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Video: Abuzz over bees
Interest in beekeeping grows
MIKE SIMONS / Tulsa World
By CARY ASPINWALL World Scene Writer
Published: 7/30/2009 2:20 AM
Last Modified: 7/30/2009 4:57 AM
Linda Highbarger's bees only sting when she's harvesting their honey.
"I've got one hive that's kind of nasty," she said. "But they're producing a 100-pound box of honey every week, so they can be nasty so long as they keep producing like that."
She keeps several hives of bees on her three-acre property near Chandler Park in west Tulsa, selling jars of her Hilltop Honey and honey-infused beauty products at local farmers markets. The bee stings are a small price to pay to reap the environmental and medicinal benefits of local, organic honey — as well as its delicious taste — she said.
Highbarger loves all things honey (she even peppers her conversation with "Oh, honey!") and thinks bees are fascinating.
"We used to put our lawn chairs out there and drink a glass of wine and just watch them," she said.
The personality of each hive is based on the queen — if she's nasty, they'll be nasty, Highbarger said. That means her top-producing hive has a rather wicked queen.
A growing population interested in eating locally grown, pesticide-free products is contributing to a beekeeping boom in the Tulsa area, said Greg Hannaford of the Northeast Oklahoma Beekeepers Association. Association members teach two classes a year to train novice beekeepers — and classes fill up quickly.
Bee boom
Many believe that eating local honey can aid allergy symptoms and sweeten foods more safely than processed sugars or artificial sweeteners. Beekeeping's popularity may be partly tied to its perceived health benefits, but there's also a lot of interest in it as a hobby, especially among baby boomers, Hannaford said. Women age 48 to 58 are the association's fastest-growing demographic.
"The creatures themselves tend to fascinate people to no end," he said.
The honey is definitely a bonus to the agricultural and environmental benefits that bees provide.
"The best-tasting honey in the world is what you make yourself," he added.
And you don't have to live on a farm to keep bees — an ordinance enacted several years ago clarified rules for beekeepers in Tulsa city limits — making it easier for beekeepers to raise the insects and produce their own honey. Hannaford's own honey-producing operation is in the middle of midtown, smack dab in a neighborhood of houses without buzzing hives or fruit crops.
And urban beekeepers are essential to managing the city's honeybee population (they're often called to remove swarms from yards) and pollinating local plants.
A healthy, well-managed honeybee population also helps protect our region against the influx of dangerous, aggressive Africanized bees.
"We don't have Africanized bees here yet, but we will," Hannaford said. "Tulsa has an advantage because we have a huge population of (beekeepers) to deal with them."
Traditional (European) honeybees aren't aggressive unless they're protecting their hives. And if the Tulsa area has a healthy population of honeybees surviving on local nectar and pollen, it will discourage populations of Africanized bees from moving in, Highbarger said.
"There's not going to be anything to encourage them coming here."
Sudden death
Colony collapse — the sudden death of European honeybee hives — has been perplexing beekeepers for the past few years.
Highbarger lost a hive earlier this year, one that she was keeping on someone else's organic farm.
The bees were there in March. In April, they were gone. They left seven gallons of honey behind. She still doesn't know what caused it.
Colony collapse should concern everyone, she said, because bees are essential for pollinating fruit and nut crops.
"If something happens to the bees, what's going to happen to the humans?" she said. "And it's because they're taking in pesticides and becoming stressed, what is happening to us?"
Just don't show fear around the bees. It cause you to give off pheromones that can cause the bees to be more aggressive about stinging you, Highbarger said.
She gets stung "a bunch," but that's because she has to go into their hives to harvest honey.
"I have never been stung just walking by, only when I go into the hive," she said. "They're just protecting their home.
"And sometimes they're just having a bad day."
Why local honey?
The theory behind eating locally produced
honey to combat allergies is that the bees
are using the pollen in your area, so eating
honey produced from that pollen can help
your body build a tolerance.
But some scientists argue that the pollen
that cause sneezing and congestion — such
as ragweed or cedar — are windborne, while
the pollen that bees collect are typically too
heavy to fly in the breeze.
There’s not much clinical evidence to support
the claim that honey alleviates allergy
symptoms.
“Science-wise, there’s nothing I know of to
back it up,” said Dr. Harriet Shaw, residency
director for Oklahoma State University’s College
of Osteopathic Medicine.
Bees carry the pollen on their bodies in different
places than they carry nectar, she said.
So the pollen is never really incorporated in
the honey.
“A lot of people seem to think it’s true,”
she said. “It couldn’t hurt. It’s true that
people are looking for anything that could
help with allergies.”
Honey has some documented health benefits,
she said. One recent study compared
honey to the drug dextromethorphan, in
terms of its benefit as a cough suppressant.
Honey actually worked better for children,
Shaw said. But children under a year old
shouldn’t eat honey because their digestive
systems haven’t developed enough to fend
off traces of botulism that can be lurking in
honey.
Where to buy local honey
Hilltop Honey is sold at the Cherry Street
Farmers Market (both the Saturday market,
and the Wednesday market in Brookside)
and the downtown farmers market on Tuesdays.
Local honey is also sold at:
Grumpy’s Garden, 1140 E. 15th St.
Natural Farms, 420 S. Utica Ave.; 6560 E.
91st St.
Akin’s Natural Foods Market, 3321 E. 31st St.;
7807 E. 51st St.
Cary Aspinwall 581-8477
cary.aspinwall@tulsaworld.com
By CARY ASPINWALL World Scene Writer
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