
(08:50):
can do anything and invent anything, you know, so people
actually try. I mean they try these little of fake
bees that can you know, like tiny um, Yeah, they fly,
you know, root robot be you know, or what you're
talking about, which is kind of like a little build
(09:12):
thing or yeah, but it's nothing is efficient like be.
And it's not just that. The magic of what bees
do is beyond people. So it's hard to describe because
what they do is they're attracted to the flowers that
are in their perfect prime of producing nectar. So bees
(09:33):
and flowers have evolved together. And how presumptuous of people
to think that a hundred thirty million years later we
can come up with a fake b and some hand pollination.
And also people have recently come up with honey, but
(09:58):
not made by be what did that just be syrup? No,
they actually looked at the components of honey and recreated
it in a lab. How do you feel about that?
I don't feel so good about that, because again it
gets back to like the genuine, real magic of bees
(10:18):
and are and the genuine magic of our world. Yeah,
isn't honey one of the only like food ingredients in
the world that doesn't actually expire? That they found honey?
I read somebod they found like honey in the pyramids.
That was still I mean, there's that has antibacterial problem,
doesn't at all, like it has so many, so many
healing properties for the body. But honey is another part
(10:42):
of this conversation. And I learned this through you. You're
not supposed to take the bee's honey. That's their food,
that's their reservoir, you be. I mean, I guess it's
not surprising, but it's still it kind of surprises me
that people don't understand that honey is be food. Right,
we think of it as something for us. Well, we
think of everything is something something for us. Yeah, but no,
(11:05):
honey is not for us, all right? So okay, on
the top of these in space, Oh no, okay, I
(11:27):
love that. Maybe we need to take the best to
space to save them. Maybe that's what we gotta do. Yeah, okay,
So honey, I want to understand this too, because oh honey,
you know you like me, We need the sound. Love
(11:48):
you more. Hastag save the bees, okay, um, honey. Explain
to people that because not only do we think that
all animals produce things for us, but I feel like
he is one of those things that goes by the
wayside because again, people are scared of bees. People don't understand. Yeah,
the weird thing about being someone who removes bees, you know,
(12:10):
because people go honey, and then there's an equal sign
and then there's bees or bees equal honey. So that's
what they're here, that's what they're here for, and there's
no other purpose. Maybe people know about pollination. I don't know,
but generally speaking, if I say be, you say honey
(12:32):
or ouch. Yeah, yeah, I'm scared runaway. So with that
and um removing bees. Often when I remove bees, people
are like can I have the honey? Or what are
you going to do with the honey? Or like this
is the biggest deal is you know? Yeah, Like they're like,
(12:55):
get these creatures out of here. But I want what
they make. I want what they make, right, I know? Um,
And most of the time when I remove bees, they
don't come with excess honey. And you know, I mean,
unless you're a beekeeper, you wouldn't understand this. So it's
it's totally I fully get it. But sometimes it takes
a year or two if ever, for a hive that
(13:17):
I keep, you know, to grow to a size enough
that they make excess honey that I feel comfortable taking.
So you do ethical you know, what is the function
of honey for bees? So it's just their food source.
So they have two things that they get from the flowers.
When they get nectar, and then they also get pollen,
(13:40):
which is how they pollinate because they're collecting that pollen,
rubbing it on themselves, keeping it in their little legs
at and then they go to the next flower and
you know, so they're providing that pollination, but they're also
collecting the pollen to take home to the baby bees.
Let's do this, Let's run it back the way. Like
Jim mentioned that, we met Melissa, which I'm going to
(14:03):
call you're the first one ever no way that Yeah,
I love it so sweet. Literally, so we this is
a big problem that people have. We had bees in
our home. Yeah, and we had to call probably five
six seven peoples before we found someone that was not
(14:24):
adamant about killing the colony, oh right, and their reasoning
Oh no. Some people were like, either way, they won't survive.
You know, whatever runaround they'll give you to not save
the bees. So that was not an option for us.
Luckily we found you and we had one outside, a
hive outside, and we also had a hive inside. It
was kind of like in the how would you describe
(14:46):
off it? It was of our house, I guess, which
is like, I don't know. The one outside was remarkable though,
that is that was like a personal experience with the
architecture of the bees because it was on a decaying
pomp under the that was already and it was massive.
It was massive. I don't know how that didn't fall
I don't know either. They picked the right type of
(15:06):
palm tree. They're so smart because it's not the kind
it's the kind we have to cut the palm front off.
