Beekeeping is a sixteen-billion-dollar-a-year business. But the invaluable honey bee now faces severe threats from diseases, mites, pesticides, and overwork, not to mention the mysterious Colony Collapse Disorder, which causes seemingly healthy bees to abandon their hives en masse, never to return. In The Quest for the Perfect Hive, entomologist Gene Kritsky offers a concise, beautifully illustrated history of beekeeping, tracing the evolution of hive design from ancient Egypt to the present. Not simply a descriptive account, the book suggests that beekeeping's long history may in fact contain clues to help beekeepers fight the decline in honey bee numbers. Kritsky guides us through the progression from early mud-based horizontal hives to the ascent of the simple straw skep (the inverted basket which has been in use for over 1,500 years), from hive design's Golden Age in Victorian England up through the present. He discusses what worked, what did not, and what we have forgotten about past hives that might help counter the menace to beekeeping today. Indeed, while we have sequenced the honey bee genome and advanced our knowledge of the insects themselves, we still keep our bees in hives that have changed little during the past century. If beekeeping is to survive, Kritsky argues, we must start inventing again. We must find the perfect hive for our times. For thousands of years, the honey bee has been a vital part of human culture. The Quest for the Perfect Hive not only offers a colorful account of this long history, but also provides a guide for ensuring its continuation into the future.

The long nineteenth century (1789-1914) has been described as an axial age in the history of both bees and literature. It was the period in which the ecological and agronomic values that are still attributed to bees by modern industrial society were first established, and it was the period in which one bee species (the European honeybee) completed its dispersal to every habitable continent on Earth. At the same time, literature – which would enable, represent and in some cases repress or disavow this radical transformation of bees’ fortunes – was undergoing its own set of transformations. Bees, Science, and Sex in the Literature of the Long Nineteenth Century navigates the various developments that occurred in the scientific study of bees and in beekeeping during this period of remarkable change, focusing on the bees themselves, those with whom they lived, and how old and new ideas about bees found expression in an ever-diversifying range of literary media. Ranging across literary forms and genres, the studies in this volume show the ubiquity of bees in nineteenth-century culture, demonstrate the queer specificity of writing about and with bees, and foreground new avenues for research into an animal profoundly implicated in the political, economic, ecological, emotional and aesthetic conditions of the modern world.

A fascinating study that “opens a window on the world of beekeeping and female beekeepers” (Lexington Herald-Leader). From Africa to Australia to Asia, women have participated in the pragmatic aspects of honey hunting and in the more advanced skills associated with beekeeping as hive technology has progressed through the centuries. Who are the women who keep bees and what can we learn from them? Beeconomy examines the fascinating evolution of the relationship between women and bees around the world. Bee expert Tammy Horn profiles female beekeepers, describing their work and how they manage it; the sense of community they enjoy; how beekeeping is relevant to questions about globalization and politics—and how it provides an opportunity for a new sustainable economy, one that takes into consideration environment, children, and family needs.

‘An exceptional first book; Harvest is a subtle, fascinating braiding of travel, cultural and natural history ... It is a pleasure and an education to journey with him in these pages’ Robert Macfarlane In a centuries-old tradition, farmers in northwestern Iceland scour remote coastal plains for the down of nesting eider ducks. High inside a vast cave in Borneo, men perched atop rickety ladders collect swiftlets’ nests, a delicacy believed to be a cure for almost anything. Eiderdown and edible birds’ nests: both are luxury products, ultimately destined for the super-rich. To the rest of the world these materials are mere commodities but to the harvesters they are all imbued with myth, tradition, folklore and ritual, and form part of a shared identity and history. These objects are two of the seven natural wonders whose stories Harvest tells: eiderdown, vicuña wool, sea silk, vegetable ivory, civet coffee, guano and edible birds’ nests. Harvest follows their journey from the wildest parts of the planet, traversing Iceland, Indonesia, and Peru, to its urban centres, drawing on the voices of the gatherers, shearers and entrepreneurs who harvest, process and trade them. Blending interviews, history and travel writing, Harvest sets these human stories against our changing economic and ecological landscape. What do they tell us about capitalism, global market forces and overharvesting? How does a local micro-economy survive in a hyper-connected world? Harvest makes us see the world with wonder, curiosity and new concern. It is an original and magical new map of our world and its riches.

