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Search results for: “beekeeping”

Minor Beekeeping Meltdown
It’s the first really hot day of the year. You climb up on the roof, and the new hive – a bee package we installed this spring – has tons of bees all over it. There’s a liquid sugar feeder on the top of this hive, and 10′ away is a mature hive that might be swarming.

It’s been a frustrating bee season so far, and I see this and just think the worst immediately. The mature hive is robbing the young hive for the sugar syrup sitting up in the top of the hive. Or, a swarm is trying to move in – though I’m not sure that is possible. But being up on a hot roof, your brain already starts to melt when you see this.

I take some pictures and send them to my local beekeeping friends, we have a gmail email group, and wait. The mature hive, which I believe has already swarmed once, it very quiet in comparison.

Bees Don’t Read Books

My beekeeping teacher told us that the first day of class. So while you are trying to figure out what is going on and how to fix it, the bees are doing what they want.

If the young hive was being robbed, you can try to place a wet sheet over the hive to thwart the attack. (there is a entrance reducer on this new hive to thwart just such an event)

Was the young hive going to swarm? This has happened to friends, though I have never had it happen to me, thankfully. Watch this cool video of us catching a swarm.

Was a swarm trying to move in on a young weak hive? I’ve never seen this, but my brain was racing through options.

By now I was starting to get replies from my fellow beeks.

Bearding. In other words, the bees are hot. So they are outside the hive.

Doh!

I use what is called a screened bottom board on my hives. It has a screen window built into the floor, and plastic slider that covers the screen. This allows a few things:
- Varrao mite counts with a sticky slider board.
- Varroa mite reduction when the mites fall through the screen and out of the hive.
- Ventilation in the summer, and air flow to cure honey faster.
Previous to this first hot day of the year, we have still been having cool nights, so I have kept the slider board in, as the bees need to keep the brood boxes (where the eggs are laid) warm. Cool drafts at night aren’t good for that.

But today the temperature was really high, and a closed in box gets hot. So the bees go outside to cool off. You can see in the first photo that the bees are on the shady side of the hive.

My friends emails asked if I still had the bottom board slider in, and then meltdown subsided. Pull out the slider, the bees will cool down.

Pulling the slider out from the bottom board, slowly…

The plastic slider removed.

BTW, a key thing here is if you bees are on a DIY bee table/stand, the tabletop part of the stand has to have the center cut out, so air can flow to the bottom board.

Hive stand top is cut out to allow air flow.

So I was calmer after that, and felt less than smart, even though I’ve been doing this for years. Standing back and looking after the fact, it did look like an overheated hive.

But when you walk into it, that isn’t always apparent. So once again, its good to belong to a group of beekeepers that you can check with, right there on the roof.

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May 17, 2017
Bucket Bee Feeder Video – Beekeeping 101
Here’s a homemade bucket bee feeder I made to feed the honeybees sugar syrup. Watch the video and then step through the photos below.

I like the bucket bee feeder because you can feed the bees sugar syrup in the early spring and fall without having to open up the beehive. Our other sugar feeder videos all involve opening up the hive to feed the bees. This doesn’t.

The downside is if the weather is wet or cold or both, the bees wont fly and can’t get to this feeder. So I will use a combination of hive sugar feeders and this outdoor feeder.

Couple of tips when making the bucket bee feeder:
- Be sure to buy a food grade bucket with a gasket ring that seals the lid.
- Don’t drill holes where the handles meet the bucket.
- Fewer holes might be better.
- The bucket must be level when inverted.
You may have to shop around to find a bucket with the support ring that we will use as the feeder. This ring is for a person to be able to handle the bucket better with their hands, but when the bucket is inverted, the spaces under the ring make for great sugar cups.

5/64″ holes

I found that a 5/64″ drill bit worked well for me. Several people have suggested, after watching the video, that fewer holes would keep the sugar syrup from overflowing as much when its first turned over. With fewer holes, one would drill or cut through the walls between the spaces to allow the syrup to fill the ring. I’ll have to experiment with this. Let me know if you do as well.

If you accidentally drill in to the ring cavity where there handle attaches to the bucket, like I did, you can glue the hole shut. Silicon caulk works, or some plastic glue.

When you first flip over the bucket, some syrup will pour out. It will slowly stop. If it doesn’t stop, the drilled holes are too big, or the gasket isn’t sealing.Be sure the bucket is level, or the syrup will flow out.