It's not the kind fall off. Something that was incredible.
I was observing how you were interacting with both hives,
and I was keeping my distance and you know, nervous
and resonating that energy, but you were singing to the bees,
(15:28):
you had them in your hand, you were overjoyed, and
I wanted to know more about how you got to
that energetic place. So you started to talk to me
about something, and I remember, this is what initially really
sparked my giant love. You started it for bees. So
if it's cool with you, you can tell that story
again about how the hive works and you know, the
(15:50):
recycling of the queen and everything like that. Oh, there's
so much. There's so much because they're a super organism.
So I get all x sited. We share the excitement
with you. By the way, go full weird, right exactly. Yeah,
So yes, bees crawling on me. They're they're really really soft.
They're soft like feathers, you know. And uh and most
(16:14):
of the time bees are not into stinging anybody because
they do lose their lives. It's the female bees that
sting because the males can't write. The males are just
big flying. They don't really do much for the for
the high. Do they do? Yeah, they procreate with the queen.
They procreate with the queens, so they pass on the genetics,
which is thing number one. And then but they also
(16:37):
create this gorgeous sense of well being with the high. Yeah,
because they're like they're only about ten percent okay, as
should be totally. They're they're they're really flying teddy bears.
They're just like love buckets flying around the drones. The boys.
(16:59):
I love you tell I mean, because I was like, Melissa,
I'm scared of getting stuck. You're like, that's a boy
bee okay, And I really you you wanted me over
from probably even before I met you, but you really
want me over at one moment when you were like,
look at her, She's such a sweet little girl. And
I was like, because sometimes when you speak that way
(17:21):
and you make that emotional connection to things, it changes
the relationship to it. And I was like, this is
just a little, sweet little girl, and she maybe one
of a thousand in here, but she's special, I want
to hear. So the overall is that they have this
incredible unity between all of them in a particular colony,
(17:45):
and the cement of the colony is the smell, the pheromone,
and that's the queen. So the queen has this very
powerful scent that keeps them together for years until you know, eventually,
at one point, you know, she uses up her fertility
(18:06):
and she starts to go on the wax singes side
of the waning side, I should say, over the hill,
over the hill for a baby, and so so they
will replace her. What do you mean by that? Do
they eat her and kill her? Well? Honestly, honestly, okay.
These bees are also can be brutal because they're not
like us, all mushy and emotional like that. They really
(18:29):
believe in in the greater good of all, all of
them together, and if it's best to have a new
queen to continue for all, then they just murder her.
And why don't they could harm her or put her
like the ball? Yeah, why can't they take that ball
to Palm Springs and drop her killer? No, Sometimes they
(18:52):
do actually have two queens at one time, so they
do allow the retired queen to kind of live out
for a while as the new queen begins. They do. Sometimes,
you've also told me when there's more than one queen,
the colony has the ability to split, yes, which is
really cool, which is reproduction, but at the superorganism level
(19:13):
of the whole. So when they split in two, people
think it's scary to see a swm of bees. To me,
it's like the music of the universe. Because they're they're
at their most docile when they split into two and
half the bees or maybe a little bit more leave
with the old queen, the old matriarch or mother, and
(19:36):
they leave with her, and it's such a moment of
hope and like blind faith because they don't have a body,
which is the calm anymore. They don't have the food.
They're not taking it with them except for what they
put in their little stomachs, and they're just flinging themselves
out to the world and saying, Okay, we're gonna maybe
(19:59):
start over, maybe find a home. How how long will
it take hive like a mist scenario, to land somewhere
and set up shop. Well, it's usually a matter of days. Wow,
But that's a long time. And they're flying around the
whole time in a swarm. Well the swarm lands where
the queen lands. So they usually pick a tree or
(20:20):
you'll see them like on a fence or something, you know,
or on the side of a house or under a
balcony or something, and they're in a they're in a
like a shape all together, like a size of a
I don't know, football, and the queen is in the middle.
There somewhere. So again it's her scent that keeps them
all glued and hanging together and holding onto each other.
And then they have Scout bees. She goes around and
(20:45):
she scouts for a new home, and then she comes back,
and then she comes back and you know how she
reports about it. Hey girl, I found a house. So
the way I know this, I kind of I know
this because it's kind of like that, except not singing.
I but she could be buzzing, which she could be.
