Joe Rogan Experience #1908 — Erika Thompson Transcript

Transcript

0:00 Joe Rogan Podcast, check it out! I became fascinated with to be a bee war? He's like, no, they're going to sort it out. And I go, they're going to communicate? Like, is it going to be a bee war? sending out to the entire colony to let this colony that's a super organism know what's going on. when they're figuring it out they're smelling that the is it that these other bees have a

3:13 Absolutely. so sometimes they'll just live out the rest of their bee life. through the winter, they'll live a little bit longer, and they'll live quite as much. And when we need more bees to make it through the winter, live a little bit shorter, but she can live significantly longer than all the other bees they'll either starve or freeze to death. So right now there are no male bees in most hives.

6:30 here's what happens within the colony when it's time for the queen bee to mate. So once a queen And what happens to the male bees is once they mate with a queen, their endophallus rips out of their abdominal cavity and they fall to the ground. Yes. So they have one role. their food source in the winter when nothing is in bloom and there's no for there's no flowers out there for them to forage from.

9:17 They're walking around different, you know, they're kind of fumbling and bumbling around. So they fly up in the air and they put a pheromone out that lets the queen know that they're there? waiting for a queen to fly by. And how does the queen detect where they are, they don't really have a nose like we do. You know, they even have, they can taste through their feet.

11:52 With all these little catacombs and all these little combs that they create, So the weight of the hive will bring it down. And the way that It is very fascinating. But do we have any sort of studies on what is the process that's going on within them that allows it's just they know that they need a safe place to live. And so they start to build a beehive

14:32 That's to lay eggs for the colony. colony. And they will lay eggs that turn into bees that look different. They're male drone bees. And so their larvae and their pupae look a little bit different than the worker bees. And so as a are because, again, 95% of the colony's population is female. Where does? So we often think of a colony of bees being a monarchy where the queen is in charge and making all making the decision. So we often think of, you know, a colony of bees being a

18:03 It's the colony that would know. Oh, geez. I mean, it's kind of crazy that they fight to the death. Sure. Like this poor queen, All the other bees defecate outside the hive, and she has bees that clean up after her. So swarming is when the bees will decide to leave their hive and make another either, you know, they're trying to make another bee colony or they're trying to find a new place to live.

20:27 I mean, it's a super organism. So that queen bee is really, you can think of her as the reproductive A colony of bees. but the colony really wants to be with their queen. I mean, if it's five, eight feet of comb in the walls of someone's shed or in someone's you know backyard and I don't know where the queen is, typically where most of the bees congregate.

23:11 Oh, that's a bee telling the other bees where to go. they communicate and she is signaling to all the other bees where to go and she's letting them know you you know, a large colony tends to be more defensive than a smaller one because they have more resources to defend. But every colony is different. something happened to it, it got damaged. Maybe, you know, they felt like they didn't have the

26:05 So in those backyard sheds, people tend to not go in them very often. and she's sawing through the side of the shed where the bees were. This is wild. No, these bees are not trying to sting me at all. Whoa. This was a... but there's bees flying around your face and you're just biting into that honeycomb. There's I tell you what, you're watching me at my most joyful moments.

28:15 monitor my brain And there's definitely another dopamine hit when I first see that beehive. oh, that's a beautiful shot of the comb with a bunch of pollen. So it's full of those brightly Is it as bioavailable? We wouldn't want to harvest as much pollen from bees as we do other protein sources, of course. Okay. I have no idea how our bodies process bee pollen.

31:53 She brought a small colony. fours and and you notice that there's a queen there, so you took the queen, put her in this little hive thing. she's roaming about freely hopefully laying eggs and doing what she needs to do. And I was really lucky to have parents that encouraged and supported that as well. So over 10 years ago, I took a beekeeping class and I started keeping a hive in my backyard in central Austin

35:46 job. And in 2018, I quit my full-time job and became a full-time professional beekeeper. And so it really started as organically as it could. Eventually I got asked to do live bee removals. And for me, that was just what I fell in love with as a beekeeper was being able to go into a hive and see how bees live and work naturally without a human making decisions for them.

37:43 has in their front yard. You know, it's a it's a box about a foot deep and it has that plastic lid with a small opening. And it's one So all the information that you know about in terms of like pheromones and how they construct the hive and how they create a queen and all that stuff, that's all stuff you've gotten from books? but I couldn't imagine that being my favorite thing to do.

40:02 other side that you're really helping people. I mean, when I go and remove bees from a place, it's like you're giving You're very sweet and calm and then you're there touching them with no gloves on. And, you know, and I'm showing them the queen or whatnot in the clip. parents would tell me this is the most exciting thing the kids have seen in months, you know,

43:14 just makes you, it forces you to be in the present. And it's hard to explain that to people but I can understand how people, it would terrify people. You know, I'm trying to read their behavior and they're probably trying to read mine as well to see if I'm a threat. But, you know, before that, they'll sort of ping you. everything with a lot of care and precision or as much as I can. And I hope that they pick up on

45:58 I'm probably talking to him. You know, after I've opened their hive and removed half the wall or what have you, that super organism. So they all want to be together and they're all doing what's best for the bee removal process. It takes a lot of creativity and everybody will do it in a different way and more naturally. There's just, in the hive. So maybe me, maybe a beekeeper coming in and that will make it harder for the bees to

49:53 away from it. So it's, it's, you know, one of the best tools we have in beekeepers. We don't I get burlap sacks. But, you know, once they start kind of reacting to it, You know, I was just sharing the work that bees and beekeepers do every day and could have never Yeah. see you is a mind blowing experience. But then then what I thought was like the most viral someone could go, I thought that was it.