As suggested by a viewer, test this out with plain water first. I used a 1:1 sugar syrup solution with some essential oil mix added with the feeder. Here is a homemade essential oil mix. I now buy a commercial essential oil mix from a beekeeping supplier, its just easier for the small amount I use every year.
April 12, 2016
Varroa Mite Treatment For Bees – Beekeeping 101 – GF Video

Here is the oxalic acid varroa mite treatment I use on our honeybees. I’ve used a few mite treatments in the past, tried the varroa resistant queens, one year I did the hands off method, and the oxalic acid mite treatment is the best thing I’ve used so far. This is based on my use, and other beekeepers I know. Some mite treatments are pretty awful in the hive, oxalic acid strikes a good balance.

Oxalic acid occurs naturally. It is present in spinach and rhubarb, and is found in small amounts in honey. My treatment method is based on a post by Rusty on my fav beekeeping blog, Honey Bee Suite.

One of the great things about this method is that it is super easy. Some people will vaporize oxalic acid in their hives, but this requires some gear, and I don’t recommend it for the hobbyist beekeeper. Our treatment process uses a 60 ml syringe. You can buy these at agricultural supply stores, or online here.

This sugar – acid mix is also great for spraying bee packages before putting then in a hive. It knocks down the mite load quite a bit. All the packages I hive are sprayed with it before dropping into a hive. When treating a regular hive, it is best to apply the mite treatment in late fall, when there is little brood in the hive. The acid will not kill any mites that are in capped cells.

Oxalic Acid is easiest to buy as wood bleach

The oxalic acid varroa mite treatment recipe:

Oxalic acid is also known as wood bleach. It is used by wood finishers. You may be able to find it in a hardware store. I couldn’t find it, so I bought it online, order oxalic acid here. You can buy the syringe here.

Put 600 ml of hot water in a quart Pyrex container, or similar glass jar.

Add 35 grams of the oxalic acid crystals and stir to dissolve in the hot water

Add 600 grams of granulated sugar.

Store in a glass jar – I use a canning jar.

Take the cover off the hive, do not break apart the hive. You apply the acid through the top super.

Measure 50 ml into the syringe, and dribble 5 ml into the spaces between each frame of a 10 frame hive. Some people will use more of the acid in the frame space areas that have more bees in them.

Rusty suggest practicing the dribble with water before doing this, and I agree. It takes a little work to get it right. Rusty references the Scientific Beekeeping site in her post for the exact oxalic acid varroa mite treatment recipe.

December 3, 2015
Beehive Winter Wrap – Beekeeping 101 – GF Video

After trying several kinds, this beehive winter wrap works best for me. Its easy to put on, and I can re-use it every year. It makes winterizing beehives easier, and the honeybees make it through winter.

Beehive Winter Wrap How To:

Insulating the beehive is the first part of winter prep. The second and third parts of winterizing the beehive is to use an insulated inner cover and add a backup source of food, we use the dry sugar method. Before any winterizing, treat the bees for varroa mites.

I use the 2″ thick polystyrene you can buy at the lumber store. Its usually used for insulating walls and basements. Its not the cheapest stuff, but it will last a long time, just don’t beat it up. One 24″ x 96″ piece will wrap a hive with some leftover.

I cut it with a retractable box knife with the blade pushed all the way out. Be very careful when cutting. Use a piece of metal or wood as a straight edge, and make series of cuts down through the polystyrene. You can also use a hand saw with a straight edge. Best to cut this on a work table or somewhere you don’t mind getting knife marks. Once you make several cuts down through the material, you can snap it off, kinda like cutting drywall.

Keep in mind the pieces do not have to be perfect.

Do Not Block The Lower Entrance

Upper Entrance Kept Clear!

The front piece of insulation will be shorter than the back piece. You have to make sure not to cover the lower or upper entrances with the insulation. These both need to stay open through winter. I use a ratchet strap to hold the hive wrap against the beehive, you could also use 2 bungee cords, one near the top, one near the bottom.

December 3, 2015
Easy Insulated Inner Cover – Beekeeping 101 – GF Video
Here’s how to put together an insulated inner cover for your beehive without having to buy a new cover or build one. I learned this method from Phillipe at MudSongs.org , he has some great info on his beekeeping site, very down to earth.