But isn't it a dance? Aren't they be communicate like
(21:09):
through physical moves, shaking her booty, the she's doing a
little figure the infinity sign on the swarm itself, and
she's communicating to all her sisters who are paying attention.
But pretty much you know the whole thing, and uh,
whether the place she found is spectacular, mediocre or poor,
(21:34):
and if it's spectacular, more and more of her sis
scout sisters will go check it out. And when they
check it out, look, there's actually books on this research.
People have researched this and discovered this is what bees do.
I don't know how we be. Researchers are amazing people.
But when they go and they find a cavity, whether
(21:55):
it's your soft it or inside a tree or something
like that, they take measurement. The bees take measurements. They
walk it. They walk it, and also by the sound
vibration within the cavity, like the reverb, yeah, the reverb.
And then they are also checking for the holes. They're
like access like a whole bunch of different things. And
(22:20):
and this is the hard thing for homeowners when when
they sent that a previous hive has been in that space,
they automatically favor it, which is why, which is why
bees keep coming back unless you really really block it up.
Oh wow, So if you see a bee on their own,
they're either scouting or away from like from what I'm gathering.
(22:43):
Bees kind of work as a unit if they don't
have honey, if they don't have a home. About what
about when they go to like feed or pick up nectar?
Do they do that in groups as well? Are they
kind of they tell each other. They communicate a lot.
So they'll say, oh, look lavender flowers over there. They'll
communicate that with their sisters. They tork it. They totally
to it. Yes, we have much in common with bees.
(23:21):
How long can a bee survive without like a hive
or a queen or a home not very long, maybe
a day or two. That's no time at all. And otherwise,
what's the lifespan of a bee? Um Around six to
eight weeks depending on how hard she works or you know,
a bunch of conditions. So a queen also six eight weeks.
(23:44):
No queen can live for years. I actually saw in
my research, I saw beekeepers that use these markers. I
hope they're safe for the bees. I assume they are
where they mark their little like bodies so they know
with the beer is a year old queen? Sorry, queen
is a year old? Or or two years old? Or
(24:06):
I don't understand that. How can be last a few weeks?
And then like how is the queen born? They look different? Right? Well,
this is why people have often over the millennia thought
that royal jelly, right, which is what the queen's diet
is exclusively, that's what she eats in her lifetime. Royal
(24:26):
jelly is an excretion from young bees. That's like a
special food. What they excreted I think from their heads
and their eyes and and that and it and it
gives that longevity to the queen and that's why it
is believed. I don't know if it's true that it
(24:46):
has the same effect on any people, but people think
that royal jelly give you, gives you longevity, a fountain
of you? Right? Is that what the queen eats? That's
basically like within her own you know? So I'm here
wrinkling and aging. When I excuse me, can I just
(25:08):
call Bolgia that? Do you mind? Now? I come home
and Emily has emptied out an entire cabinet. It's all
royal jelly. Yes, I actually just ordered something. No, I
would never take. Wow, that's incredible. So she eats this
(25:31):
royal jelly and she survives longer. And why does she
look different? Doesn't she have like different wings or something. Yeah,
So when she's a little egg and she bursts from
an egg and the eggs are like smaller than a
sessame seat, They're really tiny. Yeah, And so that bursts
open and at that point they feed all the little
tiny baby larva bees royal jelly for the first couple
(25:55):
of days. But with the if they if the bees
choose their queen and they're going to grow a queen,
right as opposed to a regular worker bee or bees determines.
I thought like a queen had to give birth to
a queen or something. Well, there's a little bit of both.
It depends on the situation that they gets a little complex.
(26:20):
You let me get into it. So, um, in a
normal healthy hive, they have a queen cup, which is
like a ready room for a baby queen. Right, so
it looks like the top of an acorn, and it's
empty most of the time, and they're normal and nothing
to think about. But once it has an egg in it,
that means the queen has come along. The hive is
(26:42):
decided it's pretty much time to swarm. So because she
knows and everybody knows that we're prepping now to swarm,
she'll go and she'll put an egg in that cup. Queen.
The queen will do it. So she's like kind of
picks at that point, Well, she knows they're gonna she's
gonna swarm, she's gonna leave, right, so she puts the
egg in there, so she kind of picks. She kind
(27:04):
of places the egg. In other emergency situations or what
they call a supersedure, which is when they're gonna off
the old queen and create a new queen because she's fading.
