Busy Bees

For some reason our honeybees have been visiting this can of dirt (soil). Even through the winter months when it warmed up enough they would "bee" flying in and out of this can. I got in close enough to see if I could find out what they were doing in there.......it looked like they were eating. So my question was what and why? I took a sample of the dirt to see if I could find out what they were eating, but that still didn't answer my question of why. Perhaps they are like us and need certain minerals and nutrients that come from the ground. Can you see the bee in flight going into the can? (picture below)
This picture below was taken just a couple of days ago, the weather had gotten really warm close to 70 and this is what we saw. The girls have been bringing in so much pollen and a lot of beekeepers won't believe me, but they have been working all winter. Once the sun warmed up the day they would be out, even when the temps were 45 degrees and the wind blowing, bringing in pollen. We located some bushes that were covered in blooms and sure enough there were our girls gathering what they could! When conditions are this good the queen will start laying eggs and the colony will begin to grow and grow to the point where they think they need to split. They will then proceed to build (pull out) (beekeeping talk) lol, a queen cell, actually several queen cells. We didn't want them to split right now because it's still to cold and this picture below is a sign that maybe they want to split because of overcrowding.

So Sunday it got up to 70 and we decided to take a quick look inside. Sure enough they were overcrowded the queen had been busy! Babies were hatching and I found a couple of queen cells being pulled out.
I also found some beautiful honey! Can you see the difference in the two colors? I would really have loved to sample both flavors but they had brood on this frame so I put it back in the hive for them. It was sooo painful. LOL

To remedy the over-crowdedness I put another super on top to give them more room. I checked on them the next day and they were very happy :0)
Above is a better picture of the brood to the left. Can you tell a difference? We left our bees a lot of honey to last them through the winter so we haven't had to feed them, but with the cold lingering on, we want to feed them a little.

So I tried an experiment....I am an explorer, I love to try new things and I'm ALWAYS up for an adventure and a challenge.

Most of you that follow my blog(s) know that I also have chickens. So I took some of the feeders that they used when they were baby chicks and I made experimental bee feeders! A brilliant idea in my mind.......but ONLY if you live out miles and miles away from people. LOL Mind you now there were NO casualties of ANY kind and it was the neatest thing to watch well...for me at least LOL
This was at first....not to many.....
Naturally as all good things go, all it takes is "word of mouth" for things to be found out. It didn't take long for all of our girls to find these feeders. I put out three of them and they drank every drop! The feeders were dry as a bone within two hours.
The yard was like a major Bee highway, and I found so many flaws in my creative experiment that I had to put the idea on hold until I can find some more time to explore the possibilities....lol

Questions???? Comments???? I'd love to hear them.

BEE CREATIVE

Julie

The End of A Drone's Life and Other Things

Could you imagine being treated like a "king" from the day you were born till the day you were thrown out in the cold?? That's the fate of the poor drone in the world of the honeybee. The honeybees are all female except for the drones the only males in the colony and their only role is to fertilize the Queen. Ahh...the life of a drone...... he is fed by the worker bees and nurse bees when he gets hungry and only leaves the "comforts of home" when he flies out to mate with the Queen or to use the bathroom ;) lol Honeybees are very hygienic and WILL NOT defecate in their hive. As a matter of fact we beekeepers see the evidence on our cars and other surfaces in the vicinity. It looks like yellow specks....okay I'm off the subject...sorry ;) back to my story. This poor guy has met his fate. The girls threw him out. It finally got cold here and during the winter the less mouths to feed the better in the bee world. I've noticed them running the drones out for about a week then it dawned on me to take pictures. Still they didn't come out very good. But good enough to see that it's a drone. A strong hive will usually house a hundred or so drones,less than a thousand, they die off here and there and aren't hatched out at the same time. Rotating so to speak. They don't all have the fortune of mating with the Queen, the one that does falls to his death after mating.

The queen stops laying eggs when the temps start dipping low signalling the onset of winter. She will mate again before the drones are thrown out to have fertile eggs for the spring.
She choses which eggs will be fertile (females) and unfertile (drones). The worker bees build larger cells for the drones because they are bigger bees.
We had some freezing weather that came upon us quickly and when the temps plummet some girls are caught out and don't quite make it back home to the safety and warmth of home. I found these girls outside of their hive, some loaded with pollen and barely moving. It breaks my heart to see these poor girls so close but yet so far from home, still struggling to make it. I pick them up carefully and take them inside and when they start warming up I put them in a jar and give them a drop of honey and before long they are buzzing around wanting out. This is the time to be careful especially if it's still freezing outside. I keep them covered (and you have to do each hive separately) take them to "their" hive and let them either crawl in or some will prefer to fly above making sure the hive is theirs, before going in.
You can see one of them crawling around on the inside of the jar, above.
There are so many stands that you can place the hives on this one above is one made of steel.

