Oh, beehive!

[your_comforting_company]

Bee class was pretty cool tonight. The teacher sounded a lot like a bee, but always smiling and very knowledgable. We built a few bodies and frames and put the foundations in, and looked at a few different kinds of foundations.
Looks like my frames won't require shimming, as their foundations were a little loose too, so maybe I'll only have to do a little trimming.
My Nucleus hive is on order (don't know if I already mentioned that) my hive lacks about 4 frames being finished, except for the beetle-traps and feeders, and I'm ordering foundations tomorrow.

Now that I have jigs built for one the other hive should be fairly quick to build, but I'm still worried that I won't have time to finish it before I need to install the bees, so we'll see how it goes.
Got a few other pieces of safety equipment I gotta make, and finish the smoker that became a smudge pot last year lol.

I'm getting by on the cheap, but if you have the money, it's worth it to just buy all this stuff in a kit.

Met a lady who uses the honey and extra wax to make her bathsoaps and lip balms and all sorts of neat stuff, so she'll be a lot of fun to hang out with after I get established. I'm going to try to attend the next club meeting and sign up, since dues are only $7 and they always have a "pot luck" supper. I offered to bring some wild foods. This bee club helps Landmark Park harvest their honey every year, so it all ties together!
This past month has been really cool for me. Good karma?

[crashdive123]

Make sure you build or get your queen excluder before you introduce the bees from you nuc to your hive.

[your_comforting_company]

Oh, I almost forgot that. Mr. Carter says he doesn't use one, so I gotta talk to a few more keepers to see what's preferred, but I might just run one full box for this year, and when they swarm next year, introduce a new hive with excluders. or two broods in one hive.. top feeding, beetle traps and regular dusting with powdered sugar is basically all I should need to keep a healthy hive.
There's a lot of options and it's a lot to take in at once. Glad this class came along. Should make it real easy.

And these folks are giving their time to us with nothing in return. So I really need to give props to Wiregrass Beekeepers, Milliebee, and the Cooperative Extension service.

[crashdive123]

If all you are wanting to do is increase the size of your colony just using hive bodies will work. If you plan on harvesting honey though I would recommend doing it from the supers. If you take a capping knife to a brood chamber I'm pretty certain that you will stop the development of that part of the brood.

[your_comforting_company]

Never mess with the brood! I'm going to be running medium honey supers on the top, with 1/16" smaller spacing (5/16" vs. 3/8 brood spacing). So far everyone suggests two hives to start, and agrees there will be NO HONEY the first year, so growth is the primary concern in the first year, just as if you were planting a peach tree sapling.
As I start building my next hive, the Brood chamber will be the first one I build, so I might just run two on one hive, which will also increase the bees tendency to create another queen. This is because there are so many chambers to fill and fertilize.

Bees are interesting little creatures. The man upstairs knew what he was doing. Dummies like me are just trying to figure it all out, LOL.
I think I mentioned before that I'm using the Langstroth principles for building my hive.

I must have half a dozen printouts, and another half dozen sites bookmarked. Most of those sites are ones you suggested to me last year. So a big Thanks! to Mr. Crashdive, too!!

[your_comforting_company]

Bees are really interesting. Class this past Tuesday was really cool, learning about bee biology and habit. Anyone who claims that this world we live in is some cosmic accident, is really either very shallow or very ignorant. When we understand the science involved with this relatively simple insect, there can be no dispute.
In the same way that Darwinists are discounted by the simple deer, being an all in one package for OUR survival (why would a deer evolve to suit our needs, rather than it's own?) so it is with bees.

Just a few little factoids: Queen bees mate with other queens THROUGH the drones, who are "half a being"; basically a shell containing half the chromosomes of the queen, and no chromosomes of it's own. In this way, strong queens are able to add their DNA to the gene pool.
Beeswax is a bi-product of the bees simply being alive. It's a secretion that the bees make naturally, much like our sweat. Bees build their hives, literally, with their own sweat.
What kind of bee (worker, drone, queen) comes out of a hive cell, depends entirely on what it's fed. Queens get "royal jelly" for their entire larval stage, while workers only get it for a short while, then get switched to a mix of pollen and honey. Drones get the worst treatment of all.

I meant to post about class a few days ago, but I've been pretty busy. Can't get foundation to fit my frames, and now I'm not sure that the nuc I have on order is going to fit inside my box. Not sure what to do about it, unless I can find one of the companies (or an individual) who might do some horse-trading for a hive. I have a large buckskin that should be worth a few bucks more than a hive, being somewhere around 15sq ft with NO holes.
Might have to find better plans and start over, saving this hive for later.