So in those situations, the bees themselves can pick it,
can pick the egg, and then I'm guessing they will
give it more royal jelly. Yeah, so then what they
(27:26):
the a normal maiden b or female be whatever worker
be um. They feed her after a little bit more
like bee pollen and honey mixed. You know, they take
her off the royal jelly to create a queen. They
keep her on the Royal jelly and then she genetically Okay,
so there really there's something to the Royal jelly. I
(27:46):
mean really, when our Amazon order gets even oh my gosh,
we have an episode on bees and when order royal jelly.
You guys heard of the black market? What about the
b market? There's so many bee products, it's insane the
amount of products that bees make. So royal jelly is
one of them. When everyone had their own hives that
(28:08):
we're pollinating their own food crops in their area, and
everything was local because there was no container ships and
semi trucks and YadA YadA shipping bees to pollinate, shipping
bees to pollinate. That was like, it's so bizarre, it's
really so you know, this whole thing where people are
getting back to beekeeping and backyard beekeeping and stuff. I
(28:31):
think is very hopeful and positive because it goes back
to a way of being with bees and learning and
and like understanding not just bees, but like the whole
cycle of bees, weather, seasons, solstices, you know, the natural
cycle of a year when because because people don't know,
(28:55):
they think bees make honey all the time, they do not.
I didn't know that, right, They make it in accordance
with the cycles of um, the weather wherever they are. Yeah.
And and you know the bloom of the flowers correct,
and especially of the trees. Yeah. I feel like we're
(29:16):
always trying to evolve. That's the wrong word to use
because it's not what's really happening. But like society moves
forward technology and how people can make more money and
you know, get the masses to do whatever they want
them to do. But for me, a lot of it
is going back, you know, going to back and reading
(29:38):
and understanding the people that were here when we didn't
have internet, when we didn't have those things. Because we're
growing in a completely different direction. I think that people
way way way before us. We're far more advance right,
Like when it comes to communication. I even think there
might have been potential for telepathy and things like how
(29:59):
be is communicating? Really what bees represents the interconnectedness, the
symbiotic relationship between us and everything around us that we
as human beings oftentimes forget or don't even realize that
that exists. So bees not only are just a gateway
bug to learn more about bugs in the world, but
they're also a gateway bugs spiritually. Yeah, okay. In be mythology,
(30:23):
bees are considered in a variety of more ancient cultures.
Be that takes you between life and death to accompany yeah,
you and the transition the soul to the next you know,
life time or whatever and so um. Yeah. So I
think that the reason that is is because bees are
so intimately in and out of death and life and rebirth.
(30:47):
My personal belief, you know, because I believe in reincarnation,
is that bees, for millions of years, they cycle, even
though it's only six weeks or eight weeks, they cycle
most highly in their own high so they don't for them,
it's like nothing transition, yes, exactly. So you know that's
(31:08):
kind of how I have to see it, because it's
a bit brutal to be a beekeeper. Not only that,
but a be remover because I end up having to
cut through brood and I always end up killing some bees.
And you know, as people like us who are so
sensitive to animals and their suffering, UM, I give myself
(31:29):
solace by thinking, well, you know, I always say I'm sorry,
and I always wish them well. But I do think
that they're recycled and they're just so much more in
tune with you know, the life and death as being normal. Yeah,
everybody's afraid of them. We fear it. That made me
(31:50):
think this is maybe going to be the somber part
of the conversation within their own hives. Obviously bees go
through the cycle of death and birth and perhaps we wraarth.
But as a hive on a larger scale, we understand
like what might cause a hive to die? But like,
what are some of the reasons why a hive might
(32:11):
perish when they have all of these systems and all
of these practices like swarming that could essentially keep down alive.
I mean, how long does the hive even last? Does
the hive have like a expiration data? Yeah? I have
found hives to be super Okay, the colony, the hive itself.
The superorganism is like very individualistic in a way. It's
(32:34):
almost like a person, you know, And in that sense,
sometimes they live long, robust lives for ten or fifteen
or who knows how long, you know, some iteration of
the same because they obviously changed queens over time, and
they cycle through so many you know, bees constantly, because
(32:55):
every single day a thousand bees are born and a
thousand bees die plus you know, yeah, so they're constantly
cycling and changing. How many piece is there in the
average quality like total? I think the average is like
twenty to to be healthy, you know, to be like yeah,
(33:21):
because if you're too small, it's there's so many jobs
in a hive. There's so many variety of jobs that
if you're really tiny, it's it's harder for you to
you know, to get up to that other size. You
have to be a certain size to kind of make
it in a way, you know. But this is where
beekeepers come in, because it's like, well, what's the point
(33:41):
of being a beekeeper? Why not just let them be
in the wild, you know, why collect them and force
them to make honey for us is one way you
could think about it, which is not my perspective whatsoever.
