my honey bee order is in

I just ordered a package of bees for April 17. I didn’t keep any honey bees last year and I missed having all those pollinators in the vegetable garden. It’s nice to think ahead to spring before winter even starts.

honey bees

I picked up a package of bees today. Both of my hives died early last winter - it was a very hard fall/winter for bees here. I have heard that the overwintering rate in our area for experienced bee keepers was about 20%. One out of 5 hives survived. I almost decided it wasn't worth keeping bees and if I have to buy new ones every year, but I went ahead and got one hive anyway.

They are not off to a good start. Tonight will be very cold and I was told to keep them inside at 60F overnight and install them tomorrow. I was also told to spray sugar water on the frame near the queen to make sure they stay in a cluster and keep each other warm. I hear our weather will warm up at the end of this week, but we have another cold spell coming in soon after that. Our trees are all blooming, but the bees can't fly to gather any nectar until temperatures are above 50F or so.

my honeybees - preparing for winter

I'm in the process of preparing my honeybee hives for winter. I have two hives on the far side of my vegetable garden nearest the pond. They're on the northeast side of the yard with a southwest exposure. The bees for both hives were added in early April, since both hives died last winter. One hive is much stronger than the other. The strong one has about 70 lbs of honey, while the weak one about 30-40 lbs. I'm guessing here from lifting the boxes. (Hives should have a good 70 lbs of honey stores going into the winter.)

This is what I've done and am planning to do for winter:

Done
 - Removed super and extracted honey: In early September I removed one full super (a short box with 10 frames for building comb and filling it with honey) from my strong hive. I took about 15 lbs of honey from this box.

- Fed weak hive: I've been feeding my weak hive so it can build up its honey stores for winter. There aren't many flowers left now, the goldenrod is gone. I only see the late aster in bloom now.  I feed them sugar water.

Planning to do
- Get bigger feeding bucket: I've been feeding the weak hive about a liter at a time, but they eat it so fast I can't keep up with the. The bucket seems always empty. So I'm planning to add a bigger container of sugar water.

- Build a box to absorb winter condensation: I'm planning to build a box (called a quilt box) that sits at the top inside the hive and insulates, helps with airflow, and absorbs moisture. It's my guess I lost my hives last year because of condensation dripping into the cluster of bees.

After this, they should be ready to go for winter. At least as ready as I can get them. Of course, I can always use advice. I've been keeping bees 3 years now, and have plenty more to learn.

More bee stuff: Kathy's Bees

me and my new bees

Actually, it's not so easy to get a selfie with a new bee package. iPhone's don't work so well wearing leather bee gloves. But the bees did pose well I thought. They are very sweet bees. Once they take up residence and start protecting their hive, I won't do selfies with them.

I lost both my bee hives already

:-( The boxes of both my hives are now empty and stacked crosswise. I was sad to see so many bees die. I am guessing they died from dripping condensation as I saw water droplets in the hive when I opened it. I noticed bees begin to die in November, just after it got cold. (more ...)

winterizing my bee hives

I'd like to do my best to keep my bees alive this winter so I've been reading and asking advice at my local bee club. As they say, ask two beekeepers the same question and you'll get three answers. On top of that, bees have a mind of their own and you can treat two hives the same way and they'll still be totally different. So, here's what I've done for my hives. (more...)

hive check - "dewinterizing"

At midday today, I opened my second hive, my remaining live hive. The bees were very active, bringing in lots of yellow and orange pollen. I see a few scattered crocuses around in my yard, but I bet they've found another yard with many early spring crocuses and snowdrops. (more ...)

more honey

Yesterday I bottled 10 pints, 15 lbs, of honey for us to eat. It's spicy and sweet, medium amber. Really good. (more...)

bee hives wrapped up for a cold night

I wasn't planning to wrap my bee hives. At my bee club people usually just add insulation to the top, which I did back in November. But this is way colder than we're used to! Predictions for tonight are 5 to 15 below 0 F (-20 to -26 C) with a gusty wind to 35 mph. So I wrapped both hives in a tarp. At least this will cut down any drafts getting in the openings.



I also secured the chicken coop better than usual. At less than 20 F (-7C), I turn on a ceramic bulb heater in the coop. That's been on most of this week. This afternoon I lowered tarps that protect the run from wind. I'll go out after they start roosting and close the coop door - which I never do.

Brrr! Stay warm!

bee hives in winter cold

My bee hives are dwarfed by the long winter shadows. I'm wondering how the bees are doing. We've had a couple weeks of temperatures in the 20's and below. (...more)

christmas day bees on hellebores

Last week the hellebore has been blooming gloriously in the misty unusually warm New England weather. Today the sun broke out. I saw my bees were out foraging. Hard to believe on the last week of the year! I found some, collecting hellebore nectar (....more)

honey!

