Bee problems

[heyeddah]

I would also like to add that if you could get someone to help you collect the honeybees you could start your own hive and begin collecting honey. This hobby/business is almost as fun as chickens. There are many start up and informational sites online. You have to find and contain the queen and move the swarm into a box frame

Good Luck keep us abuzz


.http://www.google.com/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=1G1GGLQ_ENUS310&=&q=beekeeping&aq=0&oq=bee+keeping

 

[DDRanch]

Interesting. My 2 cents. Yellow jackets or wasps, kill them. You can purchase traps that contain the bodies after they are dead.

If it's bees, call the Utah agriculture line and get some advice. I have also found the local humane society a good source for all kinds of animal/insect questions and help. Let us know what happens.

 

[bargain]

Please please don't spray and poinson if honey bees or any bees,

I'm a bee keeper as well as a chicken and poultry nut, and we need bees for crops.

Call the local cooperative extension and get the name of someone who is a beekeeper. They will generally come out and get a swarm and gladly so as it will fill their bee box. Wish I were closer and could help.

Many Thanks and have a blessed day. Nancy

They do like any thing stinky smelling as well....They like foul water and so if you could move some old smelly chicken poop and put in a water location away from the chickens it would move them further out.

When we had pigs, we used to have bees over there all the time!

 

[briana1975]

Ok i am new to this so here goes a stupid question. Are bees usually a problem around chicken coops. And if so what can I do to deter them? My 6 year old son is deathly alergic to all stinging bees hornets wasps etc.

 

[MarkR]

Quote:
Usually only for the bees. Unfortunately, my chickens find my bees particularly tasty.

Seriously, not really. I keep bees and chickens. Nothing that the bees are attracted to will live in my chicken area (well, nothing growing on the ground, that is). They (the chickens) eat everything that grows there. There's nothing around chickens that would particularly attract bees so I'd think your son would be perfectly safe from bees.

Wasps and hornets might build in nooks in a coop or come after any fruit laying on the ground (again, it's never there long enough to be a problem where the chickens are concerned), but as long as you keep an eye on things it shouldn't be a problem.

 

[dale]

My bees like to go to the feeder and get the corn dust- they like it as a pollen substitute. One day they rifled through the feeder and worked five pounds of feed out of the feeder. Nutty insects anyway.

Get some corn flour and set it in a dish 10 to 20 feet from the coop and the bees will gather there. Once the trees and plants go into bloom the bees will gather their pollen from there.

Please don't spray the bees.

 

[utahchickens]

They are Honey Bees and not Wasps or Yellow jackets.

They were leaving every night on their own so I just waited until dusk and then swept all the feed crumbs out of the coop and put the water dish in the run. I guess when it is warm enough for bees it is time to put food and water outside the coop.

I didn't want to use chemicals around the birds. Given my hens desire to sample anything they see, I think that would have been a mistake and possibly a tragedy.

I read on some websites that bees are attracted to the protein in the feed. They only seem interested in the crumb dust, probably because it is small enough for them to carry, so I used scratch for the really cold nights in the coop.

Birds didn't like them at all.

Any rate, they are not an issue anymore since we removed food.

Thanks all.

 

[crazyhen]

A lot of the feeds have a smell of molasses to them. It is a sweet smell and the bees would love that. I have never had problems here but it is still cold weather with spring just around the corner. Check and see if the feed smells sweet. Jean