I don't even really take honey much for these um
But what my job is is to be a tune
to where they're at and maybe what they're struggling with.
(34:03):
What your question? Back to your question. You know, so
they could be struggling with um pests. They have beetles,
they have moths, they have mites. Yeah, in the hive,
they have viruses, they have bacteria. Yeah, I got up.
You know, Wow, that's their version. Yes, what is the
(34:26):
bees predator in the animal world? Yeah, that's the Thing's
not like I mean there's a bear or a honey bag.
You know, there's some mammals that go after them. What
about insects? Because once I saw a video maybe you
even showed me this video of a wasp trying to
get into a hive and these like awesome girl bees
(34:47):
came out. They also ball them, sometimes to death, the
same thing where they just heat them up and then
kill the wasp. Why would a wasp want to enter
a bee hive because aren't they predatory? Yeah, but everybody
wants to enter a bee hive, I know, people and
everybody else because it's got the honey, which is you
(35:07):
know carbohydrate, it's got the protein, which is you know,
both the bees themselves their protein and the larva especially,
and then also the be bread, which is the pollen
that they ferment. Once you told me it's just chock
full of food for all kinds of creatures, and once
you told me that there's a belief that at one
(35:30):
point in the world maybe bees and wasps were the same. Yes,
what will you? I just you know, what I'm so
impressed about is that you guys remember all these things
you think I just rambled on as I was removing
your bees, I was we were like taking goes practically
(35:50):
back and they were like, oh my god, this is incredible.
This woman is a freaking fatoin of knowledge. We love
what you do. Well. This is why I love removal,
is doing movals from people too, because often people are
super curious, and I do get to teach, it's all
teachable moments whatever, But you really like so good you know,
I can tell you that we really should be a
(36:12):
testament to the When you do what you love, and
you actually you love what you do, and you have
intention and what you do, it is infectious and that's
how we change the world. You're man with your bee
stickers in your car. You're wearing bee earrings right now.
They don't know, but your purse has bees on it. Like,
I love you for that. I love I even brought
(36:34):
honey and I can for you know, my hives, which
I figured. I know you're vegan, but you know it's
from my hiven't think about that's the whole other thing. Yeah,
that's so a hundred thirty million years ago, they they
went in two different directions. So somehow bees were born
(36:57):
out of this symbiotic relationship with flowers where they decided
to go vegan. They went because wasps are carnivores or omnivores,
so vegans started the world. So imagine that many years
ago they decided we're gonna go this way and just
(37:20):
eat from the flowers alone. And that's where they diverged
and make magical honey that keeps the queen alive. Okay,
that's incredible, It's incredible. And I also wanted to say
another point, so many somebody there is a school of
(37:42):
thought now that one of the things, in addition to
like one of the things that contributed to Homo sapiens
right developing, Um, you know diverging ourselves was that we
started to eat from hives and that that helped our
(38:03):
brain development to a major extent, to diverge into modern
day humans. It's a thought, what did we eat to
go from homo sapiens to homosexuals? That is a what
(38:23):
do you think? What is the answer to that? I
can answer. But I'm a lady, so that changed as much. No,
that is amazing. I'm sorry. Oh thank god, my Grandma's
in heaven. Okay, it just gets better. Oh well, look
(38:50):
spot on the shelf, honey. Right, No, that's amazing. Bees
just get cooler and cooler. That's something else. We don't
actually here to do research or care about the world
around us. I mean, for me, I'll tell you, like
my smallest change that was super impactful after meeting you
and learning this information. I can't kill a cockroach, She'll
(39:13):
tell you that. And I save bees all over but
with fear. Now I will have a bee walk on me.
I'll pick it up. I will admire a hive like
as opposed to being afraid of it, and even that,
I feel like it's a positive change, Like if you
walk by bees to check your own emotions, even if
(39:34):
you don't want to be beekeeper cool, but like informed
people don't be afraid. Look, they're actually pretty chill or like,
you know, it's not what you think it is, you know,
or whatever the case would be. So that's been a
big change for me. I really I'm not nervous about this.
So the only time, and this is really important just
for everybody to know, the only time that bees are
(39:54):
stinging people is that obviously if you step on them
or squish them or something like that, you know, startle them.
