The bee keeper diaries

[Iowanian]

It's a great time to buy stock in eppy pens.

This thread is a repository for bee keepers or those interested.

A couple of years ago, a couple of friends an my brother started puttering with honey bees. I didn't buy off because, well, I've never been a big fan of bees or getting stung by them. Last summer I tagged along a couple of times to check their hives and to remove honey bees from a house, public building and an old garage.

I realized at the end of the summer when I was helping them process some, that it's actually pretty interesting, and fits into my expanding "grow my own" logic. I'm not full blown hippy but I see a lot of logic in the self sustaining food thing and I'm doing some of that too.

That said, this thread is about bees, honey bees, bee keeping and bee fighting war stories.

I'm taking the leap and plan to get 2-3 hives this spring and maybe build some bee swarm traps to make it cheaper or to make a few bucks.

Join me and I'll share the real life lessons of an ameture bee keeper. I'm sure I'm going to learn some things the hard way.

[redfan]

Here is my setup for winter. I also put a couple of pennies under the telescoping lids for a little ventilation; makes a nice little airflow gap.
Hopefully I can make it to spring with everybody intact and viable.

[Iowanian]

That's interesting and looks like it would keep the wind off of them.
It's probably colder here but I think that would help here too.

Are you feeding?

Good luck with the wintering.

[redfan]

Yeah it's a damn fine windbreak. Not too shabby for some free found material. I think those are old garage door panels; 2" foam insulation sandwiched between sheet metal. Whatever they are, I have access to a giant pile of 'em. I could put up a decent winter shelter for livestock in a matter of minutes.

I pulled the feeder boxes off right before we had this last little temp dip. They were still sucking down a gallon a day. If we get a nice warm(55-60) stretch for a few days, then I'll put on some more feed.

I'm kinda getting into this candle making thing. I bought a couple more molds to make some bigger ones. The wife loves that I'm finally cleaning up all of the random chunks and comb I've got lying around. I told her that was the plan all along, I just needed to get enough wax to make it worth the time. Yeahhh, I'm not really a slob!! (Yes, I am.)

[redfan]

I hope everyone's hives are wintering well. Maybe you got to take a look during this warm stretch we recently had (it was warm in NW MO by end of Dec standards) like I did.
I put feed boxes on the 2 hives I took honey from. They each drank about a gallon in three days.
It was 67 here on Christmas day and all off the hives had bees flying. I didn't see any pollen being brought back, so those were most likely cleansing flights. There isn't much blooming this time of year.
We just got 1.5" of needed rain, and temps are staying warm for the next few days. We've yet to see this brutal winter I heard we we're gonna have, but I wouldn't mind seeing some cooler temps for Jan.

May the new year bring everybody healthy hives, tons of flowers, and a great nectar flow!

[Iowanian]

It's cold as hell today, but a couple of weeks ago we had a warmer one and the bees were out. I did a hive check and have 1 dead. Not positive but I'm assuming it was mites as it looked like numbers had dwindled and there was a small ball dead at the top.

It was a strong hive in the fall and had plenty of honey.

I'm debating about buying some pollen for early spring to try to get them started quick and try some splits.

[Monticore]

I know nothing about bees or beehive but I thought you guys might find this story funny.

A Physician from work also dabbles in bees and I guess he left ?lure or something to attract queen to a new hive in his car overnight with the windows rolled down, let's just say he drove to the hospital in his beekeeper get up, I just wish he would have gotten pulled over by the cops.

well it made me giggle anyways.

Monti

[Iowanian]

Month, I think your friend is full of shit. Bees aren't active overnight and wouldn't have swarmed in after dark. He's pulling your leg.

It was nice today and my bees were active. We had a Warm day a week or so ago and I went down and dumped some dry sugar on top of the inner covers. I had pulled the dead hive apart and there wasn't a drop of honey in it, and as many dead bees as I found head down into empty cells, I'm. Ore convinced they starved out and not mites. I had caught that swarm in late July and I probably didn't supplement them enough?

Given that I decided to dump some dry shushed to them as the candy was gone. I had also bottled a couple of buckets and left those supplies down by the yard to clean them up and get a little food.

For those counting I did get my first sting of the year. I had a hooded sweatshirt and one guppy under the hood and got me on the forehead. Didn't hurt bad.

I had a couple of Gallon glass jars I had dry sugar in...and the damn coons got into those.


I'm pondering feeding them a little corn syrup to make sure they have enough to eat before dandelions pop? Dumb?

