GardenFork – Eclectic DIY

Category: Beekeeping

DIY Hive Top Vent Board Keeps the Hive Cooler In Summer
Bees on a hot roof in NYC can be a problem in the middle of summer. I built a DIY hive top vent board to keep the hives a bit cooler. This also helps cure the honey in the supers, by the way. On the flip side, if you want to learn how to insulate your beehives for winter, here are a few posts.

The inner cover on top of the hive has one small opening out the front of the hive. In summer, in full sun, this doesn’t do very well keeping the hive cool. You don’t want the hive to be cold, but you should do what you can to keep it from overheating. If you have a hive in the sun, and see tons of bees crawling around the outside of the hive, its probably not a swarm, but bees that are too hot.

To keep a beehive cool in summer:
- Used a screened bottom board, and make sure the screen cover is pulled out.
- Use a slatted rack below the brood supers.
- Move it to a shadier area.
- Use a hive top vent board or screen.
DIY Hive Top Vent Board How To

I built this out of scrap 1×4 pine. What we are doing is creating a chimney effect for the hive. The opening in the center of the inner cover isn’t huge, but if we add some vents along the side, we can get more hot air leaving the hive.

I got this idea from my fav beekeeping websites, HoneyBeeSuite, and MudSongs.org.

The diameter of the holes is not super important. These are 1 1/4″ but they could be 3/4″, I think. Do not put any vent holes in the front of the vent board, you don’t want to confuse the bees that use the upper entrance. They might try to use the screen covered hole as an entrance.

I covered the holes with some scrap window screen and stapled around the holes.

The corners of the board were made strong by gluing in some scrap wood. These are 2×3″ pieces. I use regular wood glue.

What is important is that the beehive ventilation board is at least 3″ high. If you use a narrow piece of wood, the outer cover, which has a big overhang, covers the vent holes. Learn from me, the first vent boards I made were from 1×2″ pine. They didn’t work.

You can see here how the outer cover would cover up the vents if we used a narrow piece of wood to build the DIY hive top vent board.
June 26, 2018
Is Apisoir A Word? Wikipedia Says No

Apisoir is a word coined by Michael Alberty to promote the local terrior of honey. Being a wine writer, Michael had words to describe different wines, so why not honey? Erik of the Root Simple podcast interviewed Michael Alberty, and its a good listen on how one can, or as it happens sometimes, cannot create a new word. The word bootylicious is used as an interesting example of how words happen.

I’m still left wondering who determines if a word is a word.

But the idea of having a term for the unique tastes of different honey is a good one. Honey from different hives tastes different. Honey from the same hive, but from different frames of comb, can taste different.

Why does honey taste different hive to hive? Its all about the nectar used to produce the honey, and the plants that produced that nectar, and the environmental conditions that those nectar producing plants grow in.

I bet most of us have been to a farmers market where different jars of honey are lined up, and you can see the differences in the honeys. You’ve probably seen buckwheat honey sitting next to goldenrod honey, or similar pairings. So yeah, a word for that would be good.

But not so fast. Wikipedia wouldn’t allow Michael to create a page for the word Apisoir. This could be just the Wikipedia hall monitor on duty the day Michael added the page didn’t get it. But Wikipedia could have good reasons for not approving the page, they have to manage many people creating many pages. I’m sure they have some interesting stories.

Interesting to read some of the comments on the Root Simple podcast episode, as some are now saying that the word apisoir, while drawing on the French language, doesn’t sound nice in French. It sounds too much like the word pissoir. Oops.

So from what I can tell, if we all use the non-word apisoir in our posts and podcasts, it may work its way into the mainstream. Maybe if its used in a hip-hop song it will help, this practice seems to get the attention of the Old English Dictionary.

February 15, 2018
Will My Bees Survive Winter?

Helping your bees survive winter is one of the hardest parts of beekeeping. I have several videos about winter bee survival and feeding. A reader asked:

It’s been in the 20’s and 30’s for the last two weeks or so with another week of the same temps. If my bees are clustered will they be able to feed and keep clustered enough to survive until the weather breaks?

