Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

ocba - Re: [ocba] Newbee questions

ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Orange County, NC Beekeepers

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: James Latimer <pipesnc AT live.com>
  • To: "ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org" <ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [ocba] Newbee questions
  • Date: Mon, 1 Jun 2015 15:23:27 -0400


Randall,
Great post.  These are some of the things I have been practicing over the past year.  I appreciate the confirmation I get by hearing how others apply similar ideas.  And not only do you share your experience but give resources for more information.  When I was getting started and was worried about inspecting to often you made a couple comments that really helped me.  1) If you are not excited and not wanting to see whats going on in your hives, this may not be for you.  2) Go in as often as it takes to reach your bee goals. 
My opinion after 1 year of beekeeping, I have found watching the progress of a hive, pulling out comb, collecting a multitude of pollen, collecting honey, applying propolis, workers hatching, drones hatching, queens laying, queens hatching, watching a hive swarm, supersede or re-queen itself (which I believe they would succeed at beautifully if left alone for 1 month, but I can't resist) is extremely rewarding and educational.  I try to consider the bees goals prior to my own.  For example, during the time a hive is re-queening I try not to hinder the success of what the bees are already doing so well on their own.  If I know the bees are producing queen cells between boxes I try to withstand the urge to inspect the entire hive, I may just take a peek.

Thanks,
Jamie



Date: Mon, 1 Jun 2015 13:25:07 -0400
From: ra41717 AT gmail.com
To: friema16 AT gmail.com; ocba AT lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: Re: [ocba] Newbee questions

Meredith,

First question:
The admonition "don't mess with your bees too much" is a second-year topic, not a beginner topic. It is a little like the Biblical edict, "love your neighbor as yourself", which takes it as given that you already love yourself.

In the case of "messing with bees", the advice to not do it too much takes it as a given that you are already messing with them a lot. But for a beginner, you aren't messing with the bees for the benefit of the bees. You won't get a single ounce more of honey solely by "inspecting" your hives. And it is true that inspections disrupt the colony, and it takes time for it to get back to business.

HOWEVER as a beginner you had better get out there and inspect (mess with) those hives! I recommend once a week to start, then once every couple of weeks when things start to get dull. These learning inspections are to make YOU a better beekeeper, not to "help" your hive. Remember that you started beekeeping in order to learn something new; the way to learn is to get your hands dirty. These are your bees -- you own them, they don't own you -- so poke them as often as you want in order to satisfy your goals.

It doesn't sound like this is your issue, but some folks avoid messing with their bees because they are scared of them. They need to get out there and work through their fear. They should find a decent mentor or bee buddy to share with -- seeing someone else's techniques is an excellent way to learn and can make a startling difference in the bees' attitude and the beekeeper's comfort level. If none of that works, then maybe beekeeping isn't for them. They can support the same pollinator goals by putting up bat boxes, planting a pollinator-friendly garden, or maybe trying to keep a different type of pollinator (see <here>). That is much better than putting bees in their yard and neglecting them, letting them become a reservoir for diseases and pests that spill out into the surrounding area. If someone is going to keep bees in a bee-populated area, they have a responsibility to their community to inspect their hives and ensure that they don't become a source of problems for other beekeepers in the area.

Second question:
Seeing standing eggs means you had a queen within the past day. Seeing laying-down eggs means you had a queen with the past 3 days. Seeing larva of a certain age means you had a queen within that age plus 3 days. So being able to recognize eggs is a really valuable skill. If you can point out standing eggs (looking straight down on the top of the tiny egg the size of a thread snip) then I'll bet you ate lots of carrots as a kid or have the best coke-bottle-lens reading glasses that money can buy. This is a SKILL that takes PRACTICE. See Question #1 above! Will you fail as a beekeeper if you cannot see eggs? NO! Find larva, then find younger larva, all the way down the line... you may see eggs in the vicinity of the very youngest larva. Keep looking; you'll get it eventually. But I'm sure that seeing young larva is all that most folks rely on to have reasonably good evidence that the hive is queenright.

Third question:
There are all kinds of things you can deduce just from looking at the hive entrance. A free-download book on the topic is <here> (note that it is written for European beekeepers; not everything in it applies to us). Are bees coming and going at the same rate as other hives? Are foragers bringing in pollen? Is there fighting on the landing board? Are the bees bothering you (aggressive) as you stand there looking at them? Is there dead brood on the landing board or on the ground in front of the entrance? Stand behind the hive and watch the flight path of entering and returning bees: are they going off to distant flowers or are they robbing the hive next door?
I recommend that you stand to the side of a hive for a minute or so and observe all of this before you smoke it and open it. Once you open it, you can see what sort of condition on the inside corresponds with the condition on the outside. Then after you gain that experience and knowledge, you can often "read" a hive without needing to open it.

I hope all this helps some!

Randall



On 5/31/2015 9:08 PM, Meredith Friedrick wrote:
I have my first hive (installed on April 16) and things seem to be going very well.

I successfully moved the hive about 200 yards about 3 weeks ago and it doesn't seem to have hurt the number of bees at all.

To preface my questions, I want to share that my goal is to increase bee populations in whatever way I can.  I'm not that interested in having lots of honey for personal consumption or sale (although I would love to taste some from my own hive). 

History -- The last time I checked the frames (one week ago), they had filled out foundations on 6 of 9 frames with heavy bee concentrations on both sides of the frames.  I moved the exterior (empty) frames into the center and the interior frames to the exterior in order to encourage them to fill out the empty frames.  I also have a medium super on top in case they run out of room in the bottom deep.

My questions are as follows:

1.  In bee school, I was told to open the hive "minimally" because each time you do, you kill 100+ bees.  What is "minimally"?  How often should I look inside the hive, given my goal?

2.  I was also told yesterday that I need to actually see the eggs in order to verify that I have a good queen. I haven't been able to do that because of lack of contrast between eggs and my new foundation.  I have lots of capped brood and tons of bees.  Is this something I need to get someone else to come look at? I looked for the queen the last time and didn't readily find her, but given the increase in bee numbers from the previous entries, I thought that she was there. I have seen her on previous inspections.

3.  Generally, what observations can I make from the exterior in order to know that my hive is doing well?

Thanks,
Meredith Friedrick



 


_________________________________________
ocba mailing list | North Carolina Beekeeping| http://www.theocba.org/
Manage Your Subscription: http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/ocba/


_________________________________________ ocba mailing list | North Carolina Beekeeping| http://www.theocba.org/ Manage Your Subscription: http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/ocba/



Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page