I can't quite believe it. I collected honey from my own hives! It's a cool feeling. Yesterday I opened my white hive, ... (more)

no queen!

I checked my hives today. 3 weeks since I last looked inside. I didn't do a complete check because its 95F and 12 noon. I think not the best time to check. (more ... )

me first bee sting

I got stung by one of my bees last Saturday. Ouch. It really hurt. It made me hurry to finish the hive inspection. (more ...)

honey bee flowers

Today my sister helped me fill and plant flowers in four big "honey bee pots" in my vegetable garden. These fit at the end of the rows between my raised beds. I want to attract my bees to my garden to pollinate the vegetables. So I selected flowers at the nursery that had honey bees on them.

I enjoyed walking through the nursery and noticing how different flowers attract different bees. The honey bee pots I ended up with are not a mix of flowers I would have selected otherwise. Sort of an unusual combination.

An amazing plant is Campanula takesimana "Elizabeth". It is both beautiful and was just covered with honey bees. I've never seen this plant before. I bought two of these. Also a large-flowered upright chamomile, a couple deep blue Veronicas, snapdragons and a small-flowered orange zinnia.

where do my bees go?

I've been watching which flowers my bees are on. (more ...)

a new blog for my bees

I've started a separate blog just for my bees. It's "kathy's bee's". I'll post just titles here with a link.

bee record keeping

I'm trying to figure out the best way to keep a record of my bees. First, I had Siri transcribe my observations, then just transferred that to a word document. But Siri doesn't understand me very well and see certainly doesn't know words like "brood box". (more...)

bee news

Yesterday I inspected my two new bee hives. It's the first time I've gone two weeks between inspections so I was really curious what I would find. One hive looks perfect and just as I expected. It's 70% full, ready for a mite treatment and then a honey super. Maybe both at once.

The other hive - well, not so good. The top box looked nice: I saw the queen and lots of eggs and larvae she had laid. Lots of stored food. But the bottom box was different. Pulling and checking frames from right to left I came across a single dark queen succession cell. A wax igloo in the middle of the frame. This frame and the next 3 or 4, were surprisingly inactive. These are built out frames that had been used for brood, but now no eggs, larvae, or nectar. Maybe a bit of yellow-brown stuff (pollen?) at the bottom? (I'll go back and photograph this today as I am wondering now if its foul brood or some other disease.)



But that single queen succession cell seemed to make sense. Maybe my original queen can't keep up laying eggs in all the cells. BUT then, on the next frame, about 20 light colored queen swarm cells hanging down the center sideways and off the edges! So are they are planning to swarm! And succeed? Both?



What I think I'll do next (tomorrow) is (1) photograph those funny yellow-brown cells closer and see if a problem. Maybe I need to take them out. (2) Try to create more space in case they are is considering swarming due to crowding. I will move unused outer frames inward and adding a honey super. I am deciding whether to remove the queen swarm cells. A friend said she can lend me equipment if I do need to catch a swarm. But it may make sense to remove whatever swarm cells I can, leaving the succession cells.

We'll see. I'd love advice.

bee notes

For the past 5 weeks, Siri has recorded my bee notes for me. A good idea in theory, BUT I'm going to switch to an old-fashioned paper and pen notebook. Aside from my cell phone getting streaked with bee's wax, its hard for me to translate what Siri records. Here's my best translation from yesterday's hive check:

I'm checking my beehives. It's early Monday morning, Memorial day. An over overcast morning and the smells are so amazing. The smell of flowers is heavy in the air (and burgers??). I'm going to check the beehives.

White hive: The top box has 3 1/2 frames build out it looks like they're all food frames. The bottom box has 3 1/2 frames of food. There are five full frames of brood. I can see eggs and larvae of all stages. I was getting afraid that it had so much food that there would be no brood. I did not see a queen - this hive has a marked queen so I should have seen her, but did not. Certainly plenty of evidence she is here and active. There are a lot of ants on top of the inner cover. I swept them out.

Green hive has the equivalent of two frames of food in the top box. The bottom box has equivalent of two frames of food, two empty frames and the rest brood. I can see eggs and all stages of brood, but again I did not find a queen.

Flowers blooming today are honeysuckle, ajuga and wild phlox. The temperature is about 60-80F.

Most of these notes, I could translate or revise to make sense, but Siri can't distinguish when I say "food' and "brood". Well, she just doesn't know the word "brood" I think, and she will substitute random things. Sorry Siri.

Here's a comparison of my two hives five weeks after installing them. (Both had a second box added 2.5 weeks ago and their frame feeders removed the following week, so they each have 20 frames total now.):