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jcullen, yessir, send me a PM and we'll talk about gettin some out. I don't have a whole bunch left now, though, it's all gone pretty quick!
WR, people keep bees on top of skyscrapers in big cities up North, like NYC. There are many groups open to the public regarding urban beekeeping, etc. I say if the conditions are fitting, and there are flora for them to eat, mountainside beekeeping would be just as easy. Actually, considering the conditions which help the bees' pests spawn would be almost nonexistent in that setting. It might be easier than the swampy area where I am...
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Harvested twice this year, and I'm up to 3 production colonies, with an expected 2 more next year, provided that they overwinter as well as they did last year. Wound up with about 8 gallons of honey altogether, from the last harvest, and sold a good deal of it. Still have quite a lot left if anyone is interested.
More to the point, I've seen quite a lot of ailments, and had quite a many adventures with bees in the last *year and a half roughly?*. It's really fun, but requires a lot of work to get a quality product. I'm not sure that it's worth it to sell it, because the market is flooded with what I (alone) call "fake honey". Now, to the 'naturalist' who really looks at the science of it, sugar syrup that is fed to bees, is not the same thing as plant nectar that has been gathered by the bees. -Plant nectar is full of amino acids, lipids, minerals and vitamins, proteins, and most certainly pollen gets in the mix. It is a combination of glucose and fructose, which is a compound sugar. Because I do not feed my bees sugar or corn syrup unless there is a dearth and they have no stores, I have what is the stuff your grandparents called "honey". Most of what you buy today is sugar syrup, or corn syrup that's fed to the bees, and then filtered to remove everything but the sweetness.
I think it's time to move forward into research and study of husbandry of other insects. Wouldn't it be neat to have an "insect store"? ladybugs, carnivorous wasps, mantises, bees... a "beneficial insect farm". Got a lot on my plate right now, with work, land to clear, hunting season, bad soil, cave to dig, and lots of events coming up, so it won't be soon, but definately something I'm considering for the distant future!
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Oh, man. Fake honey? whodda thunk someone would monkey with honey?
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That's just what I call it because it lacks all the stuff that makes honey, "honey".
I might also mention that I've almost reached the "break-even" point. If I stop expanding the apiary, I would already have my investment back, but it's kinda addictive :D
By next year, I should actually make a little profit!
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Winterized my hives yesterday. There's this phenomena called "Colony Collapse Disorder" and it is as much a mystery now as it was 10 years ago.
Winterizing involves treating for mites before the bees cluster for winter warmth, replacing bottom traps which also reduce drafts, and refilling beetle traps. Well, long story short, I HAD 6 hives this year, 3 of which were a year old and were production strength, one which reached production population this year (and have filled two honey supers since!) and two which I acquired this year. Upon entering the sixth hive, it was completely vacant. When I looked at them on Friday, there were lots of bees. Yesterday, NONE. Strange indeed!
On the bright side, ALL of my supers on my production colonies have been refilled, and almost completely capped. I already harvested twice this year, with a running total for the year around 11 gallons. Now I have 8 supers, almost completely full, and at approximately 2-1/2 gallons per super, I have far exceeded my expectations, and have surpassed most all of my mentors' production for the year. Bee real estate.. It's all about location, location, location!
How sweet it is!
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Have you had a chance to inspect the empty hive? Are there a lot of queen cells? If so, is a swarm a possibility?
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This has been an intresting thread.....The Rise of the Bees" as it were.....
I can say that it is the "Good stuff".....for sure.
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I'll be glad to go take pictures of each frame. I saw one old queen cell, but on my last inspection of that hive, they had a queen, lots of brood, and 3 frames of eggs. I thought of the possibility of swarming, but some bees would have remained behind for the new queen. They were in a nicely insulated and draft-free box. Nothing appeared out of the ordinary on last inspection, with the exception that I needed to treat for mites.
I looked in on them Friday morning, just to see if there were any dead bees at the entrance, and there were surprisingly few, but there was traffic at the entrance, which means they were active and had already cleaned up the dead. I could see the bottom of the cluster moving about, and when I tapped the box, there was a terrific hum, about the key of A#. A mere two days later.. empty.
Throw some more ideas at me. I'm looking for possibilities!
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I don't know much about them, but could it be hive robbers?
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Have you heard of absconding? I hadn't, but it sounds like it may be a possibility. http://www.honeybeesuite.com/abscond...an-empty-hive/
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For now I'm calling it absconding, but usually it has a cause, such as too much old comb, too many pests, not well insulated, etc. But the hive robbing would be a curious explanation.. What that equates to, is that the very strong hive next to them robbed them out to the point of starvation. This would also account for why it only affected one of the two hives in that area (Did I mention I started putting bees in another location?) I ruled out pesticides, because that is a wildflower field that never gets sprayed. There are lots of anthills around to eat up any pest larvae that hit the ground. All the factors are in place for a healthy colony.. maybe one is so healthy that they took out the competition?
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I had never heard of "absconding",....... of course I don't keep bees....DW is deathly allergic to any sting, carries an epipen....Thanks for that info.
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Look, listen, and run.
Look before you go grabbing stuff, like old grills, any elevated box with an opening, eaves of houses, and anywhere else that might provide protection for colonial insects.
Listen for a "hum" or buzzing sound.
If you DO start to get stung, cover your nose and mouth and RUN in the direction you came.
Make sure you check the date on that epipen.
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....and don't jump in the water to escape an attacking swarm. They can hover a lot longer than you can hold your breath.
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Bees can fly faster than a tractor can go....bumble bees like to make nests in big old round bales......Run....get the tractor later....at night.
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....and bumble bees will sting the dog food out of you through your bee suit. Don't ask me how I know.
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On Sunday, I was enjoying the sunshine and cool breeze, along with low humidity, with my grandmother out in the meadow. Bees started boiling out of my #2 hive (westmost) so I handed off the buckskin we were softening, ran and got my suit and an empty hive, and by the time I got back with the camera, they were casting on the cedar tree not 20 yards from the hive (they usually do not cast so close). There were four casts altogether, so I dumped the first into the box, just guessing that was the one that had the queen, and used my swarm bucket to dump the other three, each weighing about 4-5 lbs, into the hive. By sunset there were so many bees that I couldn't close the lid without killing thousands of them, so I had to add a medium honey super just to put the lid on!
Anyhow, I got a few pictures and thought I'd share. Now I have 8 hives, and two more will be all I want. It takes me all day to go through the four I had last year, so I gotta find a friend who is also into bees to help lol.
First three casts ended up looking like one huge cast
http://i248.photobucket.com/albums/g...psab6aeb26.jpg
the fourth cast
http://i248.photobucket.com/albums/g...psfa20c255.jpg
First cast dumped in
http://i248.photobucket.com/albums/g...ps2539ec95.jpg
bees coming out the front, and completely covering the top of the bars. under the lid was about 2" thick with bees
http://i248.photobucket.com/albums/g...psc913aff1.jpg
They cast this close to the original hive.. pretty uncommon, so I was lucky. if this was 50% of the bees in that colony, then I still have a super strong colony, and a builder equally as good!
http://i248.photobucket.com/albums/g...ps5d40a369.jpg
Oh happy day!
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Now that is pretty cool and something most people would ever see.....Thanks.
Honey sure was good.
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I'll tell the girls you said so ;)
More bee adventure pics coming soon! Been a pretty wild spring here in SW GA!
