As a beekeeper, I try to stay up on my hives to make sure that they put up honey and don’t swarm. This year, it seems many beekeepers (due to the excessive rain) have had more than their fair share of swarms.

I, in particular, had three swarms. All in the course of 4 days. Of the three swarms, one stands out in my mind.

The first swarm was a “textbook case”. As the bees ramped up in the hive, the workers detected crowding in the hive and made several queen cells, alerting the queen, along with many of the bees in the colony, that it was time to take up residence elsewhere – and that it needed to be done before the new queen emerged.

The bees swarmed into bushes near the bee yard. I noticed the swarm while I was visiting with Nathan as he milked the cow. I setup another hive, donned my bee suit and took up a cardboard box and bee brush as my only defense.

With one hand, I held the box underneath the branch that the cluster of bees was on and with the other, I bent the branch down over the open box and shook the branch with much force. Most of the bees dropped into the box and I brushed the rest off of the branch and into the box.

I immediately took the box to the awaiting empty hive, sitting with the lid off. I banged the box on the ground and opened the lids. I shook the bees into the hive (which had half of the frames in it and half outside the hive). Once I had emptied the contents of the box into the hive, I put the rest of the frames into the hive and covered it.

I checked the bush about an hour later and brushed any stragglers into the box and put them in the hive as well. Pretty much textbook swarm capture.

The next afternoon, I noticed another swarm, but in a different location. I immediately checked the new hive and found the bees happily buzzing in the hive and going to – and – fro. This was not a re-swarm, it was a new swarm.

I followed the previous days method of swarm capture, except I had to take pruners and cut the branch free that they were swarming on, (since it was blackberry and raspberry bushes that they swarmed into)  and all went as planned. I check later in the evening and they were still in the hive.

When I checked at mid-day, there was another swarm in the same place as that second swarm from the previous day. I checked the hive where I had installed the second swarm, and it was empty. So I set about capturing the swarm again (same method as the previous day, including having to cut the branch off so I could shake the bees free). I transferred the bees from the box to the hive one again.

Well, that evening, I checked, and they had swarmed yet again, into the bushes. This time, I removed the hive body and frames used and put in its place an Illinois (medium sized hive body and frames) with mostly all comb already on the frames. As an added measure, Marilyn put lemon grass essential oil in a corner of the hive. I then put it in place and re-captured the swarm.

When I checked the next day, they were happily working the hive. No more swarming. But I l;earned that bees can be pretty temperamental about their living quarters…

The third swarm came a day later – but it was a text-book capture with no unusual tales to tell.

I have now added 3 new bee hives to my bee yard and learned a few things along the way.

According to the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), there is no single factor causing CCD (Colony Collapse Disorder), or the massive sudden die offs of honey bees worldwide.

They [finally] agree that it is man’s mis-management of the honey bees, and nature in general.

Now, I’m not a member of greenpeace, or wanting to reduce the human population to save the planet and I don’t really believe in climate change [global warming].  (I do believe that Al Gore is a pollutant, though).

I do believe, however, that where money is to be made, and where fear and comfort take precedence over cognitive reason, there will be those that turn a blind eye to the devastation that their greed, control and exploitation can do.

And I truly think that this is at the root of the honey bee die-offs.

Check the city ordinance where you live – are you allowed to keep bees in the city limits? What is the procedure followed when a swarm is found and called into the authorities?

What types of plants are you allowed to grow in your neighborhood?

In many communities, it is illegal to raise honey bees. IN most parks, mall parking lots and neighborhoods, there are no bee-friendly plants. No bee-friendly plants, no food for bees.

The OIE is blaming climate change, pesticides, viral and bacterial infections, parasites and the impact of “human activities” [translated to:  migratory | pollinator beekeeper "practices" | pollution | building shopping centers |industry and suburbs where bee fodder once was] on the environment.

For once, I’m afraid I agree with most of what they are saying…

–Pat

I installed 6 packages of bees Sunday afternoon.
I’m getting pretty fast at it -It took all of about 5 minutes for the first one, and around 2 – 3 minutes for the other 5.
I fed them pollen patties yesterday. I have 2 1-gallon “community” feeders set up with sugar-water, to help them pull wax, and to stimulate laying in the queen. They were installed in hives that had pulled comb on the foundation for all or, at least for 7 of the 10 frames, so they have a head start there.

I intend to pull honey off of these hives, so I will be installing individual feeders on each hive this week, along with queen excluders and supers with empty frames (foundation only – no “pulled comb) so the bees can pull comb. If they can get that done by May 1st – 10th, I should be in business, and will pull the feeders off and add additional supers that have pulled comb. That way, then will have plenty of room for putting up honey. This helps me in 2 ways:
1. The bees will be less likely to swarm, since they have the entire brood box for brood, and 2 supers for storing honey.
2. They will have supers with comb – so all they have to do is put the nectar in the cells and start making honey out of it.

We are planting lots and lots of Anise Hyssop (Agastache foeniculum). It is said that 1 acre of anise hyssop can supply 100 beehives with enough nectar to put up 100 pounds of surplus honey per hive. With my 7 bee hives, we should do well.

We are also planting a bee-friendly flower garden, and have some clover in. All of these plants should boost the “nectar economy” and, hopefully will provide enough stores for my bees to overwinter well. Since most of the farms are no longer here, it has been a struggle to support more than 4 hives here with the amount of bloom that has been available.

Add to that the 125 blueberry plants we have, (which will bloom in July) the several hundred strawberries, 40 plus fruit trees, and we could have a good year.
And if the black locust blooms this May, we’ll have a bumper crop of honey!!!

Here’s to a successful beekeeping year!

