Austin, TX
Honeybees are having a tough year — including in Austin
Beekeepers across the country are reporting high rates of honeybee loss this season, and Texas is no exception.
A recent survey from Project Apis m., a nonprofit dedicated to beekeeping science, found that American commercial beekeepers lost about 62% of their bees between June and March — the highest rate in almost two decades. In Texas, commercial beekeepers lost around 67% of their bees on average.
Beekeeping industry experts have sounded the alarm that these losses could have a detrimental impact on produce that relies on honeybees as pollinators, including California almonds.
Garett Slater, a professor and honeybee expert at Texas A&M University’s Department of Entomology, said it’s possible some Texas crops, such as watermelons, could also take a hit.
“It depends if the beekeepers can make up their numbers or not,” Slater said. “It’s kind of a waiting game, and we’ll learn more in the next few months.”
Scientists are still trying to figure out why honeybees are struggling. According to Project Apis m., experts at the U.S. Department of Agriculture and university labs are investigating a range of possible contributing factors, including pathogens, pesticide use and environmental impacts.
“The USDA … mobilized quickly to collect samples in California, and we anticipate results soon,” said Steven Coy, American Honey Producers Association President, in a statement shared by Project Apis m.
Michael Minasi
/
KUT News
Austin-area beekeepers reflect on losses
In Central Texas, hobbyist beekeeping has grown in popularity since a 2012 bill gave landowners the opportunity to gain an agricultural valuation on their property by keeping bees — effectively, a tax cut.
Sarah Denman’s business Bee Salty leases and maintains hives for landowners throughout Central Texas. Denman isn’t a commercial beekeeper — she estimates she maintains between 350 and 400 hives, compared to the thousands often overseen by commercial operations — but she, too, has noticed bees struggling this year.
“I have lost more bees this year than I have ever before, and I think there’s a bunch of variables for that,” Denman said.
Denman said she suspects pesticide use may be partially to blame. Additionally, she said unfavorable rain patterns in the spring and fall last year made it hard for bees to build up food stores before winter.
Kat Jones, who works with Denman and also owns her own small apiary, lost about a tenth of her own hives in early March.
“It was a very up and down winter, and that last really cold snap that happened right at the end of February was pretty hard on the bees,” she said.
Tiny enemies
Weather swings in Central Texas can’t account for nationwide losses, but Jones said she believes many bee habitats around the country are experiencing difficult climate shifts.
Slater, however, believes a long-time enemy of the honeybee is likely to blame: the varroa mite, a parasite that feeds on bees and transmits viruses. He said the mites have appeared more resistant to the pesticide commonly used to treat them over the past five years. It’s one possiblity scientists are currently investigating.
That’s why Slater’s lab at Texas A&M is focused on breeding bees that are resistant to varroa mites.
“Even if we switch to a new treatment, there’s always going to be a risk … of resistance,” he said. “So I think the most long-term sustainable solution is always going to be breeding.”
Denman said she believes the increased popularity of hobbyist beekeeping may also play a role in the spread of viruses. It’s great to have more pollinators around, she said — but there are also challenges that come with density, with more bees competing for resources and potentially sharing mites with other colonies.
“If you have an overpopulated area, it’s easy for disease to spread, right?” she said.
However, after around a decade of working with the pollinators, she feels hopeful that bees will bounce back: they’re resilient, she said.
“They came out of winter, a little bit more puny than they have in years past, but I see them recovering and doing a lot better now,” she said. “So I feel really hopeful for this year.”
AUSTIN, Texas — An Austin-based improv troupe is celebrating a major milestone with performances in Texas and on a national stage.
Jane Austin Improv celebrates third anniversary with Texas shows & a national NYC stage
Jane Austin Improv is marking its third anniversary with a series of shows, including a headlining performance at the Long Center’s Rollins Studio Theatre on June 6.
The award-winning group is known for blending Regency-era storytelling with improv comedy, bringing Jane Austen-inspired characters, costumes and courtship drama to life with quick wit and audience-driven humor.
MORE | #TBT: ‘Jane Austin Improv’ brings 18th-century romance and modern humor to world stages
Following their Austin shows, the troupe will perform in New York City at the Del Close Marathon, one of the country’s premier improv comedy festivals.
Jane Austin Improv celebrates third anniversary with Texas shows & a national NYC stage
Jane Austin Improv has grown from local stages to performances across the U.S. and internationally, earning multiple nominations from the B. Iden Payne Awards, winning the 2023 Ethel Hinkley Award for Outstanding New Improv Troupe, and being named a “Best of Austin” finalist by the Austin Chronicle in 2025.
Organizers say the anniversary performances celebrate both the group’s growth and its mission to connect audiences through creative, accessible comedy.
Tickets for the June 6 performance at the Long Center can be found here: https://thelongcenter.org/events/janeaustinimprov/
After ranking as the third-best large U.S. city for starting a business last year, Austin took a surprising tumble into the 24th spot nationally for 2026.