Beehive insulated, with insulated inner cover, and strapped to survive winter

Will The Bees Survive Winter?

Honeybees don’t hibernate, they cluster. Their metabolism does slow down, but the don’t ‘go to sleep’. The bees move around the hive, in a balled mass, with the queen in the middle. They move through the hive eating the honey stores. The bees on the outside of the cluster move their wings to generate heat, to keep the cluster warm. And the bees rotate, kinda like a volleyball team, so the bees on the outside of the cluster slowly move to the center to warm up, and the inner bees move outward to be the cluster-warmers.

In a perfect world, this works fine, then spring comes, and the queen lays eggs, and off we go on another season. But in the northern states, this is not the case. Whatever issues a hive had over the season has a big impact on whether the bees survive winter.

Best Beekeeping Books That I Still Use

I’ve got a bunch of vids and how to posts on the topic of winter beekeeping, but I’ll answer the question above right quick.

Temps in the 20 and 30s are pretty good for winter, I think. The problems get really bad when its near zero. But you can still lose your bees in a 30 degree winter.

Mite Load. If there are mites in the hive in the fall, that number will explode in winter. As the mite load rises, the bee population declines due to winter die off. The mites will eventually kill off the rest of the hive. Currently I think the best mite treatment is with oxalic acid, here’s the video.

BTW, just because you don’t see mites doesn’t meant you don’t have any. You more than likely do.

Condensation. The outside of the hive is cold, the inside is warm. Condensation collects on the top of the hive, and drips back down onto the bees. Cold bees are OK in winter, cold wet bees are dead bees in winter. The combined use of dry sugar feeding and a insulated inner cover eliminates condensation.

Starvation. Either leave a lot of honey on the hive or feed your bees starting in late summer. Sugar syrup is cheap winter bee survival insurance.

Bees eating dry sugar in late winter.

Emergency Winter Feeding. I think the dry sugar feed is great, but you can also put fondant, sugar cakes, or candy boards on top of your hive. The dry sugar method, aka moutain top feeding, is literally a piece of newspaper on top of the hive with 4 pounds of dry sugar poured on it.

Northern Queen. Southern queen that come in bee packages have a lower survival rate than Northern Queens. If you have bought a package, you can replace the queen in summer (requeening video here), and increase your chances of winter survival.

OK, that is my 500 word thought on the subject, what are your thoughts? I always learn from you all in the comments. Thx!

January 5, 2018
Honey Harvest Made Easier

Its honey harvest time again. I’ve talked about the uncapping roller before, video here, but you combine this tool with putting 9 frames in a 10 frame honey super and you’ve made your life much easier.

Most beekeepers use a hot knife, or uncapping knife to cut the beeswax caps off the tops of the honeycomb cells. Uncapping means opening up the cells so you can get the honey out, usually using an extractor.

But with this roller tool, (buy it here) you don’t need to use a knife to cut off the caps. The photos look kind of messy, but this works pretty good. With a hot knife, you run the risk of gouging into the honeycomb. This means more work for the bees, rebuilding the comb before they can fill it with honey again.

The uncapping roller punches holes in the caps. Its not a perfect process, but you get much less wax in your honey when extracting. So you don’t have to filter nearly as much wax when bottling the honey.

The second new thing I’ve done is put 9 frames in a 10 frame honey super. This means one less frame than the box is designed for. But what this does is create a bit more space between each frame. The bees draw out the honeycomb a bit farther, which makes uncapping easier. And it means less propolis between frames, its much easier to pull these frames out of the super.

I use brackets that set the frames at the right spacing. This has been a really nice thing.

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August 8, 2017
Why The Different Color Honey Cappings?

I wanted to pull some of the honey off our bigger hive. Early in the year I had stacked two honey supers on that hive, hoping to catch an early nectar flow, which I managed to do despite a swarm. But as I was going through the honey supers, which are super heavy, btw, I saw frames with different color honey cappings.