The fascinating story of the urban honeybee garden on the roof of the legendary Waldorf Astoria hotel. The tale of Honeybee Hotel begins over one hundred years ago, with the Astor family and the birth of the iconic Manhattan landmark, the magnificent Waldorf Astoria. In those early days the posh art deco masterpiece had its own rooftop garden for guests to enjoy. Fast-forward to the turn of the twenty-first century, and we meet executive chef David Garcelon, the creative genius behind the idea of restoring the celebrated rooftop garden. His vision included six hives containing some 300,000 honeybees, which would provide a unique flavor for his restaurant’s culinary masterpieces. Yet Garcelon’s dream was much grander than simply creating a private chefs’ garden: he wanted the honeybee garden to serve as a bond among people. Soon the staff of the hotel, the guests, local horticulturists, and beekeeping experts formed a community around the bees and the garden, which not only raised vegetables, herbs, and honey to be served in the hotel but also provided healthy food to the homeless shelter across the street at St. Bartholomew’s Church. Through her meticulous research and interviews with culinary glitterati, entomologists, horticulturists, and urban beekeepers, Leslie Day leads us on a unique insider’s tour of this little-known aspect of the natural world of New York City. She familiarizes us with the history of the architectural and cultural gem that is the Waldorf and introduces us to the lives of Chef Garcelon and New York City’s master beekeeper, Andrew Coté. Day, an urban naturalist and incurable New Yorker, tells us of the garden’s development, shares delectable honey-based recipes from the hotel’s chefs and mixologist, and relates the fate of the hotel in the wake of the Waldorf’s change of ownership. During our journey, we learn quite a bit about apiaries, as well as insect and flower biology, through the lives of the bees that travel freely around the city in search of nectar, pollen, and resin. This absorbing narrative unwraps the heart within the glamour of one of the world’s most beloved cities, while assuring us that nature can thrive in the ultimate urban environment when its denizens care enough to foster that connection.

Seeley, a world authority on honey bees, sheds light on why wild honey bees are still thriving while those living in managed colonies are in crisis. Drawing on the latest science as well as insights from his own pioneering fieldwork, he describes in extraordinary detail how honey bees live in nature and shows how this differs significantly from their lives under the management of beekeepers. Seeley presents an entirely new approach to beekeeping--Darwinian Beekeeping--which enables honey bees to use the toolkit of survival skills their species has acquired over the past thirty million years, and to evolve solutions to the new challenges they face today. He shows beekeepers how to use the principles of natural selection to guide their practices, and he offers a new vision of how beekeeping can better align with the natural habits of honey bees.

"[Strange Harvests is] an impressive addition to the modern travelogue, painting some of the world's most remote terrain in visceral and sometimes breathtaking prose . . . an engrossing read." --NPR An original and magical map of our world and its riches, formed of the stories of the small-scale harvests of seven natural objects In this beguiling book, Edward Posnett journeys to some of the most far-flung locales on the planet to bring us seven wonders of the natural world--eiderdown, vicuña fiber, sea silk, vegetable ivory, civet coffee, guano, and edible birds' nests--that promise ways of using nature without damaging it. To the rest of the world these materials are mere commodities, but to their harvesters they are imbued with myth, tradition, folklore, and ritual, and form part of a shared identity and history. Strange Harvests follows the journeys of these uncommon products from some of the most remote areas of the world to its most populated urban centers, drawing on the voices of the people and little-known communities who harvest, process, and trade them. Blending history, travel writing, and interviews, Posnett sets these human stories against our changing economic and ecological landscape. What do they tell us about capitalism, global market forces, and overharvesting? How do local microeconomies survive in a hyperconnected world? Is it possible for us to live together with different species? Strange Harvests makes us see the world with wonder, curiosity, and new concern.

