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mar 31 2011

Pollen?

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It’s the 30th day of March in Winona MN. The temperature was about 45 degrees F in the beeyard. The sun was on the one surviving hive (Bee Glad…) and a number of bees looked to be bringing in pollen. Except for the crocuses, I have not seen any other flowering plants in the neighborhood. I still would like to think the bees are bringing in healthy food.


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mar 31 2011

Chilled Brood

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Early spring bee hive inspections give the beekeeper an opportunity to determine the health of the colony and the condition of its queen. Inspections also allow the beekeeper to analyze and start taking corrective action for hive or colony problems. In the inspection, we look at the size of the population of bees and examine the brood. A hive with a smaller population than others being inspected at the same time may have a failing queen. Much can be learned about the queen’s productivity by examining the different stages of brood. Because of the amount of time that the brood remains in each of the different stages of development, we can determine if there is continuity in the queen’s egg laying by roughly counting the brood. When she is laying, there will be twice as many larvae as eggs and twice as many pupae as larvae. For example, finding capped brood but no uncapped brood may mean that the queen has stopped laying eggs.
Honey bee eggs and larvae are pearly white in color, and are found in open cells and should not be discolored. Pupae are housed in capped cells, which should have even-shaped cappings made of recycled beeswax. The brood should never have an unpleasant odor. Observing the appearance, texture, and odor of brood can usually identify two serious brood diseases, American foulbrood and European foulbrood. However, there is a very common bee hive condition that is similar in appearance and often tricky to identify. It is chilled brood caused by having a portion of the comb exposed to cold or damp conditions without being covered by protective bees. Chilled brood may have discolored larvae similar to European foulbrood or eneven, discolored, and perforated cappings like American foulbrood. There may be an unpleasant odor as well from decaying bees and brood. The chilled brood and dead bees in today’s photo resulted from vandals exposing a hive to the elements. Knowing the hive’s history helps identify chilled brood.
–Richard

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mar 31 2011

Why mangroves matter

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via youtube.com More on why mangroves matter in this treehugger post.
Posted via email from a leaf warbler’s gleanings


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mar 30 2011

Early Spring Hive Inspection

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Opening a bee hive engages all of one’s senses. We very quickly learn the condition of the colony within. As soon as we remove the cover of a bee hive, we smell the aroma of beeswax and honey. An unpleasant odor may indicate a brood disease or dead, decaying bees in the hive. Of course, what we see in the hive reveals much about the condition of the colony. We notice the bees’ activity in and around the hive. We find that from hive to hive the bees vary from calm to highly agitated. Some bees remain in the frames, while others fly out in response to opening the hive. The sound of the hive changes with different colony conditions. A queen-right colony with normal activity will generate a gentle humming sound. A queen-less colony will often buzz loudly for a few seconds when the hive is first opened. The beekeeper’s sense of touch comes into play, sometimes unpleasantly. Most bees in the hive’s brood nest will allow the beekeeper to handle the frames of bees bare handed, never stinging unless a bee is accidentally mashed by the beekeeper. The bees from some colonies will punish exposed skin with effective stings. Colonies that readily sting may be queenless; they may be experiencing attacks from skunks or other predators; or they may have inherited defensive behavioral traits. Even gentle bees may sting if the weather conditions are wrong; it is late in the day; or the hive has been opened too frequently. One hive condition seems to always involve my using my sense of taste while examining the hives in the early spring. An unidentified white substance found inside the cells of honeycomb tastes sweet and pleasant; it’s crystallized aster honey from late last fall.
As we inspect the bee hive, we always examine the brood. In today’s photo of healthy brood, we see, from right to left, eggs, young larvae, older larvae, pupae in capped cells, and adult worker bees.

–Richard

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mar 29 2011

Spring Greens

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The lettuce I planted in the cold frame last fall is doing well..now. This was the first winter we had the cold frame. It didn’t do much over the winter, but the mache, kale, spinach and lettuce are finally ready to eat.

The Hubs snagged this beauty (Mantis Dual-Chamber compost spinner) for me off Craig’s list last summer. It works like a dream! Loving the dual-chamber system that allows finishing off a batch of compost while starting another. It’s been a bit of trial and error ~ including one batch of slime (too much grass not enough browns). A mixture of maple leaves, grass clippings, sawdust, chicken plops, kitchen scraps (including lots of coffee grounds, mashed egg shells, greens, banana peels, etc.) DOES make beautiful compost!!

Emptied out one barrel of the spinner and started another batch of lettuce with it in the cold frame.

The re-purposed windows for the cold frame are going to need a little bit of TLC this spring. The heat ( it hit 100 degrees in there last week when it was 16 degrees outside ) and humidity have caused the interior paint to peel off.

We’ve planted some lettuce, chard, spinach, and radishes under a hoop in the raised bed by the garden after adding the compost. Really want to look into producing a larger volume of greens throughout the winter. Just starting to read Eliot Coleman’s winter harvest book and my wheels are spinning!
Is anyone out there having luck with cold weather crops under hoop beds?

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mar 29 2011

New equipment for an expanding apiary!

