Last Week In The Apiary
“Last Week in the Apiary” is a program inspired by years of helping beekeepers monitor their colonies and management practices. A big lesson from that work is all beekeeping is local, and beekeeping requires a time. It is easy to forget and delay management practices, and the aim of this program is to provide weekly reminders to beekeepers about what we are doing, in the hope that it will act as a prompt or reminder to other MD and surrounding state beekeepers that they should probably be doing the same thing soon.
This is not a beekeeper's calendar, but a journal of activities and observations which we link to weather and bloom, so we may give some context to beekeepers wanting to see how their colonies and their management compares.
We are grateful to USDA NIFA (Comprehensive IPM Approaches Tailored for a Diverse State award number 2024-70006-43556) for funding this program.
Each week that a member of our team works bee colonies, we plan to produce a succinct summary in the form of one slide worth of information with our activities in the week.
Beekeepers can click "Visit Last Week In the Apiary" to view our weekly reports.
Sign up to get notifications when new weekly posts are made by clicking the link below.
This is not a beekeeper's calendar, but a journal of activities and observations which we link to weather and bloom, so we may give some context to beekeepers wanting to see how their colonies and their management compares.
We are grateful to USDA NIFA (Comprehensive IPM Approaches Tailored for a Diverse State award number 2024-70006-43556) for funding this program.
Each week that a member of our team works bee colonies, we plan to produce a succinct summary in the form of one slide worth of information with our activities in the week.
Beekeepers can click "Visit Last Week In the Apiary" to view our weekly reports.
Sign up to get notifications when new weekly posts are made by clicking the link below.
Total and Average Times:
The project captures the time it typically takes to manage bees, to give an idea of the time commitment.To keep this relatable and dynamic, we did not include drive time between apiaries or general prep time (ie: mixing sugar) since the majority of Maryland beekeepers do not manage multiple out yards or maintain as many colonies.
The Average Time:
Per Colony relates to colonies worked and not the Total Colonies, listed at the bottom of the slide.
Actions:
Highlight management actions taken and include the number of colonies worked.
Observations:
What we observed of note while working the apiary.
Reflections:
Here we take a moment to reflect on something from the week: to be thankful, for what we may have done, things left undone and/or wish we had thought to do, or to just remember how rewarding working with bees can bee.
Average Temperature and Precipitation:
All Weather data was collected from NOAA’s National Weather Service public database collected from their Beltsville, MD station. https://www.weather.gov/wrh/Climate?wfo=lwx
Things in Bloom:
The plants noted were observed during bee work and generally observed within 20 miles of the apiary. We try to include links to information about each plant we observed. Depending on where you are located you may notice plants not included here or with bloom times earlier or later than what is indicated here.
Images:
Images included in this resource were taken during one of the actions or observations referenced that week or that relate to the content when no image was available.
All photographs presented are ©2025 UMD Bee Lab, unless otherwise indicated, and are the intellectual property of the photographer, protected under copyright law. These images may be used for educational, non-commercial purposes with appropriate credit. Commercial use is not permitted without prior written permission. They are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Questions regarding image use or images included can be directed to [email protected].
Disclaimer Regarding Products Used:
As part of an Integrative Pest Management approach, in certain cases and situations, we use treatments and products to help us keep strong and healthy colonies. Any product or treatment listed in this resource is not intended as a promotion or to encourage beekeepers to use that type of product but is intended to inform beekeepers of what we chose to use at that point in the season.
The project captures the time it typically takes to manage bees, to give an idea of the time commitment.To keep this relatable and dynamic, we did not include drive time between apiaries or general prep time (ie: mixing sugar) since the majority of Maryland beekeepers do not manage multiple out yards or maintain as many colonies.
The Average Time:
Per Colony relates to colonies worked and not the Total Colonies, listed at the bottom of the slide.
Actions:
Highlight management actions taken and include the number of colonies worked.
Observations:
What we observed of note while working the apiary.
Reflections:
Here we take a moment to reflect on something from the week: to be thankful, for what we may have done, things left undone and/or wish we had thought to do, or to just remember how rewarding working with bees can bee.
Average Temperature and Precipitation:
All Weather data was collected from NOAA’s National Weather Service public database collected from their Beltsville, MD station. https://www.weather.gov/wrh/Climate?wfo=lwx
Things in Bloom:
The plants noted were observed during bee work and generally observed within 20 miles of the apiary. We try to include links to information about each plant we observed. Depending on where you are located you may notice plants not included here or with bloom times earlier or later than what is indicated here.
Images:
Images included in this resource were taken during one of the actions or observations referenced that week or that relate to the content when no image was available.
All photographs presented are ©2025 UMD Bee Lab, unless otherwise indicated, and are the intellectual property of the photographer, protected under copyright law. These images may be used for educational, non-commercial purposes with appropriate credit. Commercial use is not permitted without prior written permission. They are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Questions regarding image use or images included can be directed to [email protected].
Disclaimer Regarding Products Used:
As part of an Integrative Pest Management approach, in certain cases and situations, we use treatments and products to help us keep strong and healthy colonies. Any product or treatment listed in this resource is not intended as a promotion or to encourage beekeepers to use that type of product but is intended to inform beekeepers of what we chose to use at that point in the season.