Wellington Beekeepers Association

11/06/2026

Your Friday funny

02/06/2026

Don't forget the beginners session commences at 6.45pm and the main meeting at 7.30pm

Guest speaker Kat Holt from Polynase services will be talking to use about pollen in honey and the stories it can tell you.

12/05/2026

23/02/2026

A team from the University of Freiburg led by neurobiologist and behavioral biologist Prof. Dr. Andrew Straw studied the flight behavior of honey bees. Using a drone, the researchers tracked honey bees as they flew between their hive and a food source about 120 meters away in an agricultural environ...

08/11/2025

Hundreds more European hoverflies have been brought over from England to be bred released in their thousands.

06/11/2025

⚠️ Auckland — You need to Act Now The yellow-legged hornet (Vespa velutina) has officially landed on our shores. Six have already been found around Glenfield, including four queens — two were even building nests.

This invasive predator is a serious threat to our honeybees — and not just the farmed ones. We have 27 native bee species here in Aotearoa, along with countless other pollinators that keep our ecosystems alive.

Everyone in Auckland needs to take action — now, not later. Don’t wait for MPI or Biosecurity NZ to handle it. They are no more responsible for this than any of us. It’s our duty to protect our own backyards and we can all help by setting up homemade hornet traps

🪤 Here’s how to make a trap with a bottle. ( i made mine in about 5 minutes) Cut two holes about halfway up the bottle and fold inwards. Suspend from a piece of wire or stand up on a flat surface.

Add a mix of:
🧴 1 cup of beer
🥄 table spoon of sugar
🍎 A splash of vinegar — White vinegar works perfectly (This is a deterrent for bees.)
💧 A few drops of dishwashing liquid
(This helps them drown quickly.)

This is a sweet bait to catch emerging queens.

As summer comes you will need to switch to a protein lure a few small bits of fatty meat or chicken skin are perfect. Just add them to the same mix minus the sugar.

If you have any Hornets near they will fly in, get trapped, and drown. This simple setup can help protect our native bees and stop this species before it spreads further. Your trap is likely to have bicatch of other species but if this hornet makes its home here it will cause devastation.

📸 If you spot one: Take a photo and report it immediately to MPI. 📞 Or call 0800 80 99 66 24/7 exotic pest and disease hotline for Biosecurity New Zealand.

Together, we can stop the spread and protect the bees that protect us.

01/11/2025

One of nature's amazing phenomenon

25/10/2025

The hives contained live bees, with the colonies being worth more than $33k.

21/10/2025

With the strong winds, make sure your hives are secure