A Cuckoo Came to Our Pollinator Picnic!!!!

Photo: Coelioxys on Santolina blossoms

There is a short border of Yellow Lavender (aka Cotton Lavender, aka Lavender Cotton) around the community herb garden at Moberly. Although we usually trim it low to keep it tidy, I decided to let one corner bloom to see which insects visited the flowers. Eagle-eyed Erin Udall from the Environmental Youth Alliance spotted a cuckoo bee hanging out on one of the flowers which is composed of tiny yellow florets. You've never seen me whip out my camera so fast to capture a shot of this bee. Erin explained that this bee is a cleptoparasite that lays its eggs in the nest of other bees. Our distinguished human visitor, botanist Douglas Justice, (with tongue firmly in cheek) asked: "Shouldn't we be squashing this bee if it preys on other bees?" "No!", we exclaimed in unison, "It's a sign of healthy biodiversity. Leave the cuckoo alone!" The Coelioxys responded by flying off to another celebrity appearance and was not available for comment.

Check out Sean McCann's blog for super cute photos of cuckoo bees sleeping on tansy stems.

Join us at MACC for our First Pollinator Picnic!

 

Sunday June 29 @ 11 am to 1 pm

Join us at the Moberly Arts and Cultural Centre Community Garden for a picnic in the garden. Learn about pollinators and help build our garden and keep it beautiful. Please bring your own picnic brunch/lunch and dress for garden work!

Where: Behind the Moberly Arts and Cultural Centre

7646 Prince Albert Street, (one block east of 60^th and Fraser)

RAIN OR SHINE!!!! Please dress for the weather. 

 P. S.: We could really use a wheelbarrow to move the mulch if you can bring one.

Happy Pollinator Week!

Erin and Hartley from the Environmental Youth Alliance install the sign at Oak Meadows Park, part of the Nectar Trail Project.

Corn poppies, phacelia, California poppies, and flax are in full bloom.

Erin shares her bee box with the customers at the Oak Street Farmer's Market. A live wasp tries to grab the dead specimens to feed to her young!

The male bumblebees are out now--look for fuzzy blonde bees lookin' for love.

Various sizes of leaf-cutter bees. You can see the scopa on their bellies sticking out around the sides.

Those blue bees in the middle are "summer mason bees" and they are out now.

Go Team Pollinator Project! Join the bee safari at Oak Meadows park this Saturday to learn how you can contribute to the Nectar Trail and help make Vancouver's bees healthy.

Moberly Pollinator Picnics

Hello my bee lovin' friends,

 Please join us and spread the word about our picnics. Take special note the July picnic with Sean McCann. His blog is incredible! (http://ibycter.com/).

Cheers,
Lori Weidenhammer aka Madame Beespeaker

 (www.beespeakersaijiki.blogspot.ca)

YOU ARE INVITED TO JOIN US AT THE MOBERLY GARDEN PICNIC SOCIALS!

Where: Behind the Moberly Arts and Cultural Centre
7646 Prince Albert Street, (one block east of 60th and Fraser)

Sunday June 29 @ 11 am to 1 pm

Join us at the Moberly Arts and Cultural Centre Community Garden for a picnic in the garden. Learn about pollinators and help build our garden and keep it beautiful. Please bring your own picnic brunch/lunch and dress for garden work!

 P. S.: We could really use a wheelbarrow to move the mulch if you can bring one.


Sunday July  20 @ 11 am - 2:30 pm

 Join us at the Moberly Arts and Cultural Centre Community Garden for a picnic in the garden. Special guest nature photographer and scientist Sean McCann (http://ibycter.com/) with a presentation of his photos and a workshop on taking photographs of insects in the garden. Please bring your own picnic brunch/lunch.


Sunday Aug 24 @ 11 am to 1 pm

Join us at the Moberly Arts and Cultural Centre Community Garden for a picnic in the garden. Learn about pollinators and help build our garden and keep it beautiful. Please bring your own picnic brunch/lunch and dress for garden work!


