Bee Love Beekeeping... presented by Mann Lake

2 Million Americans are allergic to bee stings. Do you know what to do for yourself, or someone else, when they have a severe reaction?
We kick things off with eight bee sting facts that'll make you the most insufferable know-it-all at your next beekeeping club meeting. Did you know only lady bees can sting, that a detached stinger keeps pumping venom like a tiny horror-movie villain, or that bee venom is basically one superstar protein wearing a trench coat? You're welcome.
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Then Eric sits down with Chicago allergist Dr. Juanita Mora — who, plot twist, once got absolutely obliterated by roughly 100 stings as a six-year-old sitting on her grandfather's hive (yes, sitting on it) and grew up to become the exact doctor who now teaches people how not to die from that.
Highlights:
The "two or more systems" rule that tells you in five seconds whether you need epinephrine or just a good sulk and a cold pack
Why "eh, I'll just pop a Benadryl" might be the worst sentence a beekeeper can say mid-emergency
A real live demo of EpiPen vs. Neffy (the no-needle option), including a hilarious confession about parents who've stabbed their own fingers instead of their thigh
The plot twist that you can become allergic to bees after years of stings — so "I've never reacted before" means nothing
Why your grandkids, neighbors, and even your laundry hamper might be quietly at risk
The honey myths, the botulism truth, and Eric's own homemade (informal, definitely-not-science) experiment eating local raw honey to fight his allergies
Bottom line from Dr. Mora: Every beekeeper, and anyone regularly around hives, should keep both adult and pediatric epinephrine on hand, know how to use it, and never hesitate to act during a severe reaction.
VIDEO VERSION
Special thanks to our presenting sponsor, Mann Lake! https://www.mannlakeltd.com/
Mann Lake discount code: MLBEELOVE10 for $10 off your next order.
Follow Us: https://www.beelovebeekeeping.com/follow/
https://www.beelovebeekeeping.com/
Eric@BeeLoveBeekeeping.com
Dr. Juanita Mora: https://www.instagram.com/dr.juanitamora/?hl=en
Neffy: https://www.neffy.com/
Most commercially insured patients can pay as little as $25 per prescription for two single-use neffy devices through the company's co-pay savings program.
For eligible patients whose insurance does not yet cover neffy or who face high out-of-pocket costs, ARS Pharma offers a cash price of $199 for two doses of neffy.
For eligible uninsured or underinsured patients who meet program requirements and have exhausted other options, the Patient Assistance Program may provide neffy at no cost.

Buzzing with intrigue, this episode of Bee Love Beekeeping kicks off with spider venom playing mite assassin.
Then the real fun begins: UC Riverside's Genesis Chong and Owen Wagner dish on their scrappy "Californian" hybrid bees, tough, hybridized survivors that shrug off Varroa infestations that would tank a typical commercial colony.
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• Discount Code: MLBEELOVE10
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For beekeepers tired of chemical treatments, this is the kind of hopeful buzz worth tuning in for.
Turns out the secret isn't new chemical treatments — it's happening deep in the brood chamber, where mites mysteriously struggle to reproduce on these bees' larvae.
Scent? Bad nutrition? Chemical trickery? The scientists are still chasing the answer, framing it as an evolutionary tug-of-war between bees and mites.
Toss in a hilarious military-runway bee rescue story, some reflections on falling in love with bees, and you've got a genuinely entertaining, hope-filled episode for anyone invested in the future of beekeeping.
VIDEO VERSION

Special thanks to our presenting sponsor, Mann Lake! https://www.mannlakeltd.com/
Mann Lake discount code: MLBEELOVE10 for $10 off your next order.