53:24 How many people have bought Titanic? I'm just guessing. Is that true? How many times, how many people more people have seen than the Super Bowl. how much to ticket costs. How crazy is that? With an iPhone that I just happened to set up on a rock. for that how is this the first podcast you've ever done then I would imagine people have already Yes, that's convenient.

56:00 this video has over a hundred million views you have a million. There's multiple videos. I saw. Oh, my God. That's so insane. A hundred million views. Wow. Erica, that's got to be so strange for you. It's incredibly unusual. So, yeah, it's happened. but now I'm really embracing it and hope that, yeah, I love, I love showing people that you can work alongside these creatures and that they can be very peaceful and it can be a wonderful experience.

58:11 And so I love showing people something that they've never seen before. I'm Erica the beekeeper. what I wanted to do with this opportunity and also just how I want to live my life. If I can help you in that regard, don't get involved with anybody else. One of the things I like to do is they fake scenarios. They'll come up with some bullshit. And they fake problems, and they fake solutions.

1:01:13 Well, then I probably won't. And it's my largest. It was some bees I got from the night before. And my husband said, oh, no, you've got to post that one. said, it's it's kind of my way of doing it and it's when I was going through the process of You know, it was, I didn't actually go anywhere. A lot of them are wonderful people. It felt to me like it was just the process.

1:05:05 He contributes to charities. I see a way where you could do something in your world that's akin to that. Yeah. Yeah. We have to really understand that. when our bee populations are healthy, that's a good sign for our planet healthy. I read something about cell, more than one thing, about cell phone signals interfering Obviously, we can't detect cell phone signals.

1:09:55 problem with my bees not having enough food and with pesticides and, you know, industrial agriculture. it for a short period of time. So, you know, they can only collect food So we need bees for food like almonds. plantation, and they bring these bees in, where are they And, you know, they'll come from all different areas, Texas, California. It's not just honeybees, but it's, you know, the over 20,000 species of bees that we share this planet with.

1:13:53 It's mostly made of like a soy powder. I don't know if any studies have been done that have exclusively fed bees artificial food. You to live their lives. So yeah, there's little things everybody can do to make a difference So everybody can plant food for bees. That's completely false. So there is really no merit to that claim. Yeah, they used to preserve psychedelic mushrooms in honey because it keeps them from rotting.

1:18:06 Wow. I don't believe so. I don't believe so. I don't know though. I don't know much about mead myself. of sparkling wines and stuff but they make uh you know it's alcohol based out of honey sure Yeah. I bought it online. Wow. Because I know it comes from, I think, Turkey and Nepal. This comes from 2009 2011 in the 2011 one i'll put Correct. the bees did not swarm. Within only two minutes of the cell phones being turned off,

1:21:56 So that's what they call it. which is substantiated by a Swiss scientist, Daniel Favre, in 2011. They might have made it up. That's that Favre guy. tell the other bees where to go. So, you know. How do they do that? direction or the position of the sun. colony. And the more bees that choose the nest site, the more popular it is. And essentially, Well, what happens is most of the bees will take the queen and look for a new place to live

1:27:04 the natural way we get more bee colonies into the world. a site to build a new hive, which is why I do bee removals from the same places over and over again, site as a whole unit versus the individual bees. I would be happy to. And that's really just for them to have a little bit of food. They have Or girls. Wow. So there is a queen in there, and this was a swarm, so they didn't have anything with them.

1:30:47 You haven't learned from her what she said? Inside of a grocery store. which makes it stick into your skin and rip out um they can sting other bees and it won't rip out Wow, that's so cool. And then over here there's a lot of pollen. This is where the baby bees are. every bee or the female worker bees have these little wax glands on the underside of their

1:34:25 actually how the bees will or can kill a queen. In beekeeping, we refer to it as a cuddle death There it is right there. Yeah. That's so crazy. They will eat the bees or go after the honey or the pollen. hornets or wasps and you know i try to do my best beforehand to gauge like make sure that i'm Like, they're not nice at all. and all the other bees need to go after you.

1:38:00 Yeah, it's definitely remarkable. Is this difficult for you? Well, they have been found here. Yes. Yeah, the killer bees. They fry the hornets up to eat them and put them in sake. But that's what we do. They, them. Oh, wow. brought over this subspecies of bee to breed with the European honeybees, So what pollinated plants before honeybees came here?