An insulated inner cover reduces or prevents condensation in the beehive in winter.

Why does this matter? Condensation is water that collects on the top of the hive. It forms on the side of the inner cover that faces the bees. When enough water collects, it will drip back down onto the bees. Not a good thing.

Wet bees are dead bees.

Especially in winter.

How does this cover help? Condensation happens when warm air meets a cold object. In the beehive in winter, the bee cluster is warm, and there is some humidity in the air. When the warm air from the cluster rises and hits the cold inner cover, the water vapor condenses and drops back onto the bees. Not good.

The insulation that sits on top of the inner cover here keeps the cover from getting real cold, thus reducing or eliminating condensation. Since I have been using the insulated inner cover, I have not seen signs of condensation in the hive. If you find mold in your hives, you have condensation, FYI.

My variation on the insulated cover is to put a shim between the upper super and the inner cover. I then put sugar on top of the frames, using the dry sugar, aka mountain camp, method. This sugar provides a backup food source, and absorbs moisture in the hive.

Be sure the slot of the inner cover is not covered, one should always provide an upper entrance to the hive, plus it allows for air flow. Yes even in cold weather, I believe a hive needs some air flow, so provide an upper entrance. Remember to invert the inner cover.

You should also insulate the sides of the hive.

Here is how to stack the parts of the top of the beehive, top to bottom:
- Outer cover sits on top of insulation, and usually covers it.
- Insulation – I use 2″ thick polystyrene.
- Inner cover, turned upside down, flat side faces upward.
- Spacer shim, with dry sugar on top of newspaper.
- Top brood super
I built some DIY insulated inner covers that are more involved than this stack method, and they work well for me. If you are handy, have at them.
December 3, 2015
Mountain Camp Method for Winter Feeding – Beekeeping 101 Video
The mountain camp method of feeding your bees sugar during winter is the best way I’ve found so far to provide bees with an emergency food source. For whatever reason, honeybees may run through their winter food stores, and need additional food to get through the tough winter months. The mountain camp method provides this back up food source in a brilliantly simple way. Watch our intro video and follow up video, then read through the rest of this beekeeping 101 post.

Mountain Camp Method How To

Before I started to use this technique, every fall I would make sugar patties for the top of the hives as an emergency feed. They work fine, but making sugar cakes is a pain. This does the same thing.

The mountain camp method of feeding honeybees emergency sugar is pretty simple. And that’s why I love it. Here’s how to do it:
- Lay a sheet of newspaper over the top of the hive, cutting it down so there is space around the inside perimeter of the hive box.
- Pour granulated sugar on top of the newspaper.
- Spray the pile of sugar with water so it crusts over.
- Place a spacer shim and/or an insulated inner cover over the pile of sugar.
- Tilt and strap your hives down for winter.
We built these DIY insulated inner covers that have a spacer built in to allow for sugar feeding, be it sugar syrup in zipper bags or pollen patties. If you don’t use a cover with that allows for this, you can build a simple spacer out of 1″x3″ common pine. I haven’t seen a spacer that’s deep enough for sale anywhere. They are easy to make.

Insulated Inner Cover with built-in spacer for sugar feeding

Simple spacer allows for dry and wet sugar feeding. Easy to build.

This pile of sugar on top of the hive provides a second benefit, it absorbs moisture in the hive during winter, and prevents condensation from dripping back down on to the bees. Wet bees in winter is a very bad thing.

Questions I have gotten about this method:

Can I feed them this dry sugar instead of sugar syrup in the fall? No. You still need to feed the bees sugar syrup in the fall. Watch our Sugar Syrup Feed videos.

My bees have plenty of honey and I fed them sugar syrup during the fall, why do I need to do this? I do the same thing in the fall, but the dry sugar is an emergency winter feed. Sometimes bees run out of their own stores, or sometimes they can’t get to them. Below is a photo of bees taking up sugar I provided them. If I hadn’t provided the bees with this emergency sugar, they would be dead now.

Why is it called mountain camp? From what I understand, a person who goes by that name posted this method online a while back and the name stuck.

Check out more of our beekeeping 101 and winter prep videos and posts:

Winter Bee Inspection Video

Build an Insulated Inner Cover

Let us know your comments below, thanks!
September 17, 2015
Beekeeping 101- Hive Inspection – GF Video

A Hive Inspection is just that, you are checking out the beehive to see how its doing. Part of our Beekeeping 101 Video series, today we are doing a hive inspection of a nuc we installed this spring. This bee nuc had a late start, as did all our bees, because spring came late.