The one below is concrete cinder blocks. We face the holes to the outside instead of up because ants tend to build inside the holes and that's not a good thing. I just read that a good deterant for ants is powdered cinnomon sprinkled around the base of the hive on the ground. If you are thinking of becoming a beekeeper a good book on the subject is "Beekeeping for Dummies" by Howland Blackiston. I would recommend reading this book BEFORE getting started. This is a book I still refer to. Another good read is "First Lessons in Beekeeping" by Keith S. Delaplane, another I reference to.


This is a design my husband made for us. It is wonderful! The only problem is it was made for "his" height. ;-) Since he (my husband) works and "at this time" I'm at home full time and by the time he gets home it's to "late" to work bees, I work the hives during the mornings( during the summer) whew....anyway we had to move the hive to cinder blocks til he can "lower" it for me;-)
This design is wonderful because it is just the right width to hold the frames during inspection of the hive. You can see in these pics that we have had a LOT of rain....
Still even though it's cold outside don't forget that the girls still get thirsty....so make sure they have fresh water to drink. They'll love ya for it...........

BEE WARM.........

Julie

The Citrus Queen

This post is about a hive that the President of our local beekeepers association rescued from a citrus tree in someones back yard and a delima that we were facing.

We had originally thought that one of our major hives was in trouble and was without a queen. When we went into them about a month ago for winter preparation we noticed a lot of queen cells pulled out on most of the frames.......further inspection revealed no queen. We went into a bit of panic because a hive cannot survive without their queen and this is NOT the time of year this sort of thing needs to happen. We weren't able to make a complete inspection of all the queen cells because of the weather. Some of the cells had been sealed over on the inside and some of them just hadn't been completed but we didn't look at all of them.....lesson learned. Apparently at least one of the cells we "didn't look at" was sealed with a queen growing inside, meanwhile we had called our local Pres. beekeeper and he told us we were in luck, he had a small hive we could have.

It was raining when we picked up the small hive and brought them home after dark. The next day it was still raining off and on so we went in between clouds and put a screen wire (recommendation of the pres.) over the top of the hive that was "queen less", then placed the new hive on top of the screen. Now, if you've read my bee blogs you will remember when I combined two hives into one over the summer, but on that combination I used paper, a method that I had read about. This method with the screen wire was a life saver! But, at the time we didn't realize just how much! The reason you put a barrier between the two is so they can get used to the scent of each other and the queens pheromones can travel through to the "queen less" colony, therefore acceptance will be more likely.

After about a week we went back to see if they were ready to combine........I caught the citrus queen in a queen catcher to protect her because we just weren't sure what the reaction from queen less hive would be. One reason is because the queen less hive is a double hive meaning that it was possible that the bees in the bottom box had not made contact with the upper box and would possibly kill the new queen. So I placed the citrus queen at the entrance of the bottom box to see if they would except her........they didn't! The guard bees jumped on the catcher and started attacking it. I immediately took her away and got the guard bees off and put her back in with her hive......we were totally at a loss as what to do. Lucky for us it was still early in the a.m. and it was a beautiful sunny 80 degree day, perfect for getting into a hive! We moved and securely covered the citrus tree hive then went into the "queen less" hive because things just weren't right with them.

One of the first things we noticed, there were no queen cells to be found on the frames that previously had quite a few.......we know what that means......there was a new queen running around in our "queen less"hive......and we found her!! We were soo delighted!