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Tis the season for beekeeping equipment. In the next couple of weeks, I plan to pick up a couple more complete hives to add to my backyard apiary. And to hold my new colonies, I just received my custom-built, all steel, three hive stand. It was built by a local welding shop, Amos Welding, and built to my specifications. Its 6 feet wide, 2 1/2 feet deep, and sits 24 inches off the ground. Click on the picture and you can see the heavy duty screen that covers the top (which combined with screened bottom board will aid in ventilation), and the legs have „feet” on the bottoms to keep them from sinking into the ground. The steel is heavy grade so it will safely hold the hives..even at their heaviest when full of honey honey in the fall.

Once it receives two coats of metal paint, I’ll locate it at the back of my property and in close proximity to my current hives. I’ll use post-hole diggers to plant the legs in the ground, then once its leveled, I’ll use some Quikrete to secure the stand. Once it sets, I’ll be able to locate my new colonies at their new home.

I have to have everything ready by April 11th when my new 3-pound package of bees arrives at Dadant and Sons. That will take one space. Then I’ll use another space when I split the orange hive. Then the third will be ready to go for any swarms I may catch this spring. And if I get more swarms, I’m already thinking about alternate locations. After all, I have to keep the neighbors happy too!        

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mar 27 2011

Pimp-my-Basket: Part One

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Most of my knitting supplies have been picked up at thrift stores. It is a great (low cost) way to build a collection.

After about a year of picking up bits here and there..
My knitting basket is starting to look like ..ok… is an avalanche.

Last weekend I did some surfing and came across a tutorial for a Knitting Roll pattern to help contain some of my needles.
Perfect for a collection of wooden needles I’ve been picking up with coupons at the craft store..
Woodland fabric (~ I love mushrooms ~) for wooden needles.

: )

This great roll up took me about 2 hours to make (maybe less time for those who know how to sew..) If you would like to check it out the tutorial, pop on over to Loulabelle!

Happy Sewing!

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mar 27 2011

Winter just doesn’t want to leave…

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This past Monday the high temperature here was 84 degrees and the bees couldn’t stop bringing in the pollen. And now the various forecasts are calling for the possibility of snow here Sunday and Monday.

Winter truly doesn’t want to let go even though the calendar says it is officially spring.

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mar 27 2011

What a Mess!

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Yesterday I arrived in South Georgia to inspect the 10 hives we installed a week ago.  I was excited to see what the bees had done.

But we found a real mess…..Phrases ran through my head like „shock and awe;” „it’s always darkest before the dawn;” „pride goeth before a fall.”   And „What WAS I thinking?”

The guys had reported that there was a swarm of bees living in an abandoned stove on the property before I left Atlanta.  I had driven down with a hive to put this swarm into – old frames, 10 frame medium hive since I don’t use those if I can help it any more.  I thought we’d capture the swarm and have a bonus 11th hive.
We started by looking at the stove at 11 AM.  No bees.  The scouts had found a good enough home and the hive and gone to better places.  We then went to Hive #10 to begin our inspections.  
Hive #10 had absconded.  Probably they were the bees in the stove.  I was heartsick.  If I had only arrived the day before, etc. etc.  
With a sinking feeling I opened Hive #9 and the bees were still there, but these bees had not built comb in the frames provided in the hive box but had built beautiful comb attached to the inner cover of the medium super we had used as a surround for the Ziploc baggie feeder.  We opened Hive # 8 and found the same occurrence; same with Hive # 7; same with Hive #6.  Every single hive had built comb attached to the inner cover and had not moved into the hive box!
Horrors!
OK, so we had to figure out what to do.  I had not come prepared for this, but we decided to cut the comb from the inner cover and tie it into our foundationless frames to get the bees going the way they should.  We ran out of rubber bands after the first hive and started using the ball of kitchen twine that I had brought.  We did this on every single hive – we worked from 11 – 3:30 nonstop and moved all the work the bees had done.
I’ve never had my hands in so many bees.  I got stung about eight times, but never badly until the last sting in the pad of my third finger.  The whole time I tried to move slowly and gently and we did the best we could.

However, I am so worried now – often after a hive is messed with like that, the bees abscond, or ball the queen and kill her.  Or we could have injured the queen in the transition.  

I don’t know if this happened because the baggie feeder occupied 2/3 of the top bar access and they experienced it as a barrier.  I don’t know if this happened because we used a medium super as a surround, thus providing them with a hollow cavity like a tree.  I just know that I am so sad about this mess.

Here are the tragic pictures. We didn’t leave them with any food. The guys were going to set up a set of feeding jars in the center of the fields near each hive and everything is blooming in S Georgia now.

I’m crossing my fingers and hoping for the best.  All the hives had orientation flying going on as we left them.



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mar 27 2011

What I Take to a Bee Hive Inspection

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Once Jerry Wallace gave a great program on what he takes to an inspection. I talked about my re-purposed knitting bag as a bee bag in an earlier post, but thought you’d like to see the contents all laid out (upper left to right)

Flour sacking towel for hive drape
Squirt bottle with sugar syrup in it
Kitchen twine
Wet ones to clean hive tool between hives
Frame gripper
Thumb Tacks
Benadryl
Baby powder (on your hands it keeps bees away and if you use nitrile gloves it helps to slide them on)
Hive tools – prefer to use a different one with each hive as per Jennifer Berry
Plastic Zip Locs for whatever
Magnifying glasses
Swarm lure (in jelly jar)
Large rubber bands
Lighter for smoker
Swiss Army knife
Pruners
Sharpies
Ball point pen
Nitrile gloves
Bee Brush
Frame rack
Clip board with notepaper on it

OK, that’s it. What do you carry in your hive kit that I don’t?

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