[displacedinMN]

Dad used to put fly bait in a pan-and put it in the sweet corn patch. They would eat the bait. Coons don't have a 'get full' reflex. Just saying you could put it there and elevate your 'bee food'


Also heard that bees fall for the 'fake spring' we are having. It warms up too soon-the bees go out to look for food-it cools off again and the freeze. Just not fair.

[Monticore]

Originally Posted by Iowanian

Month, I think your friend is full of shit. Bees aren't active overnight and wouldn't have swarmed in after dark. He's pulling your leg.

It was nice today and my bees were active. We had a Warm day a week or so ago and I went down and dumped some dry sugar on top of the inner covers. I had pulled the dead hive apart and there wasn't a drop of honey in it, and as many dead bees as I found head down into empty cells, I'm. Ore convinced they starved out and not mites. I had caught that swarm in late July and I probably didn't supplement them enough?

Given that I decided to dump some dry shushed to them as the candy was gone. I had also bottled a couple of buckets and left those supplies down by the yard to clean them up and get a little food.

For those counting I did get my first sting of the year. I had a hooded sweatshirt and one guppy under the hood and got me on the forehead. Didn't hurt bad.

I had a couple of Gallon glass jars I had dry sugar in...and the damn coons got into those.


I'm pondering feeding them a little corn syrup to make sure they have enough to eat before dandelions pop? Dumb?

It could be but he isn’t really the type to make jokes or make stuff and my wife did see his vehicle at the hospital full of dead bees later that day but who knows

[Iowanian]

I don't think it's so much the getting cold again that gets them. My belief on what kills bees late, and it happens a lot...we have a warmup and the bees become more active. They become more active and they eat more of their food stores when they are limited, and there aren't available pollen or nectar to find. A late dandelion bloom is very detrimental.

[redfan]

Oh yeah, feed 'em when you can. They won't drink syrup if they don't need/want it/too cold.

On Sat(2/29) I put a gallon each of 2:1 on 2 hives I thought might be light. Both had very little taken. In the past, I've had hives drink more than a gallon a day at this time of the year (if it is warm enough).

All of my hives were bringing in maple pollen (I think - I suck at pollen ID) like mad over the weekend, so they'll be broody soon I hope.
When I first came up to the hives n Sat, I noticed a bunch of pollen sacs lying on the ground. I had left my mouse guards on and they were knocking off the pollen as the bees would enter. So no more mouse guards.

I hope everyone's hives have made it through so far, and I hope we can soon start to see the nectar flow.

[Iowanian]

I had a friend tell me not to feed syrup(liquids) until average temps are 50?

My bees have been active so I hope they're finding something, I'm out of pollen patties.
I'm sure I'm behind you in nectar flow but i wouldn't think it would have to be warm too many more days before trees start budding and some dandelions pop.

I just hope it doesn't do the warm early march, my fruit trees blossom, freeze thing again.

I did go check a couple of trees I had found bees in the fall and was going to cut out early but they're both dead. Hope that's not a sign for how bees fared in the wild this year.

[redfan]

Your friend is not wrong. We're having a warm spell this week and I'm leaving these on until the weekend. This was the last of the heavy syrup and I'm too cheap to waste it.

[Iowanian]

My hives are looking strong and I was going to do some splits....but we had snow...Friggin snow...probably freeze off all the fruit tree blossoms and other flowers and set things back.

It's supposed to warm up this weekend so I'll try to make 2 splits and flip my hive boxes around. For those that don't know, you swap the top and bottom boxes so they'll use the empty food comb to lay eggs in the bottom box.

I checked a couple of trees at a cemetery and they are full. One should be an easy cut out the other might be tougher and I might try a trap out. Those bees were a little aggressive and I had 3-4 fly into my hoodie and got me on the back of the neck.

Total stings for the year 1+3/4...that's up for the year and probably my fault because I'm trying to be a little more brave and use less cover this year.

I'm also planning to work up the swarm traps and get them out to some new locations this year.

If you're interested in reading I'll keep doing this thread another year, and I do enjoy seeing what you other guys are doing with your bees.

[Iowanian]

Have any of you made your own bee vacuum? I'm leaning towards making a bucket vac using some pvc, 2 ball valves and a small shop vac that I have. I'll post some pics when I'm done if I do go this route, but I'm probably going to do it.

That said, I've borrowed one from my bee pal and I'm probably going to tackle a removal from a grain bin this afternoon. The bees enter through the grain dryer hole and the hive is under the drying floor, probably in the cinder blocks. I went to look early in the week and didn't have enough tools to get to them. This will be a new one and then I think I'm going to do a tree cut out.

I've got 7-8 swarm traps out and If I can stumble into some queen cells I think I'm going to split a couple of my hives.