We have gotten so attached to the bees, they are such a huge part of our lives now. We worry too much about them sometimes and we become afraid for them when it seems harm may come to them....well, I feel like I'm talking about my sons as well! LOL I guess when we love something, anything.....we get attached and worry, worry, worry. The honeybees are in such trouble all over the world right now and if we don't worry and try our best to take care of them then they will no longer "bee"here....then we are next.This is the picture where the honeybees built their hive on the citrus tree. The white stuff is the comb that they store honey and brood in. It is truly beautiful. I am amazed at the different colors of comb that they produce. It depends on the age of the bee. I have seen a fairly new hatchling have wax coming from the minute slits on the sides of her abdomen, it's pure white and sometimes looks like crystals. New pure white wax grows darker over time and the more it's used by the bees. Some frames of wax that we have in the hives looks and smells like creamy butter, (sometimes I think it's my imagination) but really if you close your eyes it does smell like creamy graham crackers, it smells so good.
The rest of these pictures are of the citrus queen and her girls. Can you see her? Look at the end of the tweezers. Look at how dark she is, most of her girls are dark or black. They seem way more calm than the Italian bees. Most of them look like Italian honey bees. This could just be an older hive. Honey bees grow darker the older they get, but we have seen in some of our calmer hives, "newbees" that are dark in color. Not sure what type they are. It depends on what breed of drone the queen mated with.


In the upper picture she is lowering her abdomen into a cell to lay an egg.
Here she is again pulling out from the cell just after laying the egg in the upper picture. Can you pick her out? She looks disconnected, but she's looking into another cell to see if it's ready for an egg.

Feel free to leave a comment, question or complaint, I love feedback. It always helps to know what readers see or think.

Thank you for dropping by, please come back.

Until next time.........

Bee alert :0)

Julie

Where have all the HoneyBees gone?

My theory, they packed up and flew to Arizona!My husband and I took a much needed and way in advanced, planned trip to Sedona Arizona a few weeks back. It's such a beautiful, tranquil place. We saw some amazing sights and had a glorious time together.
We traveled from Phoenix to the Grand Canyon, and stayed the night along the way. The land changed it seemed every time we went around a curve or over a mountain. Some places were flat even in the highest part of the mountains, the scenery was spectacular everywhere!

The most fascinating thing to us was seeing honeybees.....everywhere we went! We asked everyone we met about them but no one even knew they were there! We wanted to find a beekeeper but still no luck.
When we got to the Grand Canyon, sitting in line we noticed honeybees all over the flowers outside of the ticket booths, I asked the Park Ranger about them and he said he didn't even know they were out there and knew nothing about them. I thought No wonder they moved here! They can live in peace! Another thing I noticed was the bees were the only pollinators with the exception of a butterfly now and again. It may have been the time of year, I'm not sure. Here we have lots of different pollinators, more now that they've cut back on spaying for mosquitoes. (didn't kill them anyway, just the good insects)
When we got home I did manage to find a "retired" beekeeper over the internet. He told me he stopped keeping bees years ago because a law was passed (because of FEAR) that no one could keep bees in the rural areas any more. Everyone had become "afraid" of the honeybees! He also said that the "African honey bees" had pretty much taken them over since then and the honey bees "as we know" is probably long gone, he said the honeybee is defiantly in trouble.

The media has really messed this country up! They are the puppets of major corporations and government! I am a skeptic from WAY back and have a hard time believing what the media and government throws our way. Honestly!! If someone were to stand back a distance when I get into our bees they would swear that I was being attacked by the vicious killer bees! PLEASE!! When in reality all they are doing is flying about trying to figure out what I'm doing and for me to hurry up and BEE on my way! Sure every once in a great while one of the guard bees gets upset and will warn me for a few days when I pass by, to stay away, but I don't blame her and I certainly don't think she's gone "killer" on me! For heavens sake! Scare tactics from these groups bring my blood to a boil! Maybe we do have some aggressive honey bees, I know our girls get pretty upset at us sometimes. But geez wouldn't you get pissed off (sorry) ;-) if someone barged in and disrupted your home that you've worked so hard on??? Some people just don't get it! We want and want but what's going to happen when we no longer can get or have??? Other than relying on the "government" and hey they can't do ANYTHING for themselves! Wake up People! Stop believing all their Bull!AUGGGGGG!

Okay, I'm still mad and upset and I won't get over it! But I will move on to brighter things!
Although, the get away was wonderful it was nice to get back home to those that missed us. I love my girls, they are the sweetest!

BEE Knowledgeable in what you "Believe"

Julie

Fall cleanup and Honey in a straw

Remember in my last post I talked about combining two hives to make one?

Well, I didn't realize it would be so quick! I put them together the afternoon of Aug.19th and the morning of the 21st I was walking around the yard and I saw white powder???....or is that dust???? Did I powder sugar them when I was in there last???? Well if I did it surely wouldn't be on their front porch and all over the ground?? (It's funny how when you're telling what is running in your mind it seems like the thoughts take longer than they actually do) In this case nanoseconds LOL:O) Anyway it hits me...bam! You Nut! It's the paper from in between both boxes!
This top picture is the back of their hive (the back porch) Some of them enjoy hanging out back here.
This is the front of the hive
This is in the yard. Those girls were bizzy! that paper was all over the place! But they made a successful combination. I opened them up long enough to slide the frame they were on into the box with the rest of the bees, took off the extra box and put them back together. Everyone seemed happy and content.

