The Honey Factory

[OhZark Biddies]

Things:

I think I have bees that are “hot” all the time.

I could not mow within 10 ft of them. I am afraid to let my wife be anywhere near them, especially when I look at them.

All I did was open the telescoping cover and they swarmed out the front. I was behind the hive. I did not shake, bump or rattle the hive. I did not have the cover up for more than a second.

Compared to my other hive they are terrible. My other hive is almost friendly. I opened the lid. Bumped the frames over. Closed the lid and one bee came out of the top box and looked at me.

I think it is as Jerry said. I can’t say they are anything but mutts now. I bought Saskatraz, however both hives have changed Queens which mated in the wild.

I do not want to change Queens now. There is a very slim chance this hive will survive the winter. I think waiting until spring is a better plan, especially if my queen mated with some “local native feral guys”. They might have a better chance of making it through the winter.

I am going to feed them for as long as I can. If they get bad enough before freeze up, I will behead the queen, if I can find her, and combine the hives into one. Hopefully, that would help them through the winter.

I plan to wrap the hive well. I am going to use the queen excluder, they hate, as a divider to keep the bees down, I plan to put white rice above the divider ( cheesecloth also) to catch and trap moisture.

I will use my mechanics camera to spy on them through the escape hole. That way I will not have to open the hive until April. I will not add a pollen party until April.

I plan to put sugar block frames in the hive when I close it up.

I was going to put the hives one on top the other with a 1/2 inch neutral space formed by double 1/4 inch hardware cloth. That is not going to happen now.

I am going to place an empty frameless super on the bottom for a spot for dead bees to fall to. I will use a very small entrance reducer at the bottom.

I thought about putting a heater in the hive that maintains 40 degrees, but am leaning away from it. I had thought about making a separate space the bees could not get into for the heater.. I am trying to think of everything I can that might help them through the winter.

Finally, I want to thank you all. I love all your feedback and ideas. I know bees are done differently locally but I think I can adapt a lot of all ya all’s ideas.

Bees are new to me and very challenging. I knew very little before a couple years ago, and that was only what my Brother in law told me.

I love learning “new” things. I find this exciting. I might even put a hive in Togo, surrounded by an mega electric fence to ward off the young Sasquatch and bear.

This did not turn out at all like I wanted it to, I envisioned selling a hundred pounds of honey and keeping 50 for myself, killing off my bees and doing the same next year.

I feel fortunate to have only been stung twice, once while 20 feet away watch the hive, but standing in their flight path, the other Just the other day. Neither time was I wearing a suit.

The mean bees have made me a little less lackadaisical about putting my suit on. Since I noticed they were meaner (I actually notice this in mid to late August, but did not say anything here until I was sure they were mean) I have been checking the zippers under my neck in the bathroom mirror to make sure no hole exists. I cannot think of anything worse (well, maybe I can) than a bee or two inside my hood.

Cindy if they get too mean, I will mail them to you..

BTW, the video idea was much funnier when Karen’s bees went after her than when they went after me.

I think your plan is a good one...with maybe a few things to consider

considering your extreme conditions, one thought/suggestion might be to take your loss on the hot hive this fall, so you can use it’s resources to help your other one survive... if that’s needed

Here March is when a lot of hives starve out ... but ours break cluster off and on all winter so they can burn through a lot of resources during those times... yours might use relatively less since they will likely stay in cluster...

So anyway I like to have some resource frames in the freezer as a late winter emergency stock if needed... so that might be something to consider as far as using the hot hive...

Also, maybe some straw bales as additional wrap and windbreak?

and then lastly, do you have a Varroa mite plan? Many hives succumb to mites over winter with mite loads peaking in October ...

but if you’re leaving that up to the hygienic tendencies of your bees, that might be as good as anything? I really don’t have any experience with those, so I don’t know.

I think you did really well this year... and especially after seeing your wildflower meadow, I think your goal of getting a big honey crop is very doable in the future!

 

[OhZark Biddies]

I plan to put out a couple traps next year, hopefully, I can catch my own hives if they swarm.

If my hive swarms and I happen to catch it, can I behead the swarming queen and put the hive back together?

It appears swarming kicks honey production in the rear.


Do any of you use the plastic excluders?

I use metal queen excluders with an upper entrance hole in the honey super

As for catching your hives’s own swarm and then re-combing them?