[Rick]

Perhaps, YCC, it's the other way around. Maybe WE adapted to use everything on the deer.

Good posts on the bees.

[crashdive123]

Not sure if your class covered it, but the way bees regulate temperature and humidity in a hive is pretty cool. That, and knowing the exact humidity of a cell and when to cap it.

[rwc1969]

Time is honey, I like that.

[your_comforting_company]

So...
I started on my new hive yesterday. Got hive bodies built and all the top rails for the frames. Using new schematics from beesource.com.
My first jigs won't work, so I've gotta rig up some new assembly jigs for this "standardized box", and I'll use it to start, and just modify the other box later.
http://www.beesource.com/files/dadantfr.pdf <this part is a real pain to make without real tools, but between a few C-clamps and my table saw, It's coming together nicely. Pictures coming soon, and perhaps a few words about doing this all yourself. The link above shows how to make the top rails; each cut in order. So far only one neighbor says it might create a problem, being allergic to bees, but since my hives are really about 350yds from him, I doubt it will ever be an issue.
Bees do NOT want to sting you. Stinging you means the bee dies, and she'd much rather work on her colony than die.
Even with the purchase of more wood yesterday, I'm still under $65 on two hives. I can't even count how many hours I have in this project so far, but it's a lot.

[your_comforting_company]

Hive bodies done and this time they are standard size. Also shown are the top rails.
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A pic of my jig for making the sides of the frames, and a pic of the sides in process
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Parts being fitted and assembled
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hive full of frames. If you buy a kit, it will look exactly like this (well... maybe not quite as crude, lol)
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Still gotta make the inside cover, top cover, and screened floor. Talked to Mr. Cutts yesterday and we're still on for about mid-March, so I have about two weeks left to get foundations in, get equipment, and drop bees in. I'm excited!!

[crashdive123]

Looking good YCC. You've been buzzy.

[your_comforting_company]

You bet your sweet beehind I have! I don't know how they can sell completed frames for $3 or so.. It's a lot of work!

After work this evening, I managed to make the screen floor and inside cover. Class is tomorrow and my head basket is on backorder

betterbee.com should have listed on their site that they didn't have some of my kit in stock. I really didn't appreciate finding out later that they didn't have everything I needed.

next project in this endeavor will be the smoker. Gotta make leather bellows and get good at brazing. Unless someone has one they might be willing to barter?

Now where did I put that book about metalworking?

[crashdive123]

I've got an extra suit that you can borrow until yours comes in. You'll swim in it because you are quite a bit smaller than me, but you are welcome to use it till yours gets in.

[your_comforting_company]

Let me get back to you on it. I might be able to borrow one from one of the teachers at class tonight. I'm gonna call the company today and find out exactly what the ETA is on the veil.
Thanks. I might have to take you up on it if it's gonna be a while.

[Rick]

Jeepers. Good job. I had to give you a little rep for the hives. They look great. I can hear the queen talking to the drones now. "And boys, wait until you see your place! You're gonna love it. A real palace with hand carved woodwork!"

[crashdive123]

Let me get back to you on it. I might be able to borrow one from one of the teachers at class tonight. I'm gonna call the company today and find out exactly what the ETA is on the veil.
Thanks. I might have to take you up on it if it's gonna be a while.

Just let me know. It's a complete suit with the veil zippered to the collar of the suit. The veil has stretched some, but I just duct tape it to the helmet and it works fine.

[Rick]

Crash wears a veil (snort, giggle).

[crashdive123]

I'm just looking forward to Memorial Day so that I can wear white without being ridiculed.

[your_comforting_company]

Jeepers. Good job. I had to give you a little rep for the hives. They look great. I can hear the queen talking to the drones now. "And boys, wait until you see your place! You're gonna love it. A real palace with hand carved woodwork!"

I priced out some dado blades for this project, and it would have cost more to get the collection of tools than a hive. Dado blades run up around $100 for adjustable types. But by making a simple "stepped" set of cuts I accomplished the same thing. It took a lot longer, but it worked pretty well.
Nothing left now but the top cover with metal, and drop in foundations. Doesn't look like any of my order has shipped yet. Grrrr.

I will be looking into ways to make my own foundations too, so that's something I'll be exploring in the near future. A mold and some wax should be all I need??

A side note. My table saw burned up in the process. Bearing locked up in the motor. It's a Craftsman, so I'm gonna be checking with Sears to see if they'll fix or replace it. It's pretty old, so I doubt they will. I wound up borrowing one from my uncle to finish up. On the bright side, I might have a new work bench, lol.