The Honey Factory

[duluthralphie]

am planning to start bees this coming spring,

anyone have problems with bears? my farm/land is up north, lots of bears like i mean a lot.

Nothing an electric fence doesn’t cure.

 

[Fishychix]

Whew! I made it through the whole thread

I’ve been interested in keeping bees for a while but I hate bugs. Go figure. I don't have a problem with the bees, we actually get along pretty well as long as they stay on their flower. Its the larva that I’m not looking forward to. Does anyone ever run into them accidentally? If I know where they are and that it wont touch me I’ll be fine, but other than that Im liable to loose my lunch. You should see me gardening. Its quite a thing to watch
It turns out two other houses quite close to me also have hives so I may have missed my window. But after looking at overall costs, thats probably a blessing in disguise right now.
I look forward to continue reading this thread to learn more real life stuff, but can anyone recommend a book or two that I would find useful? I had to print out a beekeeping glossary while reading as I was getting lost with the terminology
Elk already advised me on a couple of things and I will look into those as time permits. Thank you!
As far as types of hives, it seems everyone is using the Lang(?) (“traditional”) style. Why?
I like the look of the one that has a pentagonal shape (trough type looking structure), but as I read someone mentioned that some frames wont fit into extruders. I imagine that would be the same for the pentagonal type. But I really like their look. Someone else just had their hubs build a long Lang(?) hive and that looks similar to the trough type I like the look of.
I really look forward to getting updates on that one.
Last question (for now ) what is the daily, weekly, monthly upkeep? How time consuming is it?

 

[R2elk]

Its the larva that I’m not looking forward to. Does anyone ever run into them accidentally?

You cannot run into honey bee larva accidentally. The queen lays they eggs in the honeycomb cells. The worker bees feed them and cap the cell. When the larva is a mature bee, it will chew its way out of the cell. You will never see an alive honeybee larva outside of the hive unless you remove them from the hive.

Last question (for now ) what is the daily, weekly, monthly upkeep? How time consuming is it?

My daily upkeep is feeding the bees sugar water in the spring until the blooms begin. After that I leave my hives alone until it is time to steal their honey in the fall.

 

[Fishychix]

You cannot run into honey bee larva accidentally. The queen lays they eggs in the honeycomb cells. The worker bees feed them and cap the cell. When the larva is a mature bee, it work chew its way out of the cell. You will never see an alive honeybee larva outside of the hive unless you remove them from the hive.

My daily upkeep is feeding the bees sugar water in the spring until the blooms begin. After that I leave my hives alone until it is time to steal their honey in the fall.

That honestly helps a lot. Thanks
I did do better in the garden this year. I dont think I took off in a horrified panic that I remember. I try not to scream bloody murder in public. .

 

[duluthralphie]

You will want to see larva. Like Bob says they will be in their cells. They aren’t crawling around like maggots.

Uncapped larva means your queen hasn’t run off and your hive is doing well.

Or ok

 

[Fishychix]

You will want to see larva. Like Bob says they will be in their cells. They aren’t crawling around like maggots.

Uncapped larva means your queen hasn’t run off and your hive is doing well.

Or ok

You said the m word

 

[duluthralphie]

You said the m word

I did but I said “not like” them

 

[karenerwin]

It is a beautiful warm day out today. High of 66 and sunny, no wind. So I decided to check on my remaining bee hive. Sadly, they are all dead and gone
I’ll add some pictures to see if anyone has any ideas. I think they starved and it also looks like some kind of infestation was (beginning?) in some of the combs.
I also saw a lot of little white things. Don’t know if those are eggs that died and dried up or something from an infestation. Any helpful thoughts would be appreciated.

Dead bees on top of the small hive beetle trap.

 

[karenerwin]

I have more pictures but didn’t want to over do it.

 

[MarkJr]

Starving bees typically have heads down inside holes with butts sticking out. No stores, or any stores that are there are two frames away.
Take a close look at the pile of bees. Any deformed wings? This is the time of year also that varroa load gets terminal due to shrink in colony size for winter.
Which reminds me, OAV treatment next weekend.