Not sure what this meant. Were the darker wax cappings honey that was older? Had the honey had more time to cure, or lose moisture and darken? There wasn’t as much dark honey in the frames, there was a lot more honey with lighter, almost white cappings.

This is a dilemma I’m happy to have, after last year’s drought left us with almost no nectar flow, and no honey to harvest. Any honey the bees managed to make we left in the hives for them to use over winter. This year’s spring rains helped kick the nectar flow in early.

Because of that early nectar flow, I wanted to pull some honey frames off the hive, extract them, and get the frames back on the hive before the nectar flow stops this summer. So I pulled off all the dark capped honey frames I found in the honey supers. Most of the lighter capped frames stayed on the hive.

If you all are wondering why I only use medium frames throughout the hive, once you pull a honey super off a hive, you will understand immediately. Honey is heavy. A medium super of honey weighs about 40 pounds. If your hive is on a hive stand, and you have two honey supers plus 3 brood supers on a hive, you are pulling 40 pounds off a hive above your head.

I put metal handles on all my honey supers, and its ideal to have a helper with this any most all jobs with beekeeping. Learn from me.

OK, back to the question of cappings. Why white and darker cappings in the same hive? First an explanation about cappings from the best beekeeping blog, Honey Bee Suite. Rusty says:

Depending on their genetics, bees either place the capping wax directly on the surface of the honey, or they may leave a little air pocket between the surface of the honey and the wax. These two methods make no difference in the flavor, color, or quality of the honey, but they make the finished combs look dramatically different.

The honeycomb with the air pockets is said to have dry cappings. The comb appears white or very light tan. Honeycomb with wet cappings is not actually wet, but it looks like it might be. The appearance is darker and may have a variegated pattern due to scattered mini air pockets, which have a lighter color.

While some honey bees produce both types of capping, some consistently build one kind or the other. Italian honey bees (Apis mellifera ligustica) are known for producing white, dry caps. At the other end of the spectrum, Caucasian bees (Apis caucasica) produced wet caps almost exclusively.

White cappings are called “dry cappings”, darker cappings are called “wet cappings” FYI.

But why the different color honey cappings in the same hive? I put honey supers on this hive in spring, and then the hive swarmed. Not wanting to lose the honey season while the hive raised a new queen, I re-queened the hive. The new queen was a mix breed from Long Island. The white cappings of the newer honey suggests she is mainly Italian. The original queen was Carnolian.

June 15, 2017
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
Quick Swarm Traps To Capture Swarms

Make these quick swarm traps when you have some spare beekeeping parts on the shelf. The parts are just sitting there, so we might as well use them, right? Here’s how I build a swarm box using that famous GardenFork mantra: Use What You Got.

I had some frames from a dead hive, plus some frames of honeycomb that had been damaged by wax moths. While not in the best of shape, these are perfect for a quick swarm trap. Not sure if you can see it in the photo above, but most of my frames use plastic foundation. One benefit of this is you can scrape out damaged comb and not ruin the whole frame. The center frame had some wax moth damage, which I removed.

Above is the difference between frames made with wired wax foundation and plastic foundation. Use either one for your hives, its a personal preference, lots of strong opinions about this of course… I like the plastic foundation because its easy to clean up, it lasts longer and the bees take to it easily.

I am using a medium frame super, that is the wooden box that the frames sit in. If you have spare frames, but not a spare super, you can make a box out of scrap wood or cardboard or even plastic sign material. Make sure it has an entrance and ventilation. Again, Use What You Got.

Bees that are swarming and looking for new home LOVE the smell of an old beehive, and are attracted right to it, hopefully. So save those chunks of old burr comb and honeycomb, and stick some in each of your quick swarm traps. I put the comb on the bottom board, under the frames. It doesn’t have to be attached, it can just sit there.

