Gardening for Old Folks (Adaptative)

[cavemanrich]

that night, all of the chickens went and laid down where the coop used to be..

Just like with bee hives. You can move it 3 feet or 3 miles. any other distance, and bees get lost.

 

[bruceha2000]

So you have to move the hive 3' at a time with some "wait time" between moves?

 

[jvls1942]

we have to make room in the freezer for some chickens.
DW figures if we take the blackberries out , that should give us the room we need.
today she bought several packages of wine yeast. she figures there are enough blackberries to make 25 gallons.. She scored a bunch of buckets from Trig's bakery dept to start the
fermentation..
today was graduation day.. No more PT..
......jiminwisc........

 

[cavemanrich]

So you have to move the hive 3' at a time with some "wait time" between moves?

I have a friend that kept bees, so he told me some things about it. I still have another neighbor that currently keeps bees.
This is what I know. If you decide to relocate hive to the other side of your yard, lets say 10 feet or more for example, The bees fly out, but upon returning to your yard, will be searching in location where their hive was. They will not try to see if one of the other hives is theirs. Remember that bee hives have drones,, aka army bees, that guard the hive from other bees entering. A returning bee knows not to try any other hive except its own.
If their hive is within the 3 feet distance, they will recognize it as home.
Another example,, You sell your hive to your neighbor mile away. Bees do venture out, and on return trip, they come back to your yard. Its like selling a homing pigeon and doing it multiple times, since it keeps returning to you.
When you relocate 3 mile distance, bees venture out, but the territory is completely new to them. They then take a note where to return to.
This tells us that bees may venture out in any given direction searching for pollen, nectar, up to 3 miles.

 

[R2elk]

I have a friend that kept bees, so he told me some things about it. I still have another neighbor that currently keeps bees.
This is what I know. If you decide to relocate hive to the other side of your yard, lets say 10 feet or more for example, The bees fly out, but upon returning to your yard, will be searching in location where their hive was. They will not try to see if one of the other hives is theirs. Remember that bee hives have drones,, aka army bees, that guard the hive from other bees entering. A returning bee knows not to try any other hive except its own.
If their hive is within the 3 feet distance, they will recognize it as home.
Another example,, You sell your hive to your neighbor mile away. Bees do venture out, and on return trip, they come back to your yard. Its like selling a homing pigeon and doing it multiple times, since it keeps returning to you.
When you relocate 3 mile distance, bees venture out, but the territory is completely new to them. They then take a note where to return to.
This tells us that bees may venture out in any given direction searching for pollen, nectar, up to 3 miles.

Don't believe everything you have been told. First off, drones are male bees whose only purpose is to eat, sleep and breed the queen bee. They do not guard anything.

Personally I have moved bees miles away and and not so many feet away without any issues. You close the bees in the hive the evening before the move.

 

[cavemanrich]

we have to make room in the freezer for some chickens.
DW figures if we take the blackberries out , that should give us the room we need.
today she bought several packages of wine yeast. she figures there are enough blackberries to make 25 gallons.. She scored a bunch of buckets from Trig's bakery dept to start the
fermentation..
today was graduation day.. No more PT..
......jiminwisc........

If you know what to do then disregard my info.
My mom used to make her own wine. From grapes, and other fruit as well. She did not add wine yeast, but rather depended on the yeast that was on the fruit surface. (natural)
Of course if you decide to rinse your fruit, you need to add yeast.
She used glass vessels to do the fermentation. After fermentation stopped, she drained the clear liquid with the use of a siphon. Being careful not to stir up and mix the sediment on bottom. She let the wine settle another 3 times, until there was no sediment present on bottom. Then bottled and corked.
She used an airlock to keep out any other yeast/bacteria ETC.
On a few occasions, wine did not make, but instead turned out to be vinegar.
I don;t know the science behind one and the other. Just know that she did end up with vinegar by surprise. (unwanted BTW)

today was graduation day.. No more PT..

Not sure what this means

 

[cavemanrich]

Personally I have moved bees miles away and and not so many feet away without any issues. You close the bees in the hive the evening before the move.

If you move them miles away re-read my post and it will say, that further distance is fine.
I'm only going by what my friend told me. He had multiple hives in said yard. Also by other farmers' lands. They let him keep the hives there free of charge. He had to do all his own maintenance of them. Farmer benefited with bees as pollinators.
I imagine if you only have one hive, then bees would find it 10 feet away.
Do you think my friend was smokin me purposely???

I just assumed that the useless drones had a second job of security. I now see that the women in that colony had to be soldiers as well.

There are also multiple varieties of honey bees, so I may be incorrect assuming this about ALL BEES.
He told me about some expensive varieties of QUEENS he purchase from Eastern Europe. They were quite pricey.
My neighbor that keeps the bees currently told me he was getting Queens for something like $16.

 

[R2elk]

If you move them miles away re-read my post and it will say, that further distance is fine.
I'm only going by what my friend told me. He had multiple hives in said yard. Also by other farmers' lands. They let him keep the hives there free of charge. He had to do all his own maintenance of them. Farmer benefited with bees as pollinators.
I imagine if you only have one hive, then bees would find it 10 feet away.
Do you think my friend was smokin me purposely???

I just assumed that the useless drones had a second job of security. I now see that the women in that colony had to be soldiers as well.

There are also multiple varieties of honey bees, so I may be incorrect assuming this about ALL BEES.
He told me about some expensive varieties of QUEENS he purchase from Eastern Europe. They were quite pricey.
My neighbor that keeps the bees currently told me he was getting Queens for something like $16.

I have multiple hives and had no problems if I moved them a couple of feet or a hundred feet. I have had multiple different kinds of honeybees. Other than how well they collected honey or over wintered, I found their behavior to be very similar.

Sixteen dollars for queen bees is really cheap.

 

[oldhen2345]

those chicks might never go to the other coop on their own.
a long time ago I had a 8ft x 8ft coop. One day I decided to relocate it. I hooked up the tractor to it and dragged it about 50 feet to where I established my permanent chicken yard. that night, all of the chickens went and laid down where the coop used to be..
...jiminwisc.....

That is pretty funny.
The baby barn is about 6 feet from the big girl coop- just a different enclosure where small pullets are safe from pecking. Most of the time, the babies bed down outside the baby barn door and I put them in their enclosure after dark- until one day, they decide to go into the big coop themselves- definitely a day for celebration. One time, I had to literally pick the littles up and put them in the coop for a few nights until they got the message. I am afraid I will have to do that with these.

 

[jvls1942]

My neighbor hauls a couple of semi loads of bees to Texas every year. They must find their hives OK down there. He does not set the hives out up here in Wisc, at home.
OH2345, just put a light inside the coop at dusk. the chicks will go to where it is light when it starts to get dark..
I have been making wine since 1970.
with grapes you do not need yeast. but I still do use it on them.. If you depend on the natural yeasts on the fruit, you never know what you will get. vinegar is one result of that
different wine yeasts give you different kinds of wine..
I have at least six of the 5 gallon glass carbouys for finishing the wine. I have a box full of air locks of different kinds.
We start the fruit in buckets and then strain out the fruit after a few days of fermenting.
I have a siphon that I can pump if I don't want to wait for gravity to do the job.. I am usually not in a hurry, so I only pump it once to get the flow going..
Blackberry is not my favorite wine. But it is still good. Raspberry is awesome. Rhubarb is surprisingly wonderful. elderberry and choke cherry are good also.. I made dandelion once. Not worth the extra work of picking the yellow off of the bitter stems. I made plum once, it took years to clear.. tried apple once, it fizzled. I might try it again some day.
......jiminwisc.......