Keeping bees

Camp, He's a Bee Josh! Isn't it great when someone so young has a passion.

Had to smile when he admitted to only wearing sandals on his feet and getting a couple of stings on his feet then saying the bee's aren't out to get you ...
 
Obviously  he never had the pleasure of working  queenless hive on a thundery day when they are as mean as Satan. One sting that leaves a decent pheromone marker and " Your doomed ...aye  doomed I tell'eee " the only action is to run like the wind for a good 300 yards .

 Same with a very strong double brooded hive when it has four or five supers on it during a prolific nectar flow from Canola /oilseed rape .. Your smoker is not always enough to keep them calm even on a nice warm balmy day and as you lift out the lid of the hive they come out the entrance like tidal wave of kamikaze warriors ... all you can do is pray your gear is sound and that the suit is tucked into your wellies and not like some.......  over them allowing the hordes to climb up inside the legs of the suit.......OUCH !


Guess how I know all this    

Plantoid, fortunately what you describe does not have to be common. I had a hot hive last season and requeened and the aggressive behavior calmed down considerably. That being said, I find that sometimes it's best to just keep supering (quickly) and forego the inspection.  

The only trouble with forgoing the inspection & supering up is that you can have a swarming situation because you have missed a new queen being hatched .

Then if they swarm you lose a lot of honey sometimes as much a whole super of it if double brooded , for the prime swarm issuing from the hive will have gorged themselves  on it.

It all sounds so interesting! No idea what you actually talking about, mind you!  

 

(me either!)

plantoid wrote:The only trouble with forgoing the inspection & supering up is that you can have a swarming situation because you have missed a new queen being hatched .

Then if they swarm you lose a lot of honey sometimes as much a whole super of it if double brooded , for the prime swarm issuing from the hive will have gorged themselves  on it.

So true, thus the first option would be sticking it out for inspection and requeening. I wouldn't put up with that hot, aggressive behavior for long.

camprn wrote:

plantoid wrote:The only trouble with forgoing the inspection & supering up is that you can have a swarming situation because you have missed a new queen being hatched .

Then if they swarm you lose a lot of honey sometimes as much a whole super of it if double brooded , for the prime swarm issuing from the hive will have gorged themselves  on it.

So true, thus the first option would be sticking it out for inspection and requeening. I wouldn't put up with that hot, aggressive behavior for long.

Sounds like some family reunions!  

     


It is nature in the raw after all .

It ain't pretty, but it's better!

last year i built a top bar beehive and bought a package of bees. One of the bars of comb got crooked because when I was inspecting the hive I placed a unfinished bar in backwards and they overlapped the comb a bit wich is fine but the next comb wold be crooked so i placed this bar in the back of the hive so the brood wold hatch and they wold fill it with honey and i could collect it and remove the comb to let them rebuild it.

 Today i went out and took a peek to see how things wer going i checked that comb and it was compleatly empty i guess they never filled it with honey so i took it off and brought it in the house figuring i can use it in some bait hives i plan on making this year so now my house smells wonderful.

I plan on making a couple more hives but im going to make them a bit different because it gets to hot for a normal top bar hive here basicly it will be a horizontal lang with deep frames with top bars mounted on the frame ( the best of both worlds).

I love that healthy hive smell.

The other day I watched a program on keeping bees and it seemed such a nice thing to do. Naturally I wanted to have a go, but I realise there is a lot of commitment needed. All very well thinking of warm summer days and the bees buzzing around and golden honey etc.
But I will do my bit this year by planting some extra flowers for the bees and other insects.
The same with keeping chickens and rabbits etc. Think of the winter time with four feet of snow on the ground.
My square foot beds I can wrap up for the winter and go away if I wish and return in the spring.

Put the comb in a sealed poly bag & keep it in the fridge inside another poly bag or somewhere cool and away from mice or wax moths .