Note in the beekeeping video we did not smoke the honeybees. I don’t smoke bees unless I know I am giong to take apart the hive or pull honey off. When you smoke the hive, it can cause stress in the hive, and the bees start to eat their food stores, so it sets them back a few days whenever you do it.

If you are going to just do a quick eyeball check, I see no need for the smoker. For this hive inspection, I wanted to confirm the presence of the queen and make sure the hive looked robust and smelled good. You can tell a lot from just how the bees are behaving.

Some of this is gut feeling, but listen to your bees while doing the hive inspection. If there is a low incessant buzz, the beehive may be queenless, which is a bad thing.

How do you know if the hive is queenless? The big red flag is no uncapped brood. In other words, no open cells with very small eggs or larvae in the bottom of the cell. You might also see a lot of drone egg cells, which means you have a drone laying worker. Which is bad. This means one or more of the female workers has started to lay eggs. The eggs will be sterile, so they become drones, hence the presence of large drone cells.

Pull out a frame from the center of the top brood super. If you see open brood, that’s a great thing. The queen has been present in the past few days, and she is probably still around. You want your frame pattern to look roughly like the photo above. It wont be perfect, but something like this. Not every cell in the brood area will be capped, there will be some empty ones.

I think its best to learn how to raise bees by having two hives. You can compare the two, and get an idea of what is ‘normal’. There are several good books on beekeeping we recommend here.

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July 22, 2015
Apple TV, Digital News, Printed Newspaper & A little beekeeping GF Radio 383

An eclectic mix of DIY on this week’s podcast. We are talking Roma paste tomatoes at Rick’s house, and how they are doing well with measured rainfall. His tomatoes have been doing well and are now starting to ripen. We talk about toilets briefly, and Eric announces he will stop talking about toilets, maybe. Then, of course, more talk on toilets.

Get a toilet snake here: http://amzn.to/1HcQ0Wf

Eric talks about the upcoming GardenFork Patreon fund, allowing GardenFork viewers to become sustaining supporters.

Steak grilled right on the coals is next, Eric did an experiment with this method last weekend, and will shoot a video about it this weekend. Interesting to Eric was the lack of flare ups from the coals, as the meat is right on top of it. Read the NY Times article here: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/01/dining/steak-on-charcoal-cooking.html

Both Eric and Rick use the Apple TV box instead of watching Cable TV. Its great. You can watch GardenFork on it, either though iTunes or YouTube on the Apple TV box. Buy one here: http://amzn.to/1Cmir8s

Send us email! [email protected]

July 7, 2015
Best Beginning Beekeeping Books

These are the two best beginning beekeeping books, and I’ve bought more than my fair share of beekeeping books.

Kim Flottum’s The Backyard Beekeeper, I think, is one of the best books. This is actually the book that introduced me to beekeeping. I was in our local bookstore just looking around and I ran across this book called Backyard Beekeeping and a light bulb went off in my head! I immediately thought, I would like to have honeybees. I bought the book and inhaled it. I’ve met Kim Flottum, the author, he’s a super nice guy. He walks you through beekeeping in detail, but in easy to understand writing. Really well done

Lots of really good pictures, Kim is clearly an expert. He is the editor of one of the more popular beekeeping magazines and I’ve heard him speak and he’s just an all-around good guy. In short, I like this book I think it’s a good one to buy for the beginning beekeeper.

The book Beekeeping for Dummies is a really great first year book. Now I know you’re thinking that ‘oh it’s one of those Dummies Books’ but despite its name I think it’s great especially for the first year beekeeper. Its inclusion here as a best beginning beekeeping book is a testament to Mr Blackliston’s easy to understand text in the book.

Your first year beekeeping you have a lot of questions, you might even have some anxiety about it. The author Howland puts that to rest as he walks you through the first year. The book lists out what you should do every month with your bees, he provides recipes and hints and tips. I just think it’s really well done, I like the book and this new edition has more up to date info.

To me these two books are the books you should buy when you’re starting to learn about beekeeping and when you actually get your bees. Buy these books before you get your bees read them over the winter and just inhale. They have a really a lot of great information – it’s how I learned. I constantly refer back to these books when I have a question about something.

