Yellow jessamine… lovely, but deadly. At this time of the year, and in most years a month prior to this, we have to deal with a poisonous source of nectar. It comes from a native climbing vine here in central Florida that is spreading rapidly and taking over lots of transitional pasture swamp property. Most years, the maple and the jessamine blooms coincide in early January. This year, because of the mild winter and warm temperatures we had in December, both of these blooms were delayed and it has put brood rearing a solid 3 weeks behind. To add insult to injury, along with the bloom of the jessamine come the inevitable demise of newly hatched baby bees that seem to be the only ones in the hive for whom the nectar is disagreeable. Except for the presence of many baby bee carcasses on the bottom boards, the brood nests are beginning to fill with pollen frames and full sheets of brood. Thankfully we are seeing lots of drones and our drone combs are now being filled with drone larva. We can expect to have to deal with the jessamine for another 2 weeks. It’s a problem in all of our mating nuc yards as well as our home cell yard. We can feed the bees syrup during the bloom and if the bees find another nectar source like willow, this will take them off the jessamine and lessen its effect on the brood nest. Why does something so beautiful and something that grows and blooms so well have to be poisonous to our bees? Pictured in this post is the yellow jessamine vine and its effects on the hive.