But they're defending their home. So that's why when they're
swarming and they're homeless for a period of time, they're
very docile. You can take your hand and put it
through that swarm of and they won't sting you. You
(40:14):
can literally like hold a whole your hand full of
bees and they have no interest in stinging you. So
if they're defending something like honey bee, bread babies, queen,
you know if but even then they still don't sting
all that much. It's such a misnomer that you're going
(40:35):
to get like thirty or sixty stings. I have, you know,
own it right here in front of both of you.
I have a big fear of being stung by be.
How many bee stings do you think, like on your
average day do you get because of course I'm sure
it happens, mistake, Okay, on average, No, it does happen. Yeah,
And and then sometimes you get a little kama kaze
(40:57):
be and she's like making it all her business to
get rid of you. But that's not like I thought
they could sting you once and then their intestines get
pulled up to I know, it's so true. Yeah, I
always feel bad. I'm like, I'm sorry, ouch, ouch, I'm sorry,
you know, and I try and get this thing around.
I usually get stung um if I'm working, which is
(41:20):
most days, like maybe three times in a day. And
and you were like, oh yeah, I just got stune
twice and we were like nothing, yeah, is it. Do
you think that you've built to resistance or does it
just like not hurt as much as we think it does. No,
it does hurt. It does hurt. It also depends on
where if I get stung, like in my little fatty
(41:41):
bits and stuff, no problem for whatever reason, Like I
can I can be done with that quickly in like
a minute, you know, no big deal. But if I
get stung on the ear right like the orf or
I don't know why bees no, Like I chew my
nails right and so right, and so they will sing
(42:01):
my cuticles, which I'm already like, and they always go
for my cuticles like they know somehow. They're like, I
gotta get you some gloves. So I'm sure she has
plenty of protective agreement, I know, but I don't like
wearing glass. I know, for the most part, I love
the feel of bees and bee hives and combs and
all that. So what's the beekeeper's secret to be stings?
(42:23):
Is there like a poultice or something? No, no, I mean,
I'm not, I'm hardly just so cool. I was gonna
say what's actually in the sting because I've even heard
that they're like medical benefits to the things. So if
you're not allergic, so sorry, because that's also that's I
feel like that's a big contributor to why people are
really afraid of bees, because the people who will go
(42:43):
into anaphylaxic shock. You know, that's a big thing. If
you get stung by a bee, that could be in
your life. If you don't have a ne EPI pen
so I get that, you know, but what is actually
in there? Same like, what are they putting in you?
It's a venom? My acupuncturist friends will then say, oh,
that's such and such a point. I mean, we know
that there's meridians and points and all that kind of
(43:06):
stuff that can create health or you know, balance. So
bee keepers in theory, should be real healthy. And there's
some anecdotal evidence. I don't know if it's proven though,
that we get beekeepers get less arthritis and cancers royal
(43:27):
jellier people. Okay, I have one more beekeeper question. I
know that, like sometimes a lot of people, even when
you're humanely moving hives, you have some kind of smoke, right, Yeah,
what is that? It's any kind of smoke. It's just smoke.
Doesn't matter what's in it, not particularly. It has to
(43:47):
be natural, that's the only thing. What does it do
to them? Um? It has a Calman effect and it
it helps mask that alarm pheromone. The alarm pheromone smells
like ben on us. Yeah you smell it, Yeah, I've
smelled it. It smells like bananas. They give off that
smell when they want their sisters to know. We need
(44:10):
to defend so to mask that smell, especially when you
first crack open a hive, because you're letting the light
in and it's like this, you know, you're letting the
outside world into a like a very wombic, very safe,
very dark environment where their babies are being born, right
and they're just going about their thing and suddenly you're
(44:31):
like hello, you know, and so you use that smoke
to to uh calm everybody down. Um, it's you don't
want to overuse it, but it definitely works. Like you
can literally pet bees because you know, they're in this
big sisterhood, right, So they're from the moment they're born,
(44:53):
they're jostled and moved and they're in this like hive
situation where they're always being touched forever, you know, their
whole lives until they you know, until they pass away. Um.