Hmmm ... I’d say yes it can be done, but the colony will need to raise a new queen, so it’ll still be about a month lag from baby queen to new eggs... and the chemical signals in the hive are still telling workers that the colony is needing to focus on that...so I’m not sure if there would be much benefit as far as not loosing time/honey crop

There are several swarm prevention methods to read about over the winter, but the main thing to know is that bees need to feel uncrowded and need to have something to do... think of them as striped cowboys... crowd them or let them sit idle and they’re gonna cause trouble!

so just putting an empty super on will often help them feel like they have room, and reversing brood boxes, and or checker boarding in some empty frames can give them something to do

But I’d say preventing swarming would be your better bet than trying to recombine the swarm

 

[OhZark Biddies]

I had a friend drop off a deep full of wax moths last night... he’d set it aside then got busy with hay season and forgot it...

then he noticed it the other day and saw the mess, and brought it to me to drop in my little spare ‘bee’ freezer to salvage what wax he could...

Half of it was full of some pretty choice wax moth worms, so I scraped a few frames with my young turkey pet, and he was in heaven gobbling them up! Lol

 

[BirdsBeesTrees]

I have a metal queen excluder. The Italians wouldn't cross it, but the Squatches acted like it was no big deal.

 

[duluthralphie]

I use metal queen excluders with an upper entrance hole in the honey super

As for catching your hives’s own swarm and then re-combing them?

Hmmm ... I’d say yes it can be done, but the colony will need to raise a new queen, so it’ll still be about a month lag from baby queen to new eggs... and the chemical signals in the hive are still telling workers that the colony is needing to focus on that...so I’m not sure if there would be much benefit as far as not loosing time/honey crop

There are several swarm prevention methods to read about over the winter, but the main thing to know is that bees need to feel uncrowded and need to have something to do... think of them as striped cowboys... crowd them or let them sit idle and they’re gonna cause trouble!

so just putting an empty super on will often help them feel like they have room, and reversing brood boxes, and or checker boarding in some empty frames can give them something to do

But I’d say preventing swarming would be your better bet than trying to recombine the swarm

I thought I had room, as the supers were empty, as they still are. I think the plastic excluder was too much hassle for the bees and they took the bottom of the excluder to be the top limit to the hive.

I have read the metal excluders are better. However, I am gun shy now and will go without any.

 

[duluthralphie]

I have a metal queen excluder. The Italians wouldn't cross it, but the Squatches acted like it was no big deal.

Do you think an excluder covering the middle 5-6 frames and open on both sides would keep the queen down and let the others up?

I seldom see brood in any of the outside 2 frames. The queens seem to like the middle.

 

[R2elk]

I thought I had room, as the supers were empty, as they still are. I think the plastic excluder was too much hassle for the bees and they took the bottom of the excluder to be the top limit to the hive.

I have read the metal excluders are better. However, I am gun shy now and will go without any.

I went without an excluder one year. It wasn't worth the hassle of removing brood from the honey.

 

[BirdsBeesTrees]

I mean, anything is possible. The greatest inventions came from someone being a trailblazer.
Making homemade cherry pie today:

And I came up with a sweet idea for you Ralphie!
I'd send you a pound of southern Iowa honey, and maybe some others could send you some honey from the states they are from?! Anyone game?

 

[R2elk]

I mean, anything is possible. The greatest inventions came from someone being a trailblazer.
Making homemade cherry pie today:
View attachment 2327993
And I came up with a sweet idea for you Ralphie!
I'd send you a pound of southern Iowa honey, and maybe some others could send you some honey from the states they are from?! Anyone game?

You are falling into his trap.

 

[OhZark Biddies]

I thought I had room, as the supers were empty, as they still are. I think the plastic excluder was too much hassle for the bees and they took the bottom of the excluder to be the top limit to the hive.

I have read the metal excluders are better. However, I am gun shy now and will go without any.

yeah, I’d probably leave it off or maybe get a metal one...

I don’t always use them, sometimes when I’ve managed to stay out of their way, and everything is going just right the queen lays a nice brood patten and the frames have that perfect band of stores in the top and the bees are leaving her lots of room to lay, then it’s a pretty safe bet she’ll stay out of the supers...

other times it’s not as tidy and I use excluder

something to consider too is a top entrance... that would probably be a good idea for your world due to snow anyway