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November 13, 2014
Winter Beekeeping Preparation Checklist
Getting honeybees ready for winter, aka winter beekeeping preparation, is one of those things that can fall off the list for beekeepers, probably not a good thing. I believe if you just leave your hives as is, most will perish.
Below we have several videos on getting honeybees ready for winter, but first of all, here’s a few things we do to each hive in late fall to prepare for winter.

Winter Beekeeping Checklist:
1. Feed 1:2 sugar syrup in the fall
2. Treat bees for varroa mites
3. Feed one gallon of syrup with Fumagillin
4. Add dry sugar to the top of the hive.
5. Use an insulated inner cover.
6. Tilt the hives forward.
7. Close up the screened bottom board.
8. Insulate the hives with polystyrene.
9. Install a mouse guard on entrance.
10. Strap down the hives.
Varroa Mite Treatment: From what I understand, varroa mite populations in your beehive soar in winter, so knocking down that population before winter makes sense. Watch our oxalic acid varroa mite treatment video, its pretty easy to do and is a huge step toward getting your bees through winter. One should rotate mite treatments, Hop Guard is the other mite treatment I’d suggest.

Sugar Syrup: Ask your beekeeping neighbor when they start feeding sugar syrup. I add Fumagillin the first gallon of syrup. Let the bees take down all this treated syrup before adding more sugar syrup to the feeder.

Dry Sugar: This year we used the mountain camp sugar method when providing sugar on the top of the hive. In years past we have made sugar cakes, but this year I wanted something simpler. Reading about this method on the Honey Bee Suite blog, I agree with Rusty’s post, that the mountain camp dry sugar method works pretty good, and because its easy, you will do it. Making fondant or sugar cakes is a pain, and you will likely procrastinate about making the cakes it until its too late. Watch: Mountain Camp Method Video

Mountain Camp Winter Sugar Feeding

Insulated Inner Covers: I am a big convert to using these. Before I put them on the hives in winter, every spring I would find mold in the hives and dead bees. Insulated inner covers reduce or eliminate condensation from collecting on the top of the hive. Imagine its raining inside a hive in winter, that’s condensation. Wet bees are dead bees. Watch and learn how make an them in this video:

Or you can use a piece of polystyrene, a wood spacer you can easily make, and your existing inner cover to do the same thing.

Top View of Insulated Inner Cover – purchase this or make your own

Tilt the beehive forward: Gravity works. Extra insurance to keep condensation from raining down on the hive cluster. Tipping the hive forward allows any drops of water that have begun to form on the top of the hive (which is the bottom of the inner cover) to slide forward, hit the front wall of the hive, and finally, draining out the front of the hive. Its easy to do, just slide a 2×4 under the back of each hive before you strap it down.

A few more winter survival tips:

Close up the screened bottom board: This is one of those opinion based things. I use screened bottom boards that have a plastic board that slides into the bottom. So I close off the screen in winter. Because it is important to have ventilation in the hive, yet reduce condensation, the hive needs at least one top vent hole.

Insulate the Hive: First of all, the best method we’ve found so far is to surround the hive with with polystyrene, secured with a ratchet strap. We have two videos about this, watch here: Beehive Winter Wrap

Mouse Guard: This can be bought from bee suppliers or you can make one out of 1/2″ hardware screening. One year I blanked on mouse guards, as a result, I lost a hive to mice. Its sad and a pain to clean up.

Close the guard down to about 2″ wide with duct tape

Strap Down The Hives: This may seem overkill, yet it has saved us. We secure the hives against high winds and bears. One strap goes around the hive itself. The second hive secures the hive to the ground with two metal stakes. Furthermore, if you live in an earthquake zone, strapping your hives is a must. Watch our video about how using straps saved a hive here.

Winter beekeeping is not the easiest part of keeping bees, therefore some preparation in the fall can help bees survive winter. Follow these tips and increase your chances of getting bees through winter.

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November 12, 2014
Clear Cloudy Honey – Beekeeping 101 – GF Video

Clear Cloudy Honey with our how to video. Crystallized Honey can be easily decrystallized, watch Eric show you how. Why causes cloudy honey? The most common reason is temperature. The honey has been stored somewhere and the honey temperature eventually lowers enough to crystalize. The moisture content of the honey also causes cloudy honey.