1:42:11 How long did that take? bees? Other bees. These are just honeybees we're talking about. I would guess that's an orchid bee. squirrel. Creepy little because they're in a larger colony. a lot of bees are solitary bee solitary So a lot of them are even better pollinators than honeybees for some plants thinking about, but they do so much work for our world and are this amazing kind of underground

1:45:33 So when they go and collect pollen and nectar from a plant, They can take the pollen from one flowering plant and make sure it meets the female part of the other plant. the plants figured out it was beneficial for them we covered really recently is the large amount of wasps that will inject their larva into other creatures and use these parasitic relationships with caterpillars.

1:48:02 a large number of wasps that have parasitic relationships with other ants and different creatures, Go to a tarantula hawk because that's one of the ones that my friend Maynard sent me. They're like a finger. Because it's pretty amazing I think it already got it. Yeah, like it's under the hood. Thank you. bodies of bees, but it lives on the bee or on the baby bees. And it will, I mean, if it was on us,

1:51:30 Yeah, what is that called again? Because it goes into like logs. larva deep inside its trunk. And look at the back of it. So it's injecting these larvae. and the larvae survive eating the tissue or eating the wood. Do you know about that? Well, the ants, once it does it, see these fungus... This cordyceps mushroom, in fact, is used as a supplement.

1:55:39 And so then they started eating them. And the way they farm them, it's wild, they farm them on Do they only have to grow them at certain altitudes still? Like they're growing them on caterpillars? Look how cool this is. And notice how it goes high in the air. But how do they know? I mean, they knew that this, they knew this was the process. That's extraordinary.

1:58:41 Look how that thing is. It's so much bigger than its actual body. See if you can find a video on that. Oh, really? Whoa. Well, the cows probably knew better than us. he rolls in fox poop it's so disgusting but we have this fox that comes and visits our yard Oh, you fucking dummy. I think my dog loves a fox. Well, here's that noise they make. Hey, what's up, man?

2:02:29 I feel like most creatures just want to live peacefully on this planet, you know? This guy is opening up his car door in a suburban neighborhood, regular neighborhood. She had a hard time dealing with the bees. They're, and yeah, they. the other coyotes know when one of them is missing. coyotes started spreading. And coyotes were spreading a little bit because they were

2:05:18 I guess they were mostly in the western coast of the United States. They're in Florida. He was a mastiff. He thinks it's a dog. And when the hen was brooding, we put her in a separate smaller pen where she has to stand. They just decide that this is going to be the egg that gives them a chick. I was in my house with my family, and we were playing some board game.

2:07:46 The coyote's like, thank you, grabs it, and hops over the fence. You fucking let the coyote into the— So he tore a hole in the large chicken coop and went on a rampage and killed, like, nine chickens one day. Oh, my goodness. techniques like sometimes if he eats and he ate kind of right before we got here i'm like he'll probably throw Well, he's a love sponge.

2:10:00 I think it's less work because then they have a buddy. But space them apart age-wise and let them teach the next generation how to be in your house and around you and what you like. It's a lot. Be practical sometimes, yeah. And something, it changes you when you move out and can live more alongside nature, or at least it did for me. I mean, I am from Texas, have lived in an urban area my whole life, have lived in Austin for 15 years,

2:12:07 Because I think your body, when it's in Manhattan, Have you seen them there? I have not. Wow. or to north america so how difficult is it if someone, oh, by the way, shout out to my And, you know, you just have to learn a lot. that the bees had. And, you know, I take a very, very small amount for my personal use and then to share with friends and family or people who have helped me in the bees. And, you know, that's

2:15:30 get them to spring snapped back none of it bloomed everything died you know and it was a it was a So we just need to be careful and mindful about how much we take. So I can even take honey from one hive and give it to another and put it in another hive and give it to another colony if, you know, there's a weaker colony. So the way that we've kept bees

2:17:38 Oh, of course. They do everything. But, you know, the world's demand for honey is so high and the supply sometimes can't meet it. Sometimes Chinese honey is cut with much cheaper corn syrup and fructose syrup So they would ship it to Malaysia and then import it from Malaysia. there's tests that, that you can do to figure out where the source of the honey, you know,

2:20:13 Well, I mean, industrialized honey. Don't buy honey from the shelf. but look for honey that is labeled locally and maybe not the name of the big brand store on it or, you know, a big company. people can go to where they can find local honey is there like an online website that can direct I mean, bees forage for up to two miles. with what they're bringing in and what's happening with them. You know, even here in Austin Hives on one side of 35 versus the other, it's different

2:23:19 like avocado honey or cotton honey that, you know... at that oh that's some oh yes that is some their feeder does it i i mean i have a hummingbird feeder and i don't dye it red so look at that so way that beekeepers will collect the pollen is the bees will go through an entrance device on the front of the hive, So, you know, they're incredibly strong little creatures.

2:26:09 and you can kind of think of it like milk, like mother's milk, I have heard of people eating it as well. How do they get that, like bee pollen, click on that stuff. That one right there, yeah. How do they get that, Jazz? And there's also sugar. What are the ingredients? That's a mess. Don't do that. So you probably eat the ginseng and you think, like, oh, my God, this royal jelly is really good for me.

2:28:50 It's upset at us. Leave it for the bees. What does that mean? out what, like, the biggest You know, I think there are Oh. Thank you. Texas Bee Works. It was really fun.