Follow Us: https://www.beelovebeekeeping.com/follow/
https://www.beelovebeekeeping.com/
Eric@BeeLoveBeekeeping.com

Genesis & Owen: https://ciber.ucr.edu/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ciber_ucr/
Facebook: Center for Integrative Bee Research (CIBER)

Yappy: "This will get me excommunicated from the bee community!"
Firefighter by day, bee-whisperer by everything else — Yappy BeeMan joins the show fresh off a job (complete with a couple of fresh stings) to spill 15 years of beekeeping wisdom, chaos, and comedy.
Yappy tells the wild story of how one shaky cell-phone video — where he caught a queen bare-handed, mid-recording, with nowhere to put her — rocketed his channel from 5,000 subscribers to a million views practically overnight.
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$10 off your next order! https://www.mannlakeltd.com/
• Discount Code: MLBEELOVE10
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From there, things get delightfully spicy: he makes the case for treating bees "like ladies" (suit optional), roasts the beekeepers who bust up cinder block basements to "save" $150 worth of bees, and explains why lazy trap-outs are basically bee purgatory.
The grand finale? Two jaw-dropping removals from a 150-year-old farmhouse — one wall hiding a 75-year-old colony, the other a 45-year-old honey vault with a jaw-dropping 100 gallons inside.
Oh, and before all that — the host crunches this year's colony loss numbers. The bees are doing a little better, but as one industry leader puts it, that's still less "victory lap" and more "crisis in slow motion."
Buckle up, beekeepers — it's a big one.
VIDEO VERSION

Special thanks to our presenting sponsor, Mann Lake! https://www.mannlakeltd.com/
Mann Lake discount code: MLBEELOVE10 for $10 off your next order.

Follow Us: https://www.beelovebeekeeping.com/follow/
https://www.beelovebeekeeping.com/
Eric@BeeLoveBeekeeping.com

Yappy Beeman: https://swarmremover.com/ https://www.youtube.com/@YappyBeeman

Before getting into the honey of it all, host Eric riffs on a string of bizarre highway mishaps — rolled-over bee trucks, a tofu spill, flaming ribeyes — proving that 2026 is just a weird year for cargo.
Then the real magic begins: mechanical-engineer-turned-beekeeper Bill Hesbach drops some serious hive-mind wisdom on condensing hives, the practice of letting bees manage their own internal climate instead of beekeepers cranking up the ventilation.
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• Discount Code: MLBEELOVE10
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Turns out our buzzy friends are basically tiny thermodynamics geniuses — using CO2 to chill their metabolism, recycling latent heat from condensation, and even running their own swamp coolers in summer. Who knew beekeeping came with a side of physics class?
The conversation gets delightfully nerdy (volcano-buried hives! snow as insulation! queens partying in CO2 chambers!) before Bill explains how to DIY your own insulated hive sleeve — and why a "quilt box" might be sabotaging your bees without you knowing it.
Things wrap up with two classic wild & crazy beekeeper tales: a swarm-catching fiasco involving mistaken identity (turns out bees are sneaky little ninjas) and a jungle honey-hunt in Thailand that ends with giant Apis dorsata bees chasing panicked undergrads through snake-infested streams. Equal parts science lecture and adventure story — this one's a hive worth diving into.
VIDEO VERSION

Special thanks to our presenting sponsor, Mann Lake! https://www.mannlakeltd.com/
Mann Lake discount code: MLBEELOVE10 for $10 off your next order.

Follow Us: https://www.beelovebeekeeping.com/follow/
https://www.beelovebeekeeping.com/
Eric@BeeLoveBeekeeping.com

Bill: https://www.wingdancehoney.com/

Host Eric Bennett, travels across the pond to Cornwall, England, for a fascinating conversation with Molly Earl, full-time beekeeper and founder of Bees Off and The Rescued Bee.
Molly specializes in live bee removals — rescuing honeybee colonies from chimneys, walls, flat roofs, and other structures — and has grown what started as a two-hive hobby into an operation managing roughly 300 beehives across mid-Cornwall.
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$10 off your next order! https://www.mannlakeltd.com/
• Discount Code: MLBEELOVE10
_________________
The conversation covers her techniques, tools, the Cornwall beekeeping season, and pest management. Plus, Molly shares a couple of wild & crazy, memorable beekeeping stories that you won't want to miss... including how the pant leg of her beekeeping suit caught on fire!
Video Version of This Episode

Special thanks to our presenting sponsor, Mann Lake! https://www.mannlakeltd.com/
Mann Lake discount code: MLBEELOVE10 for $10 off your next order.

Follow Us: https://www.beelovebeekeeping.com/follow/
https://www.beelovebeekeeping.com/
Eric@BeeLoveBeekeeping.com
The Honeycomb Conjecture: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s004540010071

Molly Earl: https://beesoff.co.uk/