The Old Folks Home

[perchie.girl]

SCG do you think some African bees infiltrated your red hive? They would be nasty in any color box.

I dont think they have made it as high up as Maine in the US....

http://www.adkinsbeeremoval.com/africanized-honey-bee.php

You dont have to read it diva... there are lots of pictures

 

[Alaskan]

 

[superchemicalgirl]

Wow, sorry you lost your queen SCG... Are you sure she flew away?
So what are you going to do about that hive?

Positive. I had hived them on Saturday. When I hived them I did something different this year to try and minimize drift as both hives were dead and being replaced with packages. Instead of shaking the bees in I did the queen box and then put a an empty hive body on the bottom, and placed the package in there. You're supposed to go back in in 24 hours and remove the package and empty hive body, and 48 to check the queen's been released. Well, it rained like a banshee Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.
I finally got in the hives late yesterday when it stopped raining. Blue team was fine. The queen had been released, and they hadn't started building rogue comb in the empty box, thankfully.
Red team was a bit different. I had decided to try 2 different methods of hiving besides the empty hive body - blue team got one medium and a top feeder. Red team got 3 mediums, 2 of which were fairly filled with honey/pollen plus a hive top feeder for nosema. The queen had had her candy eaten through (just a hole) but it wasn't big enough yet for her fat self to get out. At 4 days post-hiving the instructions are generally to release the queen. When I opened the queen box she flew away! I left the hive open for 10 minutes (after closing it, running inside and googling what to do) waiting for her to come back. Something large flew around a few times (not sure it wasn't a wasp) but didn't go in.
So... google now tells me to wait 4-7 days, recheck to see if she returned and if no eggs order a new queen. I also threw the empty queen box back in there to hopefully prevent the bees from leaving sans no physical queen present. Hopefully her pheromones on the box will be enough.

I got a "thank you for your interest, but..." letter. Oh, well, at least I already have a job that I like.

I'm sorry, but glad you heard quickly.

"A lonely blue girl guards the riverbed, she shakes her brown torch at the tide..."

Have you thought maybe it could be the color?

Darn it now I'm going to have to listen to October Rust and Bloody Kisses to figure out what my favorite song was back in the late 90s! grrr, I very rarely use the laptop, my phone doesn't show quotes....... OFF TO YOUTUBE, cd's are long gone....., probably was tapes back then...

I don't think the color had anything to do with the queen leaving. If the hive is "hot" again this year I will consider repainting the hive.

So many good TON songs...
In Praise of Bacchus
Too Late: Frozen
We Hate Everyone
Love You to Death

SCG do you think some African bees infiltrated your red hive? They would be nasty in any color box.

No, the hive wasn't that nasty! Blue Team didn't really seem to care when I opened their hive. They'd mostly just look at me. Red Team was much more grumpy - they'd protect their home and start flying around my head and body. There were a couple times I just gave up trying to inspect them because they were grumpy. I never did that with Blue Team. I didn't get stung, but they were pretty aggressive compared to docile Blue Team. I've read that the attitude of the hive is based upon the queen. I must have gotten a real meanie.

 

[dsqard]

Diva, Africanized bees definitely have not made it that far north yet. They haven't even made it as far as Utah. They just can't survive the cold temps for that long. Last I knew they were only in southern CA, AZ, NM and TX. They aren't nearly as scary as the "Killer Bees" movie they put out years ago (really bad C, made for TV movie) but you do have to respect them. You DON'T mess with any hives in AZ as they estimate 95% of the hives are Africanized. If you discover a hive, the best thing to do is to call a "bee man" to come and take care of the problem.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

Wow, sorry you lost your queen SCG... Are you sure she flew away? After they're mated, they don't normally do that

unless as part of a swarm... As a package instal, they shouldn't be anywhere near swarm condition... I forget where I read/heard it, but red is not a good color for bees as they can't see it. I guess the best colors are blue and shades of purple, then yellows. I decided to just stay with the natural wood and not paint or stain... maybe I'm just lazy

So what are you going to do about that hive?

Bees vision color range is violet, blue, blue-green, yellow, orange and ultraviolet.
Plants that depend on bees for pollination have flowers in those color ranges.
I'm guessing that white flowers like clover may have some ultraviolet that they see.

Some of my bodies are treated with linseed oil. The rest start out painted white and then some have designs on them to prevent drift.

Sorry Wisher... All things happen for a reason... Must be something better waiting around the corner for ya!