Because I like to buy bee supplies, and this was pretty cheap, I picked up this swarm attractant. Buy online here. The envelope has 2 small plastic vials of mystery fluid. I’m pretty sure its lemongrass extract and perhaps spearmint. It says not to open the envelope, but of course I did anyway, to discover the vials. Basically, the heat of the day warms up the plastic vials, which probably leak a bit of essential oil vapor. Place the vial on top of the hive frames in the box.

I’m using an old bottom board for the base of the swarm trap, but you want to reduce the entrance. The swarm may not have the population to defend a large entrance, so close it down with whatever you have. Duct tape works very well, FYI.

The screen in the bottom board helps to spread the aroma of the old burr comb, the honeycomb in the frames, and the attractant.

I made a cover for this out of scrap plywood and some 1×2 lumber. I screwed the top into the super holding the frames, and screwed the super into the bottom board. This way you can hang the rig in a tree or on a fence and when its full of bees, you can bring it down without it call coming apart. I usually attach a 1×4 piece of wood as a hanger, and wire this into a tree or fence.

Swarm traps seem to do best when located in a partial shade area about 100′ from bee yard. But you can put them anywhere to test them. I put one in my Brooklyn backyard every year, because I see bees on our flowers, but have no idea of any beekeepers nearby. I have yet to catch a swarm in the yard, but I try.

You can make quick swarm traps out of all sorts of stuff, even political signs, learn more here.

I have caught some swarms, and its a lot of fun, watch here:

May 9, 2017
My Thoughts On The Flow Hive

“Eric, what do you think of the Flow™ Hive?” I get this question every week, so I thought I’d write out a post to refer people to for more information.

The short answer is this: It is a great solution in search of a problem.

©Beeinventive Pty.Ltd.

People who are not beekeepers see this product and the beautiful videos, and then email me saying:

“I’m going to buy a Flow Hive so I won’t have to touch the bees and get stung.”

My first rule of beekeeping is: You are going to get stung.

Having a hive where you just turn on the tap and out comes honey isn’t realistic, in my opinion.

Bees are the same as other farm animals, you have to take care of them.

For most beekeepers, you harvest honey one day a year. For the other 364, you have to take care of your bees.

Below is a quick rundown on taking care of a beehive through the year.

In spring, you have to first make sure your bees are alive, then feed them sugar syrup and pollen patties until food sources appear in your are. If you want to prevent swarming, you may re-queen the hives now. In late spring you’ll add honey supers.

Spring into summer you will do periodic checks to make sure the queen is alive and laying. If you see queen cells being produced, you’ll try to prevent swarming. You may split the hive as a check against swarming. Be sure check the electric fence to make sure the bears don’t tear apart your hives.

Keep an eye on nectar and pollen sources and see if there is a dearth due to drought or just the plant cycle of your area.

In late summer you might think about harvesting honey. You’ll have to think about how much honey to leave a hive for winter. How strong is the hive? If the hive is weak, you may combine it with another hive. You may also re-queen in late summer, early fall.

And you have to deal with the Varroa Mites, or they will kill your hive. Watch our Varroa Mite Treatment video here.

As fall approaches your whole goal is to get the hive in the best shape possible to live through winter, we have a bunch of videos about this here.

These are just some of the tasks of beekeeping, my point here is the Flow Hive is one way to keep bees, but its not a hands-off method of beekeeping, as many people seem to misunderstand.

My favorite beekeeping blogger, Rusty, writes about this better than I do, read her take on the Flow Hive here.

February 3, 2016
Honey Harvesting Made Easy With Honey Uncapping Roller
Honey harvesting has always been labor intensive, but with a honey uncapping roller, its a lot easier. This is the second harvest we’ve done with the comb roller, and its much easier to use than a hot capping knife.

With a capping knife, its easy to gouge out large chunks of honeycomb, exactly what you want to avoid in the first place. The idea is to remove the beeswax caps on the honey cells, but not damage the cells themselves. Its an ideal that we don’t achieve often. When you only do honey harvesting twice a year, you don’t get to practice much with the uncapping tools.

