Requeening Adventure

Posted on April 28, 2012 by

My friend June asked me to come over to inspect one of her hives that she suspected had a failing queen.  That was the beginning of a requeening adventure.  When we opened the hive we saw a tiny amount of spotty brood, never found the queen and didn’t find eggs.  So then we decided to open the other hives and see if we could find a queen cell to requeen the failing hive with.

One of her other hives had a big gorgeous queen and several frames of capped brood.  We also found a queen cell that was capped. June decided she would just put the whole frame with the capped cell in the failing hive, unfortunately there was one problem…the queen was on that frame.  Well this led to June trying to move the queen off the frame as we watched, horrified, to see the queen fly away.

That led to our checking all around the hive to see if she was on the ground, she wasn’t.  Then rechecking the frames to see if she flew back in to the hive, she didn’t.  Sadly, this hive may be queenless now, along with the original one we were trying to requeen.  We went ahead and put the frame with the queen cell in the first hive hoping the escaping queen will return. To be continued….

Posted in hive inspecting, queenless hive, requeening | Leave a comment

Earth Day at Nature’s Touch

Posted on April 23, 2012 by

We have a wonderful organic health food store and nursery near where I live named Nature’s Touch run by Melanie Blankenship and her family.  Melanie has enthusiastically supported local farmers and crafts people including myself.  Sunday was Earth Day and she organized a wonderful festival with food samples, and booths for locals to promote their wares.

Last year she started carrying my honey and beeswax products in her store. Every time I see her she asks for more honey but I sold out from last year’s harvest and the bees haven’t yet produced for this year.  I did bring some of my candles and cosmetics to display and other vendors brought food and hand made products. It was a great event. You can see from the pictures that the weather was perfect and tons of people showed up. This was the first year of the event and everyone seemed to have a great time.  Hopefully it will become an annual event.

 

Posted in Bee Gifts, candles, Earth Day | Leave a comment

Bee Season in Full Swing

Posted on April 10, 2012 by

Within the last week I installed a new package of bees with my daughter, requeened an existing hive and caught a swarm of bees with my friend June.

It’s already a very busy bee season.  It was 5 days since the queens were placed in the hives so Sandra and I checked them today and not only were they released they were laying eggs like crazy!  I’m thinking these Beeweaver bees are going to be great.  The queens are big, fat and healthy looking.  Marked with yellow this year and easy to spot.

The swarm hive is at June’s house and doing great so far.  It was a rather small swarm, about the size of a football but as soon as we put them in a hive box and fed them they got right to work building comb and we found the queen.

It’s looking like a great start to Spring and Summer and likely a great honey harvest to look forward to in July or August.

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments

The Arrival of Violetta

Posted on April 5, 2012 by

My daughter Sandra decided to start a hive of her own at my house and the package of bees arrived today.  We ordered bees from Beeweaver in Texas.  This company has been raising bees without medication for 10 yrs. now. They breed the strongest, healthiest, most disease resistant queens.  The package arrived by overnight UPS just before Sandra and my Grandson Hank arrived at my house.  The UPS driver looked anxious and said he was happy to get the bees out of his truck as they are lethal to him!

So we set up the new hive next to the 4 of mine that are already there.  Hank gently sprayed some sugar water on the bees and we gave them a good shake to get them out of the box and into the hive.  I had ordered a replacement queen for one of my own hives so there were 2 queen cages in the package.

Hank picked out Violetta (that’s what he named the new queen) and she is now safely in her new home.

It took a long time for me to find the queen I was replacing but finally located and eliminated her.  New queen now in that hive.  Hope they accept her. I smeared honey and wax on the new queen’s cage to help.

Posted in Beeweaver, hive set up, hiving a package of bees, requeening | Leave a comment

Taking the show on the road!

Posted on March 10, 2012 by

Yesterday my daughter Sandra and I took an observation hive and did a presentation about bees to the 7th grade science class at my grandson’s school.  It was too much fun!  Those kids were adorable and absolutely enthralled.  The questions were shooting at us so fast we could hardly answer fast enough and could have filled another hour with all the information we shared with them.

One little girl is going to grow up to be an entimoligist or beekeeper for sure.  She couldn’t get enough of the bees and even brought her dad in to see them.

We covered quite a bit in one hour and finished the talk with information about Colony Collapse Disorder, monoculture, pesticides, the vanishing of the bees and a taste of delicious honey from my hives.  The kids loved it.

Hopefully, they will grow up to be good stewards of the environment and take the information home to their parents as well.  Now that we have the talk prepared we’re thinking we’ll offer it to other classes and other schools.  So much fun!

Posted in Bee presentation, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Bee Season

Posted on February 21, 2012 by

Spring is coming early to California.  A warmer than normal Winter has brought on some early blooming in the fruit orchard.  The bees are all over this apricot tree, the first in the orchard to bloom.

I did an inspection the other day when we had a warm afternoon and was very pleased to see all 4 hives doing well.  Even the one that has been struggling now has brood and a supply of honey.