X2

Positive. I had hived them on Saturday. When I hived them I did something different this year to try and minimize drift as both hives were dead and being replaced with packages. Instead of shaking the bees in I did the queen box and then put a an empty hive body on the bottom, and placed the package in there. You're supposed to go back in in 24 hours and remove the package and empty hive body, and 48 to check the queen's been released. Well, it rained like a banshee Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.
I finally got in the hives late yesterday when it stopped raining. Blue team was fine. The queen had been released, and they hadn't started building rogue comb in the empty box, thankfully.
Red team was a bit different. I had decided to try 2 different methods of hiving besides the empty hive body - blue team got one medium and a top feeder. Red team got 3 mediums, 2 of which were fairly filled with honey/pollen plus a hive top feeder for nosema. The queen had had her candy eaten through (just a hole) but it wasn't big enough yet for her fat self to get out. At 4 days post-hiving the instructions are generally to release the queen. When I opened the queen box she flew away! I left the hive open for 10 minutes (after closing it, running inside and googling what to do) waiting for her to come back. Something large flew around a few times (not sure it wasn't a wasp) but didn't go in.
So... google now tells me to wait 4-7 days, recheck to see if she returned and if no eggs order a new queen. I also threw the empty queen box back in there to hopefully prevent the bees from leaving sans no physical queen present. Hopefully her pheromones on the box will be enough.

...

Well at least you know for sure that she flew the coop. If you didn't know, it would be too late by the time you found out.
Perhaps she hadn't been mated and is trying to get more drone juice. Did she fly up or out low to the ground?
Drones fly high so a queen looking for mates will fly low for a good distance before gaining elevation so they're less likely to breed related drones.
If it were me, I'd order a new queen now. If she comes back, you could split some frames out for the new queen to make a third hive.

Diva, Africanized bees definitely have not made it that far north yet. They haven't even made it as far as Utah. They just can't survive the cold temps for that long. Last I knew they were only in southern CA, AZ, NM and TX. They aren't nearly as scary as the "Killer Bees" movie they put out years ago (really bad C, made for TV movie) but you do have to respect them. You DON'T mess with any hives in AZ as they estimate 95% of the hives are Africanized. If you discover a hive, the best thing to do is to call a "bee man" to come and take care of the problem.

The thing about Africanized bees I find strange is that as they breed with European bees they transfer their nasty habits to the offspring but the Europeans don't pass on their cold tolerance.

 

[dsqard]

CC I don't know if being hyper vigilant on protecting their hive really can be considered a "nasty habit"
BTW Wisher sorry to hear you didn't get the job. I have gone through that "rejection" a few times over the last few years. Keep working on it if you really want to change jobs. I haven't given up yet. I am still waiting to hear if I got the job in Virginia. If I haven't heard anything by Friday, I will probably send an email to the recruiter to see if he knows anything. I am hoping that they are conducting interviews still since they only posted the job three weeks ago and reposted it on Tuesday. I am hoping that means not too many people are applying. Apparently the job is not attractive to many people because it is in rural Virginia. I like rural and I LOVE the idea of driving less than 1/2 to work each way. After five years of driving an hour each way to work, I am sick of it. Ah well keeping my fingers crossed.

 

[bamadude]

Good luck dsqard

 

[ChickenCanoe]

CC I don't know if being hyper vigilant on protecting their hive really can be considered a "nasty habit"

BTW Wisher sorry to hear you didn't get the job. I have gone through that "rejection" a few times over the last few years. Keep working on it if you really want to change jobs. I haven't given up yet.

I am still waiting to hear if I got the job in Virginia. If I haven't heard anything by Friday, I will probably send an email to the recruiter to see if he knows anything. I am hoping that they are conducting interviews still since they only posted the job three weeks ago and reposted it on Tuesday. I am hoping that means not too many people are applying. Apparently the job is not attractive to many people because it is in rural Virginia. I like rural and I LOVE the idea of driving less than 1/2 to work each way. After five years of driving an hour each way to work, I am sick of it. Ah well keeping my fingers crossed.

Nasty was the wrong term because sometimes I don't take the time to access the memory banks. I guess overly aggressive would have been a better term. Once the predator being pursued is far from the hive, most European bees will return to the hive. Africans will continue to attack no matter how far, till they bring the predator down.

..........................................
This is no reflection on anyone here, just my preference. I know that many on here live in small towns.
I love rural, more accurately, wilderness. I like medium/large cities for what they have to offer.
I grew up in a large city but we had 2 farms. One in the suburbs and one in a very rural area. I spent every weekend and most summers on a farm. I went to school in the city. When we would travel, I didn't have an attraction to small towns. I loved living in the wild. I saw many advantages to cities. As a kid, I thought, I wanted to either live in a city (for access to big city amenities), or if living otherwise I wanted to live as far from civilization as possible.
I still feel that way and probably because I never lived in a small town.

 

[dsqard]

CC very true. It is not recommended to hide from them underwater like in the cartoons. They will wait for you. What is recommended if you start getting attacked is to run away from the hive and to keep running as far as you can. Carbon dioxide emissions and vibrations almost always trigger an attack.

 

[dsqard]

Good luck dsqard

Thank you dude!