How to Clear Cloudy Honey, some info:

Is it safe to eat cloudy honey? Yes, honey keeps for years. You can stir crystallized honey into your tea and it will dissolve just fine. Its hard to measure cloudy honey for baking, so its best to warm it first.

Can I use a slow cooker as a cloudy honey fix? Yes, its a great solution

There is some foam that floated to the top of the warmed honey. That’s ok, just skim it off, its beeswax probably.

The types of flowers that the honeybees collect from also can cause cloudy honey. If there are lot of rape seed flowers nearby, part of the mustard family, the honey produced gets cloudy quickly.

In my experience, we have had honey get cloudy when we have harvested honey from dead hives, and the frames may have a mix of capped and uncapped honey in them. The uncapped honey has a higher water content, and I believe this contributes to the cloudy honey.

If you have frames of capped and uncapped honey, I would leave them in the hive. If its a dead hive, I’d suggest cutting out the capped comb for comb honey. Or just extract the whole frame, keeping in mind this mixed capping honey should be consumed sooner than the capped frame honey.

This beekeeping video is part of our beekeeping 101 video series, you can check out all of the how to keep bees videos here.

Eric suggests 2 beekeeping for beginners books,

Buy On IndieBound Here
Click Here to buy on Amazon

Click Here to Buy On Indiebound
Click Here To Buy On Amazon

January 30, 2014
Winter Bee Inspection & Dead Bees – Beekeeping 101 Video
Another of our Beekeeping 101 videos on how to do a winter bee inspection. Links to more beekeeping videos at end of the post. This time we open up the beehives in late March to show us feeding bees in winter. Keeping bees in areas with snow and winter, you will want to add sugar cakes, aka fondant, in the winter, and then add protein patties in late winter – early spring to get the honeybees going early.

You can open a beehive if its above 40F to do a quick winter bee inspection, if its in the 30sF, you can open it real quick to put some sugar on the top of the hive. Do not take the hive apart for a full inspection. We are just taking off the outer and inner cover, and looking in from the top of the hive real quick. The faster you do this the better, I think.

Honeybees may not always crawl up to the top and show themselves, they may still be clustered in a lower super, so just leave them that way. If you come across a dead hive, as we did, my suggestion is to leave the hive be, tape up the entrances, and clean out the hive when it warms up. You tape the entrances closed to keep the wax moths from moving in as spring approaches.

Dead Bees near sugar cake

Why did my bees die? Its not always obvious. Condensation is a big winter killer, but since we switched to the insulated inner covers we built, click for the insulated inner cover post, we have not had a condensation problem in the beehives in winter. Every year we have had a beehive die in winter, it is hard to get them all through winter. So when a hive dies, don’t blame yourself if you have done the following:
- Followed a plan for varroa mite control
- Fed bees in fall with sugar syrup
- Left enough honey in the hive for winter
- Added sugar cakes or fondant
- Used an insulated inner cover
- Tilted the hives forward in fall
Read more of our beekeeping posts here and watch beekeeping videos here. Thx!

Questions, comments? please let us know below:
March 28, 2013
Beekeeping 101, a look back on the first year GF Radio

GF Contributor Matt joins Eric to talk about his first year of beekeeping. Matt reflects on what real world beginning beekeeping is like after watching the Beekeeping 101 – How to keep bees videos on Gardenfork. Losing a hive, getting stung, how to find the queen in a hive, how not to kill the queen are all touched on.

Matt wrote a series of articles on beginning beekeeping for our site, as he chronicled his first year of beginning beekeeping.

Matt tells us about how to work a hive and yes, you should wear gloves and beehives are heavy. We agree with Rick’s use of metal handles, as beehives get heavy.

Beehives die, and why do they die? As Rick says, bees are bugs in a box, and bees don’t read books. Eric offers a few reasons why the beehive died: a stressed queen, the queen was crushed when working the bees or putting the hive back together.

Eric gives reasons for not buying bee packages, and especially not having bee packages sent in the mail. Buying local nucs is much better. Matt’s experience with beginning beekeeping bears this out. His package of bees died, his nuc is going strong.

Matt talked about a program in Virginia that funds beekeepers,

Matt also talked about homemade or DIY honey extractors, like this one on Mudsongs.org .