With the honey uncapping roller, ( buy it here ) you just roll the tool across the face of the frame several times up and down, and side to side. You have to be careful not to crush the comb, especially when extracting honey from wired foundation. ( I prefer plastic foundation, btw )

I have found that sometimes, after putting the frames into the extractor, I may have to re-roll areas of the frame, but its still so much better than using a capping knife.

Very little beeswax in the honey when using this tool

Honey harvesting is easier, here’s why:
- You get a lot less beeswax in your honey
- No hot knife that is plugged into the wall
- Most anyone can do this task
- Honeycomb is not destroyed.
You no longer need a cappings tub of some sort to catch all the beeswax and honey while uncapping. I stand the frames up in an old cake pan. While bottling the honey, the honey runs through a kitchen sieve. The amount of beeswax cappings from one super is less than a handful.

Honey Frames after Honeybees cleaned them up

I have found that at times, not all the honey is extracted from the frames, but to me its not a big deal. I put these frames back out in the beeyard and they are cleaned up quickly by the honeybees.

Watch the uncapping roller in action in this honey harvest video

So there you go, have you used the cappings roller for honey harvesting? Let me know below:

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August 19, 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
Bear or Varmint takes apart an empty hive

I had been using this empty hive as a bait hive, hoping to catch a swarm from – no luck there – and I had just left this outside the garage. I had meant to put it inside the garage, but you know how that goes.

Then that night Charlie Pup was barking at the window looking towards the garage, and i figured she was barking at a shadow.

But then come morning I see some animal has taken the empty hive apart. Luckily it wasn’t too broken up. There was a mix of wax foundation and plastic foundation frames that hadn’t been drawn out yet.

Can’t say this was a bear, it may have been a raccoon or skunk, but it reminds me not to leave beekeeping gear outside anymore.

July 27, 2014
Inside the Hive: Views from a First Year Beekeeper (Scene 23)

Pollen is the topic of this post. In this image you can see quite a bit of it in the comb. It is of various colors and what I’ve seen them bringing in, at least the day of this hive inspection, is yellow. In fact, if you look closely at this picture you’ll see a couple of bees with what looks like little yellow corn kernels on them. This yellow substance is pollen and it is held in the pollen baskets on their legs.

Bees, like humans, require protein to survive and pollen provides that protein. The honeybees mix this with some nectar and produce something we call “bee bread” which is fed to the larva. Without this source of protein, the bees won’t develop. Some beekeepers will provide “pollen patties” to their hives. This is a man-made substitute for pollen which they will, apparently, use like pollen. I have not had any experience with pollen patties at this point.

Pollen is a little bundle of cells covered in a protective coating. The cells include vegetative ones and also a couple of reproductive ones. Pollen is the sperm of the plant and is a necessary component for reproduction. Plants which utilize pollinators like honeybees produce pollen which sticks easily to these pollinators and is carried from the anther to the stigma, thus reproduction in the plant. That’s really the main reason plants have flowers – to reproduce.

Bees, flies and other pollinators live in symbiotic harmony with flowering plants. These plants produce lots of pollen and some of it gets moved from the anther to stigma, helping to ensure reproduction in the plant. The plant relies upon these pollinators. The plants, in return, provide the protein needed for the bee to reproduce.

Happy beekeeping,

Matt

Read all of Matt’s Inside the Hive Posts here

Matt (twitter @MattInTheGarden) likes pickled cucumbers but not pickled beets. He thinks matrix math is cool. Matt wishes there were less lawyers and more scientists in the world. He knows there are some serious steering issues with Fred Flintstone’s car that nobody else seems to care about… oh yeah, folks… chuckle away at that stone-age humor. Haha very funny. Matt’s not amused by Hanna-Barbera’s lack of knowledge about vehicles and engineering, let alone physics.