Also, I saw very few mites which was a nice surprise.  I have a goal of developing my apiary to be completely chemical free which means the bees will need to be able to deal with pests and disease without chemical help.  So far, they are doing quite well.  I’ve ordered a new queen from Beeweaver in Austin, Texas.  They have been rearing queens without using any chemicals for 10 yrs.  My new queen will arrive in April and then I will need to decide which of the 4 I have will be eliminated.  That’s always a little difficult for me, I don’t like killing any of them. My decision will be based on which queen is producing the most brood. Some beekeepers think hives need to be requeened every year and I’ve done that for the last 3 years but this year I’m going to let the most productive queens go another year and see what happens.

Posted in diseases, hive inspecting, requeening, Uncategorized, varroa mites | Leave a comment

Oh Happy Day!!

Posted on January 14, 2012 by

It’s been dry and warm here in California so I thought I better check my hives and make sure they aren’t too crowded, hungry, diseased etc.

I was very happy to discover all are doing well, great in fact, even my one hive that has been struggling.  I’ve been feeding that one and they are really responding.  Now they have honey stored, pollen and small amount of brood.  I will requeen that hive in the Spring, providing they make it through Winter.  After the inspection today though I’m feeling much more optimistic about them.

The other 3 hives are looking great with plenty of honey stored, healthy looking with healthy queens.  I think all are in good shape heading in to Spring.  Now, if California would just get some rain the bees will have something to forage on this Spring and Summer.

Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment

What To Do With A Struggling Hive

Posted on December 14, 2011 by

I’ve been really lucky for 3 years now and have only had successes with my hives but luck may be running out with one hive.

For several months now I’ve watched one of my hives slowly dwindle no matter what I do.  I requeened in the Spring yet there was very little brood each time I inspected.  Also, there was scant honey stored and very little pollen.  The bees walk around on the frames but don’t build much honeycomb.  They fly in and out of the hive but don’t store honey or pollen.

I have tried changing out the frames thinking there is something on them they don’t like.  I took honey from one of my other hives and they ate it but they don’t make much of their own.

I don’t see mites or any other evidence of disease when I check the hive.  I am worried that I’m going to see CCD soon.  Yesterday I fed the bees winter strength syrup.  There are still 4-6 frames of bees in the hive but this is a lot fewer than previous years.  They are now down to one hive box and barely need that.

I know most California beekeepers are losing one third of their bees every year and this is my first hive to fail so guess I am lucky but it is disturbing to lose any and I am frustrated that I can’t figure out what has happened to this hive.

My plan is to continue to feed through the winter and hope for the best. Thankfully, my other 3 hives are thriving.

Posted in diseases, hive inspecting, spotty brood pattern, Uncategorized, varroa mites, winter | Leave a comment

Preparing for Winter

Posted on November 2, 2011 by

I imagine preparing for winter in California is quite a bit different than other parts of the country.  It’s November and our daytime temperatures in Central Coast of California are still in the high 70′s to 80′s. Never the less, the night time temps are dipping down to the 30′s so it seems time to get the hives ready for colder weather.

I put the inner covers back on the hives after I prepared them to allow a little ventilation.  I don’t remember which book I got this tip from but I glued popscicle sticks to the inside corners of the inner covers which allows a slight flow of air (but not bees) to move out the top of the hive.  The theory being that during cold and wet weather the bees cluster together, creating warmth and moisture.  If there isn’t enough ventilation the moisture will collect and drip on the bees causing them to be wet and eventually sick.

The other preparation is to make sure there is enough honey stored (I moved a full frame of honey from one hive to another that was low) and make sure the hives are slightly tipped toward the entrance so any rain water that enters the hives can run out the front entrance. I also placed the entrance reducers back on the hives with the middle size opening in place.

Some people recommend covering the hives with tar paper or some other insulator.  In my area that doesn’t seem to be necessary.  We do on occasion have temps in the low 30′s but the bees seem to tolerate that as I have not lost a hive yet, even in cold weather.

So, the bees are tucked in with plenty of stored honey, entrance reducers in place and inner covers on with ventilation secured.  Fingers crossed that everyone does well through winter.

Posted in diseases, hive set up, honey, winter | Leave a comment

What’s New?

Posted on October 14, 2011 by

Several new things have been happening in the bee world.  One of the most obvious is my blog update.  My techie friend Anna installed a new rotating header for my blog.  The pictures are ones that I took.  Anna cropped the photos and placed my bee logo strategically over flowers.  It’s a nice change I think.

Another new thing is how fast my honey has been selling, just by word of mouth.  I am delighted that people seem so pleased with this year’s harvest and word has gotten around that my honey is truly local and probably as pesticide free as one could hope for without actually living on an island!  A local organic market has asked for a case of my honey to sell.  It’s a market I have great respect for so that’s exciting.

My friend June and I have been making some fun things with beeswax which I will post with pictures and instructions when completed.

I am looking forward to attending the California Beekeeper Conference in Santa Rosa next month and will post pictures and information about that when I get back.  Hoping to hear some great lectures and new research about bees while I’m there.

Lastly, my bees are tucked in for the Fall and Winter and I won’t be disturbing them much now for the next few months, which will be nice for both the bees and me.

Posted in diseases, hive set up, honey, winter | Leave a comment