We also talk about raised beds, and how to build raised beds using bricks or plastic lumber and the pros and cons of using different materials for building raised beds.

photo by micky07

January 15, 2013
Requeening A Hive In Fall, a visual beekeeping how to

This year has been the year I’ve had to requeen 4 hives. Not sure why, but wanted to show one way how to requeen a beehive. This beehive was doing fine, I pulled some honey off the hive, and then checking it 3 weeks later there is barely any covered brood and no freshly laid eggs anywhere in the hive. You can see here in the first picture of the beehive, this frame is from the lower super, where there is usually brood, there aren’t any eggs on this frame. Luckily, I have a few other robust hives, and was able to get a queen from a nearby beekeeper.

Queens will slow down their egg laying in the fall, so you have to make sure the hive really is queenless, check most or all of the frames for brood.

Empty brood frames, not a good sign

Requeening this hive, I had to keep in mind its getting late in the year, and these bees will need a good population to get through the winter. I pulled two frames full of brood from a nearby healthy hive, knocked off most of the bees from those frames back into their hive, and got ready to open the queenless hive.

From the queenless hive, I took off the upper supers and then pulled two empty brood frames from the bottom super. I then put in the queenless hive the two frames of capped brood from the healthy donor hive, and then wedged in between those two frames the new queen in a queen cage.

Gently tap this frame over the donor hive to knock most of the bees off and back into their hive. Make sure the queen is not on these donor frames.

Capped brood from the donor colony

The capped brood will hatch soon, and will help boost the population of the hive while the queen gets acclimated and starts laying. I think this hive will make it through the winter, we still have a few months to get it back in shape.

I feed all our hives a 2:1 sugar syrup solution with an essential oil mix added in ( get the honeybee essential oil recipe here ), with this hive i may start early on the feeding.

queenless hive ready to accept brood frames and queen cage

Capped Brood Frames and Queen Cage inserted into queenless beehive.

Here are some beekeeping books I recommend:

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What has your experience been with requeening? Let us know below:

September 14, 2012
Supersedure Queen Cells – Beginning Beekeeping Video

I found these supersedure cells, sure sign of a queenless beehive, yesterday. Supersedure cells are a beehive’s way of raising an emergency queen. Something has happened to the queen, either it died, or the workers killed it because it was injured or not laying well, and the honeybees are raising a new queen. There were no signs of freshly laid eggs in this hive, and very little capped brood.

Supersedure cells are different than swarm cells. Swarm cells are queen cells that the hive is raising to create a new queen to take over the hive after the hive swarms. When a hive swarms, the current mated queen leaves with the swarm, leaving the new queen raised from the swarm cells to take over.

This hive had already swarmed, and I was thinking the new queen probably wasn’t well mated, considering we only have two hives in the yard here, and there is only one other hive nearby of Italians that I know of – there are probably feral hives nearby as well.

How do bees raise a new queen? They take some freshly laid eggs, usually 1-3 days old, and place them in these enlarged queen cells, and feed the larvae a diet of royal jelly. They don’t feed these larvae anything else, and the 100% royal jelly diet causes them to develop into queens rather than workers.

I happen to have just raised a new queen in my queen nuc, so I pulled out the frames with the supersedure cells on them, placed them in a nuc with some honey frame and workers, to make new queens.

I then took the nuc with the mated queen I just raised, and did a hive combine of the queenless hive and the mated queen nuc. I shot some video and we’ll be posting a video of that soon.

Added: Beekeeping nomenclature can be vague and confusing, because there is no one beekeeping terminology authority, here is a description of supersedure cells from my favorite beekeeper, Rusty, of HoneyBeeSuite.com :

A cell hanging off the middle of the frame somewhere is usually a supersedure or “emergency” queen cell. A cell hanging off the bottom of a frame is usually a swarm cell.

Supersedure cells are often begun after the eggs are laid. The bees, knowing they need to replace the queen, begin feeding royal jelly to a young larva they have selected. They build a supersedure cell around this larva (or several larvae) and it hangs down from the face of the comb. Swarm cells, however, are built in preparation for swarming and are not intended to replace the queen, but to raise a second queen. This way, there will be a queen for the part that swarms and a queen for the part that stays.

September 4, 2012
Combining Hives – Beekeeping How-To

Last week I discovered one of our honeybee hives had lost its queen, we had a drone laying worker in the hive. A laying worker is a worker bee who, after the queen of the hive dies for some reason, starts to lay eggs in the hive. The eggs of a worker bee are unfertilized, so they are all drones. Learn about a drone laying worker hive in this GF Post.