October 13, 2012
Inside the Hive: Views from a First Year Beekeeper (Scene 22)

Here I’ve got a photo from my recent hive inspection of hive #2. As you can see, the bees don’t all look alike. Oh, sure they have wings and are about the same size but their coloration varies. Along the bottom of that frame in the middle you can see some very yellow-orange bodied honeybees and some that are black/dark gray and a dull grayish yellow. In fact there is quite a variety of coloration and banding on this frame.

Why is that?

Mostly this is due to genetic variation among these honeybees. The queen mates with many different drones and so there is almost certainly going to be a bit of a “melting pot” in the hive. Over in hive #1, I had an Italian honeybee queen and most of the initial workers in that hive looked like Italian bees. But as the hive has grown, there has been a bit more variety in the bees in that hive, but certainly not as much as in hive #2, which my beekeeping mentor, Lindi, called “mutt bees” – I suspect the queen in that hive is some cross. Mix the genes of this queen with a variety of drones and the genetic diversity increases.

Genetic diversity in a hive is a good thing.

If all the bees in a hive were genetically identical – clones if you will – their particular genetic makeup might make them less hardy in adverse weather conditions, maybe it would make them more prone to succumbing to disease. You get the idea. The hive thrives by having a diverse population. The idea behind natural selection is that those traits which are advantageous for survival given the current situation will give the bees having those traits a leg up on those that don’t have those traits. So in a hive where the population is heterogenous, some might succumb to a disease or perhaps mites while others may be less inclined to be affected by that disease or the mite infestation. If the queen is one of those survivors or some of her drones are among those with superior genetics, the result will be that those traits will have an opportunity to be passed on via sperm and egg. The queen that doesn’t make it, or the drones that don’t make it won’t pass their traits along, of course.

This doesn’t, of course, mean that these honeybees are moving toward perfection… their population is just affected by their genetic makeup and the world around them. What affected population N and caused certain members of population N to die off might not affect population N+M. In fact, it is possible that population N+M might be affected by something to which those from population N that died were better suited to survive. Interesting, huh? Well, at least to me. The point is that the world is a dynamic place and selection doesn’t always mean improvement. When the conditions change, populations have to adapt or they won’t survive. Genetic diversity provides better odds that the population will survive.

Happy beekeeping,

Matt

Read all of Matt’s Inside the Hive Posts here

Matt (twitter @MattInTheGarden) would like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony but he’d be happy if the folks that can’t carry a tune would just hush it already. Seriously folks, you’re killing him with your off-key renditions of “Call Me Maybe”. Matt loves to play backgammon, go, and chess. He stinks at two of the three of those – guess which? His favorite Partridge was Laurie, of course.

October 9, 2012
Inside the Hive: Views from a First Year Beekeeper (Scene 21)

Propolis – that sticky, gooey substance that honeybees make from plant resins – is strong stuff. Anyone who has tried to separate one super from the one below it can testify to the holding power of propolis. As I’ve written before, bees use this to fill in small cracks and seal up anything needing to be sealed up.

Apparently, they needed to seal this frame in its box very well. Between a bunch of burr comb and an abundance of propolis, this frame simply would not come out. As you can see, the nails and glue failed before the propolis did. I honestly didn’t expect that to be the case. I was very careful when building these frames and if you look closely, you can see that some wood tore away on this frame… maybe it was just weak wood.

I two-tooled the frame out after pushing my hive tools down between the frames a couple of times. I’ll probably swap that out in the spring and I tapped it back together and noted which one it is.

Happy beekeeping,

Matt

Read all of Matt’s Inside the Hive Posts here

Matt (twitter @MattInTheGarden) doesn’t like those cutesy flower-topped pens that businesses use to discourage folks from taking them. He doesn’t understand why people like eating liver at all. There are much better things to eat in life. His favorite stooge is Moe because he is grumpy and has a smart looking haircut. Just kidding… he’s not that grumpy. Matt is one of the nine people in North America that listened to AM radio last week. If you haven’t listened to AM in awhile… it hasn’t improved.

October 7, 2012
Inside the Hive: Views from a First Year Beekeeper (Scene 20)

Varoa Destructor!

Ominous sounding name, huh?