Photo: Sweat Bee on Hebe in the Moberly Arts and Cultural Centre Garden.

Father's Day Garlic Chives and Thyme: Squeeze it In for the Bees

It seems like not long ago the mason bees were pollinating the cherry blossoms and now the fruits are already starting to turn red. The B.C. strawberries are ready to pick and by all accounts it has been a great year for that crop, with just enough sun and rain to make the berries juicy and ripe. It's time to take the spring radishes out of the garden and switch to the winter radishes--you can buy black radish seeds at West Coast Seeds. I've got some Holy Basil to transplant out into the garden, and then it will be time to clean up the back porch to get the winter garden seedling going. The sugar snap peas are coming fast and furious and the baby fava beans are growing by leaps and bounds. Some of the squash plants have buds on them. The garlic is scaping, the blackberries are blooming and the air is thick with the fragrance of climbing roses.

The hebe at Moberly Community Herb garden has bloomed for the first time in four years since the garden was first installed and it is attracting little turquoise sweat bees. The variegated sage is fiercely defended by wooly carder bees and the leaf cutter bees have started to cut polka dots out of my rose leaves just as we are saying toodleloo and pip pip to the final spring mason bees.

The gardens are pretty full, but I will still sow skinny little plants in between what is there. Verbena bonariensis is a great peek-a-boo-perennial for hummingbirds and bees that you can squeeze into your garden. The fall/winter starts are coming out in the stores now and you can buy sweet little baby garlic chives to squeeze in a pot or a garden just in time for father's day, or buy little pot of thyme for father's who have all the time in the world for their children. Squeeze in some alyssum and little patches of blossoming sedum, but do create bare, sandy patches of soil for those ground-nesting bees. Buy a big strawberry pot and fill it with well-draining sandy soil and see if the ground-nesting bees will use it to make a home. You can add some rocks and shells add interest, but leave bare patches for the bees. Use the current craze for miniature gardens to create a scene or two in your pot.

Join me tomorrow at Champlain Heights for Vancouver Draw Down fun and then Sunday at the Village Vancouver transition Village at Main and 13^th where I will be hanging out with Brian Campbell of the Bee School dude. Bring your burning questions about bees!

Hot Tip: Shanti's Curries, a new shop on Main between 25^th and 26^th will be selling some awesome crispy onion pakoras and Shaktea will be giving out samples of their new house-made crumpets.

Photo: Easter egg radishes and pickled sunchokes

The Wooly Carder Bees Have Emerged

 The wooly carder bees have emerged in all their fierce cuteness. They wait on the edge of what they consider their territory and chase off all other bees. Last week the edge of this garden bed hosted two other native bees taking turns resting, but this week it's been taken over of the carder bee. Is her tongue split in half?

The blackberries are blooming an you can see that warm grey pollen collected on the corbiculae of the honeybee. (Who is pretty darned cute herself.)

Will Fire Ants Affect Native Ground Nesting Bees?

Peter did some sounds recording of bees today at VanDusen Gardens while I took photos. An area that is rich with ground-nesting bees has been invaded by fire ants. They can quickly take over an area of ground with their large nests. I hope the fire ants will not be a threat to the beautiful ground nesting bees near Alma VanDusen meadow. Ditto for the treatment to get rid of the fire ants.

Sharon Hanna tonight @ Main Street Rocky Mountain Flatbread Company

Have you heard about Rocky Mountain Flatbread's micro-green farm controversy?  Get the scoop tonight and check out Sharon Hanna and Carol Pope's new book Kale and Friends: 14 Easy-to-Grow Superfoods.

Event details here.

Meet Sharon Hanna the best selling author of The Book of Kale.
Sharon shall be signing books & demonstrating a recipe from her new book.
We shall also be featuring a Kale & Snap Pea Salad, Kale Pasta & Kale Flatbread!

EYA Bee Safari and Photo Contest