We had an inch of snow last week and it was 71 F today. Between the wind and rains it's hit or miss on getting things wrapped up in the bee yards. I should have most of it wrapped up over the cold weekend. Last round of OA sublimation is in order too.
What an incredible fall flow. Not that I wanted the supers on this long but things got pushed back further than expected. My hives are high elevation and not what I would consider a prime area for honey yet I averaged 100 lbs per hive for the first time ever.
I'd pulled summer honey the third...
120 lbs is a good haul for a hive. Up in the Northeast Kingdom we don't get that much. Summer honey was near 50 lbs and the goldenrod pull may be 30 lbs. Very cold and wet this past week so I'm not expecting much but they will likely be packing it away this week. I did a round of Oxalic this...
You don't have Joe Pye weed or loosestrife? That's what the bees were on, Joe Pye is ending. Knapweed is starting but we don't have much of that. Again, I can't tell if they wait for Joe Pye to end then move to goldenrod or if they are waiting for a certain variety to bloom. Have had blooming...
Washboarding-
The anti robbing scent makes the most sense to me. Folks in the South that experience a summer dearth and then a fall flow say the bees washboard at the start of both dearths.
Did some bee lining this afternoon with the boy. We could only find two honey bees in 40 minutes of looking, swashed one on the bee box lid. Set up the box anyway not thinking we'd get the lone bee to return. Within an hour we had a hundred bees oriented to our location and bee lining 87...
If a person wanted plastic for supers Acorn sells boxes of of 72 medium drone frames for $144 plus shipping. That's for the heavy wax.
https://www.acornbee.com/collections/drone-combs/products/acorn-drone-comb?variant=43431770947812
Those would draw out fast and hold a lot of honey. And they'd...
Mann lake super kits come with rite cell foundation. It's excellent stuff, well coated with wax and deep cells. I use a lot of rite cell in the brood chambers and it's what I cut in half for open frame ends the bees draw drone comb in. For honey supers I use Permadent foundaiton from Mann Lake...
The overpriced label name products are weak. Apivar OK most of the time. Formic Pro or Mite Away are also poorly designed.
The bottom line is they don't have a proper dosage therefore instruct you to keep them on the hive much longer to get some sort of efficacy from the meager dosage...
Bees won't draw comb on poorly waxed foundation. Get wax on those frames or you will have a mess. Take the wonky comb and ball it up to rub on the plastic foundation. It's a quick fix in the field.
Some people have luck with tossing an undrawn super right on top of a queen excluder. I never...
A member of Bee source in Great Lakes Region of New York posted an image I find alarming. I'll zoom and crop the image and subsequent image they said was 15 miles away on an outer cover, they've been seeing more and more of them.
At least it's not a yellow legged hornet they are trying to...
Using this weekend to attempt and put a dent in my bee equipment upkeep. Always so far behind. Have frames from a bear taking out a yard years ago in boxes, unpainted boxes I'd been using for honey supers and need to use them again soon. After setting up a cell builder and grafting 20 larva into...
Agreed, move before the foragers fix on the location of the trap. late evening or very early morning I put a screen over the entrance and move them. If I don't know when the swarm arrived will move them to a far location for a few days then back to my apiary.
Prime swarms have mated queens. The...
Wild apple and crab apple trees are opening up here. Dandelion hit peak bloom, another week or so of that. Should have lilac in a week. We are finally into shorts weather. Forecast looks to be 70's and 80's until Friday.
Moving queen cells into mating nucs tomorrow. I'll have to be aggressively...
Northeast Kingdom at 1200 ft blossom report-
Tuesdays sun brought forth the first few Dandelion and started blossoms on cherry trees. Willow is ongoing with weeping starting today. Crab apple is swelling to pop and apple still two weeks away when Dandelion have already peaked.
I hear you about overwintered Nucs getting very crowded. The ones that didn't run low on stores are booming! That's where I got the brood to boost things. Only took a frame from each and added a box for expansion. Those nuc stacks will be the back bone of queen rearing and started colonies in...
Warmer weather has taken its time to arrive. Unwrapped hives and completed full inspections last week then reversed boxes. Was pleasantly surprised to see capped drone brood meaning I could start queen rearing. That has to get pushed back a week because I had unsold package bees that need to be...