"Insects are seldom mentioned in history texts, yet they significantly shaped human history. The Silken Thread: Five Insects and Their Impacts on History tells the stories of just five insects, tied together by a thread originating in the Silk Roads of Asia, and how they have impacted our world. Silkworms have been farmed to produce silk for millennia, creating a history of empires and cultural exchanges; Silk Roads connected East to West, generating trade centers and transferring ideas, philosophies, and religions. The western honey bee feeds countless people, and their crop pollination is worth billions of dollars. Fleas and lice carried bacteria that caused three major plague pandemics, moved along the Silk Roads from Central Asia. Bacteria carried by insects left their ancient clues as DNA embedded in victims' teeth. Lice caused outbreaks of typhus, especially in crowded conditions such as prisons and concentration camps. Typhus aggravated the effects of the Irish potato famine, and Irish refugees took typhus to North America. Yellow fever was transported to the Americas via the trans-Atlantic slave trade, taking and devaluing the lives of millions of Africans. Slaves were brought to the Americas to reduce labor costs in the cultivation of sugarcane, which was itself transported from south Asia along the Silk Roads. Yellow fever caused panic in the United States in the 1700s and 1800s as the virus and its mosquito vector migrated from the Caribbean. Constructing the Panama Canal required defeating mosquitoes that transmitted yellow fever. The silken thread runs through and ties together these five insects and their impacts on history"--

Barns of New York explores and celebrates the agricultural and architectural diversity of the Empire State-from Long Island to Lake Erie, the Southern Tier to the North Country-providing a unique compendium of the vernacular architecture of rural New York. Through descriptions of the appearance and working of representative historic farm buildings, Barns of New York also serves as an authoritative reference for historic preservation efforts across the state. Cynthia G. Falk connects agricultural buildings-both extant examples and those long gone-with the products and processes they made and make possible. Great attention is paid not only to main barns but also to agricultural outbuildings such as chicken coops, smokehouses, and windmills. Falk further emphasizes the types of buildings used to support the cultivation of products specifically associated with the Empire State, including hops, apples, cheese, and maple syrup. Enhanced by more than two hundred contemporary and historic photographs and other images, this book provides historical, cultural, and economic context for understanding the rural landscape. In an appendix are lists of historic farm buildings open to the public at living history museums and historic sites. Through a greater awareness of the buildings found on farms throughout New York, readers will come away with an increased appreciation for the state's rich agricultural and architectural legacy.

The corpus of literary works shaped by the Renaissance and the Baroque that appeared in Spain during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries had a transforming effect on writing throughout Europe and left a rich legacy that scholars continue to explore. For four decades after the Spanish Civil War the study of this literature flourished in Great Britain and Ireland, where many of the leading scholars in the field were based. Though this particular 'Golden Age' was followed by a decline for many years, there have recently been signs of a significant revival. The present book seeks to showcase the latest research of established and younger colleagues from Great Britain and Ireland on the Spanish Golden Age. It falls into four sections, in each of which works by particular authors are examined in detail: prose (Miguel de Cervantes, Francisco de Quevedo, Baltasar Gracian), poetry (The Count of Salinas, Luis de Gongora, Pedro Soto de Rojas), drama (Cervantes, Calderon, Lope de Vega), and colonial writing (Bernardo Balbuena, Hernando Dominguez Camargo, Alonso de Ercilla). There are essays also on more general themes (the motif of poetry as manna; rehearsals on the Golden Age stage; proposals put to viceroys on governing Spanish Naples). The essays, taken together, offer a representative sample of current scholarship in England, Scotland, and Ireland.