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January 2026 Newsletter

January 2026 – Newsletter (Laura Winters – Birds and the Bees Apiary)

Over the past month and a half, my business partner Rex and I have been busy preparing for the upcoming season.

We’ve assembled new hive equipment, including medium supers and deep boxes, then applied a coat of primer and paint to protect and […]

Pollinator Plant Spotlight – Mexican Buckeye

The Mexican Buckeye (Ungnadia speciosa) is a Texas-native, deciduous ornamental shrub or small tree (8–12 ft, up to 30 ft) with distinctive 3-lobed,, reddish-brown seed capsules containing poisonous, black, shiny seeds. It features fragrant spring whiteish-pink flowers, yellow fall color, and high drought tolerance, thriving in limestone soils, full sun, or partial shade.

It blooms […]

Pesticides – Death and destruction to bees

This week, in my personal back yard – I have experienced a fairly fast die-off of 5 colonies. These bees were here simply for the purposes of building them up to be strong, so they could be placed onto agriculture contracts.

Usually, I’ll give a build-up and background before I tell the meat of what’s […]

Propagating Pollinator Plants

This year I *really* noticed the Western Soapberry trees in the North Texas (North of Dallas / Ft Worth MetroMess) area during their bloom, and the pollinators all over the trees while in bloom. I suspect this was a 2nd bloom for the year. My time really noticing them was from the end of May […]