Newspaper placed over top super of strong hive

There are few remedies for a laying worker hive. One is to combine the hive with a stronger queenright hive. This laying worker hive was very weak, and its population low, so we decided to combine the hive with a stronger one next to it.

To combine two beehives, first you want to get as many of the bees in the weak hive into one super. I did this by smoking the bees down into the lower brood super. The remaining few honeybees in the upper supers I brushed into the bottom super.

Super from weak hive is placed over newspaper

Then open the top of the strong hive you are going to combine the weak hive with. Place a sheet of newspaper across the top super of the strong hive, and cut a few slits in the paper with a knife or hive tool.

Place the super of bees from the weak hive on top of this newspaper, put a notched inner cover on top of the weak super and then the outer cover of the hive, and leave it alone for a week. Be sure the super being added has the upper entrance a notched inner cover provides.

Combined Hive. Strapping is part of our bear defense plan

The newspaper allows the new worker bees to get acclimated to the strong hive’s queen scent, and allow the strong hive to slowly accept the new worker bees. The bees will slowly open up the newspaper sheet, and in the process, accept the new worker bees. After a week you can remove any remaining newspaper.

Let us know any suggestions or comments below. How do you combine hives?

Remains of weak hive on left, strong hive on right

May 6, 2012
Winter Bee Check & Sugar Feeding – Beekeeping 101 Video

Getting your honeybees through winter is a challenge. We feed our bees sugar in the form of a sugar cake, (sugar cake recipe below video) and show you in this video how to feed your bees sugar in the winter.

Note: I know use the Mountain Camp method of winter sugar feeding, but the video below is a good visual on checking your bees in winter.

Another benefit of sugar cakes on top of the hive is that they sugar absorbs moisture, reducing the chance of condensation forming on top of the hive and raining down on your bees, killing them.

We use these insulated inner covers in the winter, which help greatly in reducing condensation. So the combination of a winter cover and sugar cakes, I believe, really helps with moisture buildup in the hive.

Many books talk bout using fondant in winter, but I’ve found it is hard to make, and I’m not sure what the exact benefits it has over just plain sugar cakes, which are super simple to make with re-useable foil pans you buy at the store. We add a homemade essential oil mix to the cakes.

Read more of our beekeeping posts here and watch beekeeping videos here. Thx!

Do you use sugar in your hives in winter? let us know below:

February 25, 2012
Sugar Cake Recipe Winter Beekeeping 101 Video
Here’s a video on how to make sugar cakes to feed your bees in winter. Overwintering your honeybees is challenge, here is one way I help the bees overwinter, feeding them sugar cakes with this recipe. You can make these at home. I use foil pans you can buy at the grocery store.

Note: I know use the dry sugar aka Mountain Camp method of providing sugar to honeybees in the winter. Watch our dry sugar Mountain Camp video here.

The sugar cake recipe:
- put 5 pounds of sugar in a large mixing bowl
- add 7.5 ounces of water
- add a teaspoon or two of essential oil mix if you choose
- mix together and then spread out in a 9×13 or similar foil pan
- allow to dry overnight
- take off the inner cover of the hive
- carefully turn the cake upside down onto a thin plastic or wood board
- slide the sugarcake onto the top of the hive, and either put on either a shim or an insulated inner cover, and then the outer cover.
Here are some photos of how to make sugar cakes for bees.

You can add a homemade honeybee essential oil mix to the sugar cake recipe, you can see the essential oil recipe here. Update: I know buy the pre-mixed essential oil mix, its not that expensive and saves time.

To put these cakes on top of your hive, you must use a spacer – shim, or an insulated inner cover.

There are many opinions on how to get your bees through the winter, this is one way we make sure our honeybees have enough food to get through the winter. What I like about sugarcakes is that the cakes absorb moisture in the hive, which reduces or prevents condensation in the hive.

Many beekeeping books say you should open the hives only when it is 45-50F, but I’ve found if you act quickly, you can pop the top of the hive to slide in sugarcakes when the temperature is in the 30s. Obviously you aren’t going to do a hive inspection at 30F, but you have a few seconds to open the inner cover an add sugar above the supers.

Again, I think the dry sugar method is much better now, check it out here.

Do you use sugar in your hives in winter? let us know below:

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February 18, 2012

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