how to wash bees
DESCRIPTION
This slide show documents how to wash bees that have been collected in water or preserved in alcohol.TRANSCRIPT
Setting up Your Own Beeuty SalonSam Droege
Mark Inda
The ProblemThe Problem
While it is very handy to capture and store bees in water, alcohol, glycol, or formalin
Bees pinned straight out of those liquids look atrocious
Hair heavily matted, wings glued to one another, and identifying the specimen is difficult
And they just look bad and who wants to look at bad looking bees?
The SolutionThe Solution Getting a good looking specimen is a 2
step process
1. Good Washing 2. Good Drying
Both Step are Both Step are NecessaryNecessary
Don’t delude yourself that your specimens are any different
The Bee Washer The Bee Washer Creating a bee washer is so easy there
is no reason not too Get a pint or quart canning jar (buy a
jar with preserves of jam in it from the farmer’s market)
The Bee WasherThe Bee Washer Remove the central metal disk Replace that disk with a piece of
plastic window screen Plastic window screen is cheap and
sold in any hardware store. Plastic window screen is preferable to
metal screens as metal screens often unravel
Bee WashingBee Washing To wash bees dump your specimens into
the bee washer with whatever liquid they are stored in
If they are reluctant to leave that container, just add more water to flush them out
Replace the lid with the screen in place Dump the liquid out through the screen Add some water and rinse the specimens
once to get that gookiest sludge out
Wet Insects are ToughWet Insects are Tough We have never seen any damage to
insects during the washing phase You can shake and swirl them to your
heart’s content
Warm Water – NOT Cold Warm Water – NOT Cold WaterWater
Add enough warm water to amply cover the specimen, but don’t fill the jar to the top.
Usually this means about 1/3 to 1/4 full
Like washing your clothes, warm water not cold water gets the pollen, dirt, and especially the regurgitated nectar (the worst)out
DetergentizeDetergentize Add a big squirt of dish washing
detergent Other cleaning fluids will work fine too,
such as ammonia, degreaser, 409, laundry detergent, etc.
Dish washing detergent keeps your hands nice and soft though
Swirl Vigorously for One Swirl Vigorously for One Minute and Minute and NotNot Less Less
People tend to shortcut this phase and then wonder why their specimens look all goopy
Duh. When you wash your clothes you don’t just dip them in water…or do you?
Bees look bad usually because you didn’t wash them long enough to get rid of the nectar in their hair
Hint: While swirling for one minute read email from your Supervisor
Rinse Until ClearRinse Until Clear Now simply dump out the water in the
jar (through the screen obviously) And add and dump water until the
water is clear
Next: Drying Your Clean Next: Drying Your Clean BeesBees
See the associated slide shows or Power Points on Bee drying (soon to come)◦ Paper Towel Technique◦ Blow Dryer Technique◦ Automatic Dryer