funny pics

I have a weakness for captioned images, this one is killing me. :-D



And, BEE FAIL:

Introspective Bug:

Language warnings on these:

• Dear ... Tumblr ... This is a ... bee...
  
• Learn the difference...
  

Candy boards and winter

These candy boards full of sugar (36 cups sugar, 3 cups water in each) will go on top of the hives, under the inner cover. Bees can get thru wax paper to the sugar, and the upper entrance.

The upper entrance hole drilled into the candy board frame provides a vent to release humidity from the hive. Cold does not kill bees but the wet will, moisture must be released from the hive before it condenses. Another technique for a top vent is to shim one end of the inner cover higher than the other and leaving a gap. The gap is shielded by the telescoping cover, and the slant will help any condensation to run down to one side instead of dripping down on the frames and bees. If you drill a hole in the top box, you have to deal with the hole if you reverse your boxes in the spring. One other way to create a top vent/ entrance is to notch the edge of your inner cover.

Bees do very well with top entrances, and many feral colonies have top entrances, but the bees are really just adapting to the space. The top entrance has advantages of not getting blocked by snow, grass, or dead bees the way a bottom entrance can.

It will be 70 Monday, we will install the Boardman feeders as there are no nectar sources (already had a good freeze.) We plan to get one last good inspection, and prep the hives for the colder days immediately following. We will remove the top feeder box from hive 2 and install candy boards on both. Candy boards are made from old chicken coop door.

We have had the entrance reducers on both during the cold spell of the last few weeks, with hardware cloth over the hole as a mouse guard. Dead drones are all over near the entrance; mouse guard doesn't seem to be a choke point for mortician bees.

Bee doctors?

http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20141025-honeybees-play-doctors-and-nurses

Honey bees, nurse bees, observed feeding sick bees selected honeys with higher antibiotic properties.

BYU undergrad studying viral defense for American Foulbrood

http://news.discovery.com/animals/insects/virus-may-be-the-cure-for-deadly-honeybee-disease-141027.htm

Bees and Datacenters, XKCD

http://xkcd.com/1439/

Hive inspection

Last weekend we inspected the hives. They are taking 2 gal of 2:1 syrup in less than a week. The top feeders we bought run dry and bees hang out I'm the syrup well waiting for a tsunami of sugar to come down them. The frames all seem well drawn out in both boxes. Saw brood in hive 1 but did not check in hive 2 due to aggression, we saw no reason to press the point.
3 weeks ago we treated with half dose of mite-away strips. We started feeding protein patties and doubled the syrup strength after that treatment, and we added the top feeders from Virginia bee supply in Remington.
His trick of scrubbing pads as a beetle trap seemed to gather beetles but we had to catch them. We tore the pad a little to see if that helped beetles get in it. I wonder if we need to put some sugar syrup on the pad so the bees tear it.

Strange honey from Turkey

This honey will make you hallucinate http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/PLDd4_DvTbM/this-honey-will-make-you-hallu.html
Your honey is what your bees find. From a natural plant, a honey with the same effects.

hive check from 8/16/14

Hive one is looking so much better these days, lots of brood in the cells, lots of bees on the frames. they are about filling two boxes now, they are getting close to secure for the winter. We spotted our first hive beetles, so we need to think about ways to handle that pest.

Hive two got a bit bothered when we opened it up. They had not done anything with the 3rd super, no comb drawn at all, so we removed it. They still have very full heavy frames in the 2nd super. We did not see any brood in the 2nd box, and we did not get into the bottom box because they came out to harass us. I got stung on the hand, through the seam of my glove. There were hive beetles, and also some kind of wood roach.

We are still feeding sugar water in 1:1 ratio (cup sugar to cup water) as that ratio stimulates brood rearing.  They are taking a quart jar each hive, in less than a day. We will switch to 2:1 for heavier syrup in mid-September to load them up even more before the winter. We are interested in some of the vitamin or essential oil supplements, we may pick some up at bee supply when we go get the mite-away strips, to knock back the varroa mites before their numbers increase. We've also seen some ants getting at the sugar water, and one of the hives had some insect drill a hole into a frame - it had been propolized in place by the bees.

We went to a PWRB fall refresher meeting on 8/12 to listen to re-learn things to do to prepare for winter. It was nice, and we plan to get to more club meetings.

Super on hive 2

Bought 2 more boxes from va bee supply, Added another 8-frame deep box to hive 2. We put a plastic queen excluder under it. Those bees have fully drawn the comb in the 2nd story and brood chamber is like a big half circle in those frames. Really looking good. Removed Boardman feeder.

In hive one, The queen was out of the cage, just some workers had got in. Pulled the screen off and released them. Did not add box yet.