–Pat

The facts that substantiate the capabilities of this hive,  peaked my  desire to study it further. The facts I refer to  are in the articles linked to below my post.

Interesting facts about standard (The langstroth and British WTB hives – using frames) – they cme into being, and shortly after, the diseases and pests that we know today started killing off bees. There was not such devastation when old style top bar hives and skeps were used.
here is an excerpt from www.biobees.com (included below)

“During the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, honeybee colonies began to suffer on an unprecedented scale from a range of diseases and parasites that had previously been rare, localized or relatively mild in their effects. By 1920, the native British black bee (Apis mellifera mellifera) had been virtually wiped out by so-called ‘Isle of Wight disease’⁸, to which it had no natural resistance. Replacement black bees were brought in from France, Germany and Holland, along with yellow-striped bees from Italy to re-stock the empty hives, but crosses between the black and yellow races were (and still are) overly defensive and difficult to manage. While they were much less susceptible to ‘Isle of Wight’ disease, the mild-mannered Italians, along with the other immigrants, were vulnerable to both American and European Foul Brood (AFB and EFB), the two most serious bee diseases. And they were (and still are) incurable robbers of other bee colonies. ⁹“

Links:

http://www.biobees.com/british_beekeeping/british_beekeeping.html

This one is about the Warre hive and you can find plans for this top bar hive on the site:

Beekeeping with the Warré hive — Home.

To your Bees Health -

–Pat

I got a call at work (yes, I work a real job, besides the fun I have farming) from a friend this past Monday.
“I have a buddy at work that has a bunch of bees in his house. I told him you might take care of them.”

So, I have him give the guy my number.
He called me and confirmed that he had honey bees somewhere inside his house or in the crawlspace under the house.

I told him to call me when he got home – after he confirmed that the bees were still there. (swarming bees don’t hang around their initial point of descent – it’s temporary until the scout bees find a “suitable” home for her majesty, the queen)
He called me back stating that the bees were in fact, there, so I headed out to Williamstown, KY to capture a swarm. I had my yougest son (10) and my buddy that called me (he thought it would be fun).

When I got there, the bees were coming and going through an opening at the bottom of the vinyl siding on the house, where his front porch/deck was.

I shined my flashlight into the gap and noticed that the bees were not going up inside the walls, so I asked him how to get into the crawlspace – he took a piece of siding off and removed some plywood. I crawled in and headed to where the front porch was.

Sure enough, there was a ball of bees about 14″ in diameter hanging on the sub-floor between 2 floor joists. There was another one in the corner of the floor joist and the sub-floor where they meet the exterior wall, but it was much smaller – maybe 5 – 6 inches in diameter. probably about 30,000 bees…
I had a small cardboard, portable “NUC” (a half-hive that only has room for 5 frames instead of the standard 8 or 10 frames in a full sized hive) with a frame of honey on one side and a frame of drawn wax comb on the other side. I held it under the ball of bees, and with by bee brush, I brushed that big ball o bees into the box – there were so many bees, it knocked the box right out of my hand! I oicked it up and started brushing again, until I had almost all of the bees on sub-floor swept into the box – I also got the smaller ball of bees.

of course, there were probably 6 – 10 thousand bees that either fell out of the box, or missed the box during my sweeping actions. So, I set the box down and crawled out and unzipped my beesuit ( it was in the 80′s outside and concentrated effort makes me sweat anyway).
I stood there giving the home owner an update on progress and cooling off, while my buddy was walking around in a beesuit checking things out. My son had gone in with me and was holding the flashlight for me under the house, and he didn’t want to take off his hooded veil because, like me, he had gotten stung through the bee suit! Needless to say, he would not be assisting me on my next venture under the house and he made this very obvious as he climbed into the van and shut the door!

After about a 5 – 10 minute cool-down, Iwent back in and repeated the process. I did this 3 more times in all, and when I was finished, there were still 3 or 4 thousand bees left. I hated to leave them, but there was no way I could get the rest of the bees, since it was getting dark.

On the way home, I thought buying a “bee vacuum” an some queen pheromone, or some lemongrass essential oil (my wife has some for her products, but I’d have to ask and them replace it anyway)…

I have the hive set up and it’s been there all week – of course, it’s been raining, so they wouldn’t choose to leave until after te weather clears, anyway. Today will be the big test – sunny and in the 70′s. I’m hoping to get in there today and find a good, laying queen. if not, I will be re-queening that hive tomorrow…

It was a lot of work, but the bees were free – and now the man’s young daughter (who is allergic to bees) doesn’t have to be afraid…

Today, Dec. 11th, it was partly sunny and in the 60′s…. And Marilyn called to say that the bees were flying. – A perfect opportunity to feed them once more before winter in the hopes that they will stash most of it for the winter ahead…

Of course, I’m stuck in the office. So, I called and asked Nathan to feed the bees for me. Sure, he can suit up and be safe from bee stings – and he can carry a 1 gallon container full of sugar and water. And he knows how to open the hive up and put the containers in – and he’s pretty responsible. So, why am I anxious about him doing it?

Because he’s my boy and I worry about him dealing with the bees. And because they are my bees and I worry about them being dealt with by a 10 year old boy!

Sure, everything will be fine – but I should be there taking care of my bees!

I’m very grateful to have such a responsible son, (and relatively calm bees) and I have come to rely on him heavily since we have increased the number of animals and things that require some oversight. He is truly an asset to the family ( and the farm). But …

I just found out he’s swatting at the bees! That’s the part I was referring to above (being dealt with by a 10 year old boy). Yes, I have told him to “stay calm and they won’t bother you”. And “open the hive slowly and they won’t be frightened”. But he’s a 10 year old boy – and yet I trust him with my bees and I trust God to protect him from the bees…