🐝💗Our Backyard Beekeeping Journey!💗🐝

[5Australorpasaures]

Thank you so much! That really helps a lot! I didn't know about the free catalogs. Bonus!

Look for a beekeeper, they are always happy to talk about their bees and what is involved, or club within driving distance. The State usually has a State Apiarist you can contact, they will list apiaries and what services they provide. I'm fortunate in that anything I might need, bees or equipment is within an hour drive. The only thing I need is frames, foundation and medications as I make everything else which can save you a lot of money.

 

[drstratton]

We had intended to only place a super today, then I remembered we had a drone frame that needed to be pulled as shown above.

Inspection went well, the bees were mostly calm. I was a little concerned after getting buzzed off earlier...lol

We saw lots of bees, eggs, larvae, capped brood, nectar, bee bread and capped honey in the deep boxes. We are very pleased with the amount of honey in the deep boxes as the double deeps are what we will leave them with over winter. Supplemented with candy boards.

We have also decided to add another super to the package and swarm hives. Just need to put some frames together and add wax. I think I will also expand my experiment. Maybe splitting 4 & 4 in one and checkerboarding in the other.

 

[Sally PB]

@CraziChknLady, another way to learn is to find a beekeeper and ask if you can observe or help with hive duties or honey harvest. Even not knowing anything, you can be helpful, just by being another set of hands. Get your own jacket/veil/gloves (unless they say they have some you can wear), and listen to what they tell you. Just running the smoker or holding a frame can be helpful.

The more time you spend around a beehive, the more comfortable you will be when you get your own.

 

[Apis mellifera]

This frame was not intended for drones. It's the frame we were hoping to get honeycomb from.

Nice job getting rid of mites! The green drone brood frames have a cell size of 7.1mm and worker size cells are 5.4. Queens will always lay unfertilized eggs in larger cells producing drones. Once drone season is over, they may backfill the frame with nectar. I used to put a medium frame in the deep brood box, and the bees would always build drone brood on the bottom, so I would just cut it off after the drones were capped and put it back in.

 

[drstratton]

Nice job getting rid of mites! The green drone brood frames have a cell size of 7.1mm and worker size cells are 5.4. Queens will always lay unfertilized eggs in larger cells producing drones. Once drone season is over, they may backfill the frame with nectar. I used to put a medium frame in the deep brood box, and the bees would always build drone brood on the bottom, so I would just cut it off after the drones were capped and put it back in.

Thank you. I was very happy with the results. Even though I hated seeing all of those mites. Glad they were dead ones.
We have 1 medium drone frame. It works great too. But, the first time I pulled it, I gave the whole frame to the chickens. That's what the lady does where we bought our Nuc's. Not thinking about the difference between the scope of her operation and ours, until after the fact. It was a waste of drawn comb. The next time I pull that frame, I will cut the bottom off and feed that to the chickens. Then I will freeze the frame for 3 days and place it back into the hive. That way the bees won't have to work so hard to build more comb.

 

[drstratton]

Just finished our first treatment. We waited until after dark. The bees were not very happy, but hopefully this regimen will help to mostly eradicate the mites.

 

[drstratton]

I think I'm going to try an experiment. The prewaxed frames always have a smooth look to them. We forgot a deep frame and left it in the sun. It was halfway under something. When I found it the half that was exposed had that same smooth look. First I'm going to try the heat gun on a low setting to see if I can achieve that. If that doesn't work, I will set them in the sun. I will do 4 like that and leave the other 4 as they are after I've rubbed the wax on. I want to see if the bees prefer one over the other. I'll will mark the frames so I can be sure of what they are when I check them.

I will checkerboard (alternate) the frames. I've noticed that bees will sometimes fill out one side of a box first. I think checkerboarding will give me a better idea of what they prefer. I'm also hoping to see if one works better than the other to eliminate the chance of wonky comb.

Maybe it won't make a difference, but it will be good to know either way.

This is the frame that was melted in the sun. I wish I would have thought to mark it.
View attachment 4200978

The super frames are yellow so it's harder to see the wax. You will have to zoom in.

Rubbed
View attachment 4200992

Rubbed and heated
View attachment 4200993

We will be installing the super tonight or tomorrow.

We have decided to add another honey super to our package and swarm hives. All four hives will have 2.

So we put together more honey super frames last night and I waxed the foundations. I'm going to continue my experimenting. This time I will put four heated wax frames in the middle, with two rubbed frames on each side in one of the supers. the other will have rubbed in the middle & heated on each side.

I really don't know if they will draw much comb this time of year, but I'm hoping the flow is heavy enough that they will.

There are frames of capped honey ready to be pulled. We are going camping, so we will do that next week when we get back home.

We will also be doing another treatment of OAV tonight.

Bees and blooms!
Italian Bee on Chives.

 

[drstratton]

Thought this was an interesting development. I don't 100% agree with their assessment, but anything to help the bees is a good thing.

Saving bees with ‘superfoods’: new engineered supplement found to boost colony reproduction | University of Oxford https://share.google/xt8x1tmmh2JU7DVYv

 

[5Australorpasaures]

Thought this was an interesting development. I don't 100% agree with their assessment, but anything to help the bees is a good thing.

Saving bees with ‘superfoods’: new engineered supplement found to boost colony reproduction | University of Oxford https://share.google/xt8x1tmmh2JU7DVYv

Interesting read, but I'll pass.

 

[drstratton]

Interesting read, but I'll pass.

Yeah, I'd have to learn a lot more about it. Just thought it was interesting.