New queen in hive one

Installed new queen yesterday. Italian hygienic, $35 shipped by us mail. They have a green mailer envelope just for this purpose, L picked her up at the post office and put the cage in the hive.
Guaranteed to arrive alive and lay eggs within 10 days.

survey: 23% hive loss this past winter

http://www.wtop.com/884/3622770/Quarter-of-nations-bees-died-this-winter

Beekeepers nationwide lost about 1/4 of their hives, so I won't lose any until I have 4, right?? :)

WTOP: Local beekeepers grow population as activists target garden centers

http://www.wtop.com/41/3618254/Local-beekeepers-grow-population-as-activists-target-garden-centers

News about beekeeping program at American University, and talks about a petition to get home centers to remove neonicotinoids from their stores.

http://action.sumofus.org/a/home-depot-lowes-bees-neonicotinoids/8/12/?sub=fb

quick hive update

Just returned from a weekend trip, here are some external observations on the hives. we can see good activity at each hive, see pollen coming in both. Hive 2 has many more bees on the bottom of the hive, outside the screen bottom.

hive two installed

picked up a nuc form Chris H. and installed them to hive two. Queen is marked red.  five deep frames; the outers were hardly drawn out -- smaller than our other nuc. put into a new 8-frame deep super on a new bottom board next to hive one.

Did a quick check of hive one; Lisa spotted a queen running around! a few of the queen cells are opened and there are about 5 more that are still capped.  So we have a hatched queen just about when predicted; she should be mated and laying (and killed the other hatching queens) by the end of May.

hive one still queenless

Lisa and Tyler checked hive one on Tues 5/6. did not see a queen, queen cells all still capped.
I think the old queen has left with a swarm that we did not see at some point.

hive one update - queenless

Inspected on Saturday 5/3.
No queen, hardly any brood left. 3 or 4 closed queen cells. much capped brood still.
Observed swarm of bees leaving hive earlier in the day. Did not see where they went.
Lisa inspected 5/1 saw capped queen cells.

They should hatch by 5/7. then 16 days +/- 1 after emerging should be laying, or by 5/29.

Mark McGrath on ground bees

Garden Hero Mark McGrath's latest column on WTOP is about bees. Ground bees, but still, BEES!

http://www.wtop.com/41/3600792/Garden-Plot-Dont-want-to-get-stung-You-wont

Swarm!?

Just after I wrote that last post, Lisa called me outside. The bees all came out of the hive in a cloud. They flew all around the front yard and started to gather on a tree branch. I made some preparations - I taped a bucket to a pole, and put our empty hive on the stand next to hive one. I called the pwrb swarm hotline and talked to David but when I went back outside, they were gone from the front yard! They had flown back to the hive again. I took out the entrance reducer and they all went back in.

David said they may have swarmed with a virgin queen and abandoned her, or maybe they left and the queen didn't go. He said up to 20% of hives have two queens, so maybe they followed her back in.

David also said, You usually need two buckets for a swarm. Put the lid on and put it in a cool dark place. It needs some ventilation so its best to have a bucket prepared with screen windows. If you don't take them at least five miles away they will probably notice the scenery hasn't changed and swarm again. I wonder if Mike Bush's trick of stuffing the entrance with grass would work.

Hive inspection

Inspected hives Sat 4/19. Saw queen, and brood. Starting to draw out center of 2nd super. In bottom super they are still working, and haven't drawn out the outside of the outer frames.

Hive entrance seems to be a choke point, lots of bees waiting a landing spot. Want to switch to larger opening. Bees all seemed healthy. Scraped off some "queen cups" 2 empty 1 may have had a pupa.
Not much burr comb -  lots of extra space for them to draw frames instead.

Sugar syrup jar lasting longer than a week, many flowers out - dandelion, Henbit. Bradfords and cherries are done, forsythia close to done but redbud is full.

hive inspection

Inspected hive one today. Saw the queen. comb is drawn on all of the new frames, the far outside just getting started. Also starting burr comb between top of frames and lid. We added a super of new foundation (8 frames) and changed syrup jar.

 We saw several stages of larvae. did not identify eggs (they are hard to see). Very pleased. We did notice some suspicious supercedure-cell looking things, downturned lobes but did not get pics. A couple had holes in the bottom.

We pulled out the bottom board for more ventilation. we identified 3-4 mites on the board. 

Lisa fetched the eyeclops and took this photo of the nasty vermin. He was still moving.

Varroa Destructor (photo (c) 2014 L. McClinton)

Global bee study

Scientists begin studying annual bee death rates in a really substantive way http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/Dg8isvv3zD0/story01.htm

First hive started

First hive started!

Five frames of over-wintered nuc from Ann I.

Good brood pattern lots of capped brood some nectar and pollen. We saw brood for sure, Ann tried to show us eggs but we didn't want to take a lot of time with the new bees. Queen was on the first frame we transferred, which was nice.  She brought the box in the afternoon because it turned out to be too cold in the morning. We transferred the frames to our hive, and she took her nuc box home. Frames are numbered 13, probably built last year. She has treated them for nosema with fumigillin feed.

Ann said she thought we would need the next box in 2 weeks. The flowers are really starting to come out, forsythia and cherry and magnolia and the early trees. We have a second box ready, with frames and foundations, they just need bobby pins. We also have a second 2-body hive in our chosen 8-frame deep pattern.

Making a new entrance reducer to fit next to the Boardman feeder. It was agreed that the Boardman is inadequate. Putting the standard entrance reducer next to the feeder results in a second entrance, a gap bees fit through. One of the objectives is to give the new bees a smaller entrance to have to defend. Duct tape would also work to seal the gap. Ann had closed off her nuc box with duct tape.