We went to a Bee meeting last Saturday and had such a good time. It's something to see when a group of people that are interested in the same exact thing can have so many different ways of taking care of it. Some people stand back and don't really let their way of caring be known...and others (like me) just jump right in feet and mouth first! Then I want to kick myself all the way home! Not that I feel my way was or is wrong I just wish I could be one of the wonderful people in this world that could just sit back or stand back quietly and still be heard. Am I making sense?
I want you to check these two pictures out...click on them to enlarge. This little bee came buzzing up just as I was trying out some honey....several people brought some of their honey to sample..and boy was it delicious! Even little "Miss Bee" thought so...she didn't want to leave that honey. If you look close you can see her wings still flapping. Someone had put a straw in the honey bowl for easier dipping of the honey.
Isn't she cute! She finally got her fill and flew off.

Til next time...

BEE FRIENDLY :O)

Julie

Combining two hives to make one

A big dark cloud came up so I had to start my project inside....Our pee-wee hive (the last swarm we rescued) lost their queen a few weeks back and started another queen but when I went into them last Saturday she was gone as well....I really would like to know what's happening with our queens.....We decided with Fall coming on it will be wise to combine pee-wee with one of our strong hives...so that is what I did today along with investigating hive #1 (which by the way is doing well);O).*sigh* *of relief* I had a thought today while I was in hive # 1......I do a lot of talking and conversing with the girls;O)....It's part of my therapy;O) anyway, it accured to me that beekeeping is very very hard work! Not to mention that's it's HOT AND HUMID!!!! But on the bright side I do get free time with thousands of therapists....a trip to the spa....sauna and a facial.....plus exercise! all at the same time;O) I also came up with an idea for homeschoolers.....

If any of you out there are reading this maybe take me up on it...here goes, it would be such a learning experience for those of you that don't live on a farm or maybe even perhaps you do, but if you could get in touch with someone that has something of an interest to you or your child(ren) if they would let you and the children come for a day and help out with whatever the interest may be. Example a day with the bees......a day with the milk cows.....a day with the goats/sheep/pigs/horses....the list could go on and on...maybe even an animal shelter....The reason I came to this is there are sooo many people that are just soooo unaware of what life is all about and where our food comes from...that's one reason why I feel we are losing America, our rights, our freedoms......Okay this post is about the bees so this subject will have to post on my "nature" blog...jump over sometime.... you can link over to it through "my profile" section....
First of all you need to place (the book calls for newspaper but I didn't have any so I used packing paper) a thin sheet of paper over the bottom of a hive body box. I had this brilliant idea that I would get a jump on this by using a box that we have extra, it's a brood box, it holds large frames. I thought that was the type I would need but it ended up being that I needed a honey super box. It holds small frames. Naturally I found this out after the big dark thunder cloud passed by and I went outside to get started......only to find I had to start all over! The thing is to place the paper over the bottom of the correct box and tape it. I didn't follow the book really at all because to me everyone has their own way of doing things suited on the project or occasion;O) But I did get the concept/idea.
Next poke holes into the paper...this allows air flow and the odors of each hive to pass through so they can get used to each other and hopefully acceptance will take place:O)
This is our pee-wee hive....notice there is little to no activity coming or going from the entrance...notice also the extra box....that's so we can feed them and keep out robbers at the same time.....(robbers are other insects that will kill a colony to get their honey or food) it can happen so easily to a small hive.
See how few of them there is??? In their defense though most of the girls are out foraging plants and flowers for nectar and pollen.
I only put one frame into the papered box because there's just not enough of them to bother with putting all of the frames in just to take them back out in a few days...
I took the top hive feeder off of the stronger hive that will be their new home and put it on top BEFORE I took them over because I didn't want a scene! A battle! They would have killed each other on the spot....or should I say the stronger hive would've rushed in to take pee-wee's honey and killed them in the process. You see honey bees can also fall into the category of robbers :O(
Here is their new home....see the little raised lip of wood on top??? We were squishing to many bees (one is way to many for me) when we put the top hive feeder on because it sets right on the top of the frames....look at where a good portion of the bees are!!! Well, not really......but you get the idea...That's a lot of bees to squash! So I asked my husband (he'll do anything to help out):;O) to make me a spacer, so he did...we now have one for every hive and it makes me so happy NOT to hear a crunch when I put them back together!
Almost finished... it's supposed to start raining tomorrow so I trimmed the paper away from the outside of the box so it wouldn't soak through
Every thing is calm and it's getting time for the foragers to make their way back home before dark.....these poor girls never take a break I don't believe.......I have gone outside before dawn and there is always a group on the porch cleaning...waiting for day break...time to take off in flight to gather pollen or nectar......from the time they start chewing their way out of their cell they are working.....the minute they crawl out of the cell they are fed by a "nurse" bee, then they turn around and go head first into their cell to clean it out spic and span! After that is done she becomes a "nurse" bee and takes care of and feeds the others that are hatching out....after a few days to weeks they start their solo flights....I love to watch these flights....they will hover off of the porch then up a little way trying out their new found skill...wings.....flight..,..during this time they are making note of what their hive looks like and where it's located. In the early morning and evening it looks like a super HoneyBee highway in our yard! It gives me such a refreshing and calming spirit.....Nature at it's best....;O)
Some foragers coming home to a hive that's moved:O( I took them over to where their new home will be so hopefully....I have read where most bees will except foraging bees into their hive "as long as they are bringing in food and not taking it away" sounds like a good deal....:O)