This little sucker (literally) is one of the many pests which can affect the health and well being of a hive. Varoa is a mite which latches onto the honeybee and sucks the hemolymph from the bee. You can think of hemolymph as being like our own blood though it doesn’t serve exactly the same purpose in the bee as blood does in humans. For one thing, bees don’t need to have oxygen circulated throughout their bodies because they respirate (breathe) directly through the spiracles on their sides. Another type of mite, the tracheal mite, sets up home inside the bee’s trachea and block the airways. You can’t see those with your naked eye.

There’s a Varoa mite prominently displayed right in the center of the picture behind that center bee’s eyes. If you closely under the left wing of the second bee from the left on the bottom, you can see another Varoa mite. Without my reading glasses (yes, I’m getting old and my eyesight stinks) I can’t see these mites, so I generally need to rely upon examining the pictures I take when inspecting my hive. I saw other Varoa mites in other pictures but not a lot of them. I will be treating for these in the next week using powdered sugar. Essentially you dust the bees with it and it helps to dislodge some of the mites as part of the process. The bees don’t mind the powered sugar but it does actually result in some of the mites falling off.

Varoa reduces the life of a honeybee and so it is important to treat for these pests to keep them in check. Hives will have them – in fact most every hive is going to have Varoa mites. But the presence of these mites doesn’t mean that your hive is doomed. A simple method for checking them is to treat with powered sugar and stick a slide-in card in your screened bottom board. The mites will fall off – at least many will – and you can count them to gauge how your hive is doing. It would be nearly impossible to prevent Varoa since bees don’t live in a closed system – they are out and about and likely to pick up Varoa and bring it back to the hive. Our job as beekeepers is to treat for and keep account of the Varoa population rather than attempt to eliminate them – that’s not going to happen. Varoa poses no direct threat to humans or animals as far as I know. It doesn’t affect the honey either. It is simply a pest that affects the life of the bee directly.

Happy beekeeping,

Matt

Read all of Matt’s Inside the Hive Posts here

Matt (twitter @MattInTheGarden) is not a fan of seersucker suits, NASCAR or zydeco music. He prefers sausage over bacon and bacon over Canadian bacon. His favorite pizza topping is black olives, at least today. Matt thinks right now is a great time for a nap.

October 7, 2012
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
Best Flowers for Honeybees : Woodland Asters

What are the best flowers for honeybees? What kind of flowers do bees like? How do i attract honeybees to my garden?

Honeybee attractant flower – Asters

Being a beekeeper, I pay a lot of attention to what flowers honeybees are attracted to, and in the late summer and fall, the forest edges of my yard are full of Woodland Asters, and these flowers are full of honeybees. Woodland Asters bloom late, and keep their flowers quite a while into the cold days of fall. They are an edge of forest plant, they wont grow in direct sun, and are inconspicuous before they bloom, then all of a sudden, they are there in front of you. Full of honeybees too. Asters are one of the best plants for honeybees in the fall.

The flower world calls these White Wood Asters, my neighbors call them Woodland Asters, the experts call them Eurybia divaricata, which is a mouthful. The name Aster comes from Greece, meaning ‘star’. The name fits the flowers, these have white petals that shoot straight out with a yellow center. This particular aster is considered threatened in Canada, but it grows in pockets around my area. According to Wikipedia, it is common in the Appalachian Mountains.

Project Native, a cool group up in Massachusetts, sells several seed mixes that have different native asters, I’m thinking most of the asters are honeybee attractant plants – flowers.

Honeybees are all over the asters in our yard

If you have asters in your yard, but don’t see honeybees on them, just wait. Honeybees focus on a particular plant for a while, then move on to the next plant species that is ready for them. The honeybees in your area may be working another kind of flower, like Goldenrod, and when they are done with that, they’ll move on to the asters. Honeybees don’t hop from one aster to another goldenrod, they focus on one flower type, then shift to new plants.

What flowers do you see honeybees on in your yard? Let us know below:

September 14, 2012