Or else on the first warm day when the bees flight they'll seek out the smell of the scented comb & if there is a window or door open you're likely to have a fair few to sort out. Mice also love drawn comb so do wax moths .

i was thinking of sticking it in the freezer to kill any wax moth eggs that may be in the comb.

martha wrote:It all sounds so interesting! No idea what you actually talking about, mind you!  

+1

Kay

malefacter wrote:i was thinking of sticking it in the freezer to kill any wax moth eggs that may be in the comb.

That's a good scheme ..just be careful,  it gets very brittle when frozen ..maybe put it in the bags inside a pizza box in the freezer for a bit of protection

walshevak wrote:

martha wrote:It all sounds so interesting! No idea what you actually talking about, mind you!  

+1

Kay

what is so confusing maybe i can help you understand 

Plantoid, maybe you should start teaching beekeeping classes.

http://www.treehugger.com/sustainable-agriculture/europe-doesnt-have-enough-honeybees-pollinate-its-crops.html

Is beekeeping doable in residential neighborhoods ?

shure is some people have hives on the roof but you may want to check on the local laws if you want to put them where ppl can see them.

at2wooden wrote:Is beekeeping doable in residential neighborhoods ?

You would have to check your local ordinance. Where do you live? Also, you may want to see if there is a beekeeping club in your area that offers information and classes.

camprn wrote:Plantoid, maybe you should start teaching beekeeping classes.

http://www.treehugger.com/sustainable-agriculture/europe-doesnt-have-enough-honeybees-pollinate-its-crops.html

 I used to but now due to disability , no bees any more and other things I don't .

 The most frustrating thing for me whilst trying to teach bang up to date effective methods for getting honey and still having bees to restart the new season with was that so many of the keepers ignored most of what was said , they wouldn't read the books suggested nor would most do a weekly inspection of their hives.
 They were totally lacking , as in being observant as to the weather and the stores going into a hive , as a result many people starved their hives through ignorance or made them so ill that they succumbed to disease half way through a winter .

Same with Varroa ,  the things people would say to imply that they didn't have a Varroa problem was astounding .
 They only believed it when you uncapped a few square inches of drone cells and pulled out loads of  infested drone pupae .

 Same with mobile pollinating hives,  many's the time when a farmer has rung me up asking for  hives to be taken away that had been left there by other beekeepers for weeks & weeks.
 Despite being asked to remove the hives now that the crops had ceased to flower or when if in the farmers mind there had been enough flowers pollinated in a 10 to 15 day pollinating session with say 10 to 20 hives placed in that area of the  orchard   . ( usually in big fruit orchards of 40 acres or more with set areas of certain types of fruit that flower at slightly different times  )

Other times the farmer would say that they told the keeper to plug the hives for 24 hrs. whilst they were spraying fungicides over potatoes etc.  & they failed to act and now all the bees are dead ..can I take the hives away please. Sometimes farmers have to spray 15 or more times a year on crops if the humidity is too high and various moulds become prevalent .

 Though now that specific  mould resisting GM crops are slowly starting to be used the need for so many and so toxic a spray is apparently reducing but that's a different side of the situation that is covered elsewhere  on the site.

 It seems to me that most UK bee keepers are just that  , they want to keep bees without the responsibility , knowledge or skill set needed for having them .

Very few are willing to invest the full amount to keep bees well ,they would rather use witch craft , old  string and chewing gum to try and set up hives .
 
Don't get me started on the fools who repeatedly used the same anti Varroa strips in six or seven hives or those that left the strips in the hive for longer than advised on the detailed instructions that come with the anti Varroa strips.

Sounds oh so familiar.

I'm planning to start my beehive this year. I've gotten in touch with our local bee expert on the University of Georgia campus and he will help me get the bees this spring.

I'll admit my initial plan was just to put some bees out for pollination and hope for the best but the more I read about honey bees the more fascinated I became. I'm now not sure if I can stay out of the hive. I wasn't even planning to collect any honey but now I really want to.

I've read so many websites and watched so many videos about bees I feel like I've actually done it before. My husband thinks I'll turn tail and run at the first bee sting but all you have to do is tell me I can't do something and I'll prove you wrong.