Until next time...

BEE KIND ;O)

Julie

Queens, Natural or Grafted

Queen Bees....Natural or Grafted.......This is a subject that I'm still not sure about. I first of all by every means believe that the best way is the Natural way. I love watching the process of the bees when they are making way for their new queen. They have this way of knowing if or when they will need one, but sometimes all of a sudden they sometimes find themselves queenless with no warning at all. This is our first summer with more than one hive and we have had a time with them keeping a queen. We have no idea why we've lost queens out of perfectly strong, healthy hives. Since this can happen over night (per se) it's important to go into the hives on a regular basis. In my last post I wrote about this particular hive where we went "up the country" to get a new queen.....that is a "grafted" queen. I know I should know about this grafting process by now but I don't. I've just been depending on the bees to take care of that for me:O) But I will be studying up on the subject and will let you know what I think about it. NOW...if there is anyone out there reading this and would like to give me some insight on this I would love your input. Please feel free to leave me a message/comment.PulllleeeaaaassseeeeeeeI went back into the hive Friday morning to see if the bees had eaten through the candy end to release the queen, but they hadn't so I helped out a bit....I took a nail and made a small hole into the candy and put the cage back into place, closed up and left them til Sunday afternoon. The whole time on my way out to the hive I'm saying to myself.... please let the queen be alive..... please let the queen be alive.....from what I've read it's very hard to get a hive to except a new queen.
I removed the box and no queen...still mumbling under my breath...please let the queen be alive...
Sooo I start with pulling every frame out and examining it carefully! First frame...no queen no eggs...which I was glad there were no eggs because at this point I would probably have freaked out thinking the nurse bee found her way back and started laying all over again.

Another note...if you have a layer worker (nurse) bee she will destroy the queen cells if the bees do try to hatch a new queen and if she had found her way back she would've killed the new queen!

I went through seven frames and saw nothing but bees....the eighth frame I found eggs! Oh.... My heart didn't know if it should drop or jump! I did feel a slight sinking until I pulled the ninth and last frame...
AND here she is!!!!! I have two white arrows pointing at her. I want you to notice her color.....because in the pictures at the end of this post, I have a new queen that another hive just hatched out "naturally" and I found the colors are so very different. The "grafted" queen is pretty much solid in her color on her abdomen.
Here she is again (white arrows) the blue arrows are pointing to drones, they are male bees and have really big eyes.....(they're so handsome):O)
Now this picture above and the ones below are of a new queen that just hatched from another hive we have. See her colors (she's at the bottom of the frame and arrows are pointing at her)
Here she is again, the tip of her tail is black and she has faint dark stripes. I think she's beautiful!! I also think the "grafted" one is beautiful too......I really do need to google and search the web for more information about this "grafting" thing. I've got lots of books on honey bees but none of them go into this subject...they advertise for you to "buy" one but I haven't been interested in "grafting" a queen so haven't bothered. Well....now my curiosity is up....
Gotta go surf the net.....:O)

Until next time.....

BEE WISE ;O)

Julie