WalletHub’s annual report, “Best Large Cities to Start a Business (2026)” compared 100 U.S. cities based on 19 relevant metrics across three key dimensions: business environment, access to resources, and costs. Factors that were analyzed include five-year business survival rates, job growth comparisons from 2020 and 2024, population growth of working-age individuals aged 16-64, office space affordability, and more.
Florida cities locked other states out of the top five best places in America for starting a new business: Tampa, Orlando, Jacksonville, Hialeah, and St. Petersburg.
Austin’s business environment ranked 11th best in the country, and the city ranked ninth in the “access to resources” category. The city also tied with Boise, Idaho, and Fresno, California, for the highest average growth in the number of small businesses nationally.
Austin lagged behind in the “business costs” ranking, coming in at No. 80 overall. This category examined metrics such as the city’s working-age population growth, the share of college-educated individuals, financing accessibility, the prevalence of investors, venture investment amounts per capita, and more.
Earlier this year, WalletHub declared Texas the third-best state for starting a business in 2026, and several Houston-area cities have seen robust growth after being recognized among the best career hotspots in the U.S. WalletHub also ranked Austin on its top-10 list of the best U.S. cities to find a job. Entrepreneurial praise has also been extended to 15 Austin-based innovators that made Inc Magazine’s 2026 Female Founders 500 list.
Texas cities with strong environments for new businesses
Multiple cities in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex can claim bragging rights as the best Texas locales for starting a new business. Dallas ranked highest overall — appearing 11th nationally — and Irving landed a few spots behind in the 16th spot. Arlington (No. 23), Fort Worth (No. 30), Plano, (No. 35), and Garland (No. 65) followed behind.
Only six other Texas cities earned spots in the report: Houston (No. 26), Lubbock (No. 36), Corpus Christi (No. 39), San Antonio (No. 64), El Paso (No. 67), and Laredo (No. 76). Corpus Christi and Laredo also topped WalletHub’s list of the U.S. cities with the most accessible financing.
“From the Gold Rush and the Industrial Revolution to the Internet Age, periods of innovation have shaped our economy and driven major societal progress,” the report’s author wrote. “However, the past few years have been particularly challenging for business owners in the U.S., due to factors such as the COVID-19 pandemic, the Great Resignation and high inflation.”
Austin, TX
‘I want to be louder’: Austin Drag King Bobby Pudrido refuses to be deterred by Texas ban
Jay Thomas grew up like any kid, laughing at silly things and making up funny names.
So in the ’90s, when Tejano superstar Bobby Pulido’s songs played on the radio, young Jay and his peers couldn’t help but rhyme his last name with the Spanish word pudrido (which means rotten in English).
“We grew up calling him that just because it was funny,” he told Austin Signal host Jerry Quijano.
When he was thinking of a name for his drag persona, Thomas created a list.
“I was thinking of some queer icons and some not queer icons,” he said. “This one just resonated because he is a Tejano star. And in the ’90s he was this really big heartthrob that everybody wanted to be or be with.”
And three years ago, Thomas became Drag King Bobby Pudrido.
He thought it would be fun to impersonate a masculine figure from the Latino community and perform for an audience attracted to that type of energy. He also wanted to bring his culture into his drag.
Pudrido’s name has new recognition these days: Tejano singer Pulido decided to retire from music and go into politics. He’s running for Congress in South Texas’ District 15 against incumbent Republican Monica De La Cruz.
Both in an out of drag, Pudrido is also politically vocal. He advocates for trans rights and against the drag ban that went into effect statewide in March. The law prohibits drag performances in public properties or in front of children. Venues that host these performances can be fined up to $10,000.
“As a drag artist, one of the things we need to do is get booked so we can pay our bills,” Pudrido said.
Even though it’s unclear whether the ban affects some venues, he said, he thinks certain business owners won’t book drag performers because of the risk of being fined.
But as a working-class artist, he doesn’t have the luxury to dwell on it.
“You have to go to work, because you need to pay your bills,” he said.
The law has taken an emotional toll on him, too.
“The way it chips away at a queer person to hear any type of anti-queer legislation pass is something that is really big for me,“ he said. “We are constantly — just as human beings — trying to maintain our mental health. “
But that doesn’t mean his love for performing has been diminished. In fact, quite the opposite is true.
“It has fueled me,” Pudrido said. “Right now I’m in the angry phase where I want to be louder.”
As a performer and producer, the drag king has put on shows in the Austin area and recently traveled back to his hometown in Laredo for a show.
“It’s hard for drag kings to get booked sometimes, so we are still far away from the perfect ideal world for [them],” he said. “But the fact that I have a platform at all is huge.”
Pudrido’s passion for performing comes from his drag ancestors, “who started the art form as a way of being political and of being against the systems that were oppressing queer people.”
Drag King Bobby Prudido is currently producing his second queer quinceañera, “Con Mucho Amor,” with an anticipated show date in the fall.
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