July 22: Caps!

July 22, 2014:

I went out today to prop up the hive lid in preparation for a few hot dry days, and I pulled a few frames while I was there.

What I found was a few caps!  The bees are starting to put caps on the honey in the top super, which means it has started to ripen.  I didn't open up the lower super--I'll wait another week or so for that--but this sure made me happy.

And--aren't they just gorgeous?

Matricide?

This is a fascinating video of what's called "balling" a queen bee--killing her, but clustering around her and vibrating, giving off enough heat to do her in.  She has lived out her useful life, and the hive starts to see her as an intruder, since she has stopped producing the important pheromones that signal her status as their queen.

I'm not at the level of beekeeping where I'd be willing to pick up this mass of bees with my bare hand.  Maybe some day.

(Thanks, Marcia!)

Sunflowers!

The sunflowers are starting to bloom on the land around the hive!

New York Times on Colony Collapse Disorder

Biologist Mark Winston wrote an excellent column for the New York Times on July 14 about the complicated problem that is colony collapse disorder.  The following sticks out for me as maybe the best, most succinct summation of the disorder that I've read thus far:

Honeybee collapse has been particularly vexing because there is no one cause, but rather a thousand little cuts. The main elements include the compounding impact of pesticides applied to fields, as well as pesticides applied directly into hives to control mites; fungal, bacterial and viral pests and diseases; nutritional deficiencies caused by vast acreages of single-crop fields that lack diverse flowering plants; and, in the United States, commercial beekeeping itself, which disrupts colonies by moving most bees around the country multiple times each year to pollinate crops.

Winston's point, overall, is that the environmental problems we've created, and that we must face in the decades to come, can be seen in a microcosm of the hive.  We don't face just one problem--mites, say, or pesticides--we face a multitude, and they are compounded in their interactions.  Helping the bees may provide a sort of map for our own struggles--and will certainly help solve one of our looming problems in the meantime.

 

Sad-Eyed Lady of the Hive

from Rebecca Stimpson:

by Danielle Rose, at Legacy Ink

July 15: Super-Dooper

July 15, 2014: The hive got bigger today!  We added another super!

After much consideration, I decided to "bottom super"--so, in the photo above, the top chamber is the already-full-but-not-yet-capped honey super, and the second down is the new, empty super.  Then a queen excluder, then the two hive body deeps, which are full of bees and brood and pollen and honey.

I sprayed the new foundation with 2:1 (water:sugar) sugar syrup.  That seemed to help with the first super I put on, to encourage the bees to go through the queen excluder and start working on drawing out the foundation.  I assume that it will work again, along with the strong attraction of the honey sitting up there in the top super.

Our field is full of flowers, too!

Too many opinions

source: http://www.riskshoney.com/

One wonderful thing about beekeeping in 2014 is that there are literally hundreds of blogs and associations and fora and (good, old-fashioned) books discussing bees and how to keep them.  Lots of advice out there.

But almost every step of the way there are conflicting opinions about the particulars.  What kind of hive should you use--Langstroth, or Warre, or Top Bar?  Should you get your bees in a nuc, or in a box?  Should you feed them?  How long should you feed them?  Should you use smoke when working the hive?  When should you put on your second hive box?  When you put on a honey super, should you use a queen excluder?  I've had to contend with differing opinions about all these things.

Now I'm deciding when and how to put on the second honey super.

One reputable site (http://basicbeekeeping.blogspot.com/) says "A good practice is to over super (placing several honey supers on a hive) in late spring and early summer and to under super (limit the number of honey supers used) during late summer and early fall...when 6-8 frames in the existing box on the hive has been drawn out (the bees have added wax, built comb and are using the comb) then add the next honey super."

Another site (http://www.gobeekeeping.com/) says "A good working guide for adding supers is to examine a honey super on the hive to see if the bees are filling it with nectar.  If 3/4 of the cells are being filled with nectar it is time to add a super."

So far so good: both sites seem to be saying that I should indeed add another super, and SOON: maybe even tomorrow.  Now come the differing methods.  I could "top super" which would mean simply putting a new super on top of the one I have going, or "bottom super" which means--you guessed it--putting the new one underneath. Which is best?  basicbeekeeping writes:

This is a matter of opinion. Some bottom super because they feel the bees will have to walk through the new super to reach the one they were working. And while passing through the new one they will stop and pull out the wax. Others, like me, want a honey barrier and so we will use our first full honey super to serve as a honey barrier. By honey barrier I am referring to the limitations placed on the queen because she will not lay eggs in a cell which has honey in it. The queen is only looking for empty cells to lay eggs. When she reaches stored honey on the outer edges of the brood nest area, she will return to the area of opened cells.

basicbeekeeping is really interested in not using a queen excluder, because he thinks it's hard to get the workers to go up into the supers when the screen is in place.  My clever ladies had no trouble with that, though, and have drawn out and filled nearly 10 frames of the first super.  So maybe I should top super, with the queen excluder still on?

Not so fast: there are other reasons to bottom super.  According to gobeekeeping, many beekeepers argue that

bees will move up into the empty new super faster because the honey in the upper supers draw them into the new honey super.  When adding new foundation to a hive you have helped the bees by putting this new super with foundation in the warmest place fore wax builders to work -- just above the brood chamber.  Adding new foundation above all the supers as in top supering will result in comb not being completely drawn out.

I'll figure it out.  My bees seem bound and determined to just keep on working, regardless of what I do, anyway.  I think I got really lucky with this queen and her workers.  Or, more likely, I was really lucky that I went with my mentor's decision to get bees from Singing Cedars Apiary.

And beyond all this craziness, and the worry that attends it, there's a great thing about beekeepers: their general attitude seems to be "heck, try it."  They have a lot of respect for their bees, and though they worry endlessly they also seem to believe that the bees will find their way even if we do stupid things.

There's a lot of art in this science.