And sometimes they just you'll see them crawling around on
the ground and they're they're going to pass away alone
because they don't want to um solely the hive with
dead bodies. So when they know they're gonna die, they
(45:16):
leave the hive. That's what I mean. They're all about
just the unit. Yeah, totally, it's their time and that's that,
you know, but um or they're like these noisy But
you know, you can take your finger and you can
move a bee, and they're so used to being moved
and jostled around that you can just you can just
(45:38):
pet them and move them and like, you know, as
long as they're picking up that you're not doing it
to harm them. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. And also bees
move a lot faster than we do, so if you
slowly move in on a bee and don't startle it,
it hardly sees you. And most bees are solitary bees.
They don't live in a hive. Wait what you just
(46:05):
you just flipped everything. I love that moment. Bees work
at immunity. What about the infinity? Simple, Melissa, very simple,
start over, erase it. That's why honey bees are special though,
But there's all these thousands of other species of bees,
(46:26):
and most of those bees, not all, but most of
them are solitary bees, meaning they just handle their own
brood for the year or babies. And do they live
in a hive and they live usually in a tiny cavity. Yeah,
what about the real estate agent b does that one
live in the hive or live on its own? It
(46:47):
lives in the hive. The real estate agent B that
goes out to sign the house scouting stuff, the one
who does all those list e as tries to get yes.
Um so that be is that's just her job. So
she lives in the hut. She lives in the high
I got it. Yeah. Yeah, so there's solo dolo be.
(47:10):
Well that's another thing. It's the bees that we see
is because we see them, but there are tons of
hives around us. We just don't see that. I kind
of wanted to tie things into the cosmos, please, because
we're on a ride together obviously orbiting space. This is
an illusion. Yeah. We did this so that you would
(47:31):
feel more comfortable, because sometimes people first get to space,
they're a little freaked out by the nothund good, good god, homie,
I love it so. Um So they're in mythology, you know,
the seven Sisters, the Pleiades, those are also considered the
seven bees or Melissa. I know in ancient mythology. L
(47:59):
I like the letters, that's seven. I don't know about
that is it isn't it seven letters? Oh? My god?
I s so it's six bees and one queen. So
it's seven. Yeah. So there's this all this ancient mythology
around that. By the way, I just wanted to bring
(48:20):
that in at some point. That's not a coincidence. That's
not a coincidence. Gems introduced a lot of beautiful things
in my life, but thank you. One thing, that one
thing that Gem and I often talk about, which is like, yeah,
we love outer space. We're obsessed with space, you know,
wanting to know what's out there, what was before, what's
going to be later. However, just like bees, we're here
(48:41):
for a short time, and where we are is this planet.
So as much as we want to focus on what's
out there, we really need to turn inward and like
fix what's here, you know, like not worried about going
to go have a wedding on the moon, but trying
to figure out that if we don't do things like
educate ourselves about the bees and change the infrastructure, then
(49:05):
we might not even be able to get there, you know.
So no man is an island. We're all connected. We're
all connected. And then like not just humans, the bees
are very very well connected. They just are They're plugged in.
They're totally plugged into the source, and that's where they function.
From fully like fully, which is, you know, we strive
(49:29):
for it, they function in it, so you know, I know,
I know, I love that. Yeah, because bees, bees make
them the brummery sound. It's like the it's like they
believe that's the sound of the Yeah. Yeah, but home
is more like a dive, dive into the inner source.
(49:49):
Bees are more like they're already there. So we're just
sharing it. We're just sharing that home with the world. Yeah. Wow,
you know that that it's believed that that home was
the sound of the creation of the I have a
lot of respect for bees. I have a lot There's
(50:11):
just so much to learn, not just about bees. Through
learning about bees or the environment, just life. You know,
Like we were talking about cultures earlier, spirituality, Like you're
saying bees, it comes from within them, is a place
that they already are in. In in Western culture, we
(50:31):
approach the spiritual element of our life is like an
external thing. A lot of times it's a place we
go to on a Sunday or on a holiday. And
in Eastern cultures, a lot of these cultures that actually
keep these practices that we three of us admire, it's
a part of every aspect of their life the way
it would be for bees. So it's really a privileged
(50:52):
to be keep, to be a beekeeper, and to be
with them all the time. Thank you for talking about
the best today so much. This so sparkly and wonderful.
Thank you so much. I feel the bees in the
air around. Thank you for listening and caring and joining
us on this journey. And we hope you do something
(51:12):
with this information. Love you, see you next week, Love
you by. This podcast is brought to you by boon
Flower Productions in partnership with I Hearts Michael da podcast Network.
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Hosts And Creators
Gemeny Hernandez
Emily Estefan
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