Andrew’s Bee Blog

Dad got out today to have a look at the swarm hive.  It was a beautiful day outside, at least 60 degrees.  He was wearing the gloves and veil/hat, but when he opened the hive, the bees were a bit aggresive and one them stung him through his shirt.   He put on a jacket.

We are going to start feeding the hive with sugar syrup.  This will give them a little boost until spring arrives and the nectur flow is on.  We are glad to see the hive is doing well and lasted over winter.

ABSCONDED!!!

The Package Hive got up and left.  Can you believe it, it was late September and they got up and left.  Emmy called me and said that there were quite a few wasps flying into the hive.  I thought this weird, but considered them just looking for food.  Dad went down to check it out, as I was at work, and what do you know, they left.  Not sure why, the hive looked very healthy.

Emmy and Will want to get on the swarm list at Jones Bees.  The Swarm Hive has done very well, and was easy to capture.  Maybe they can do the same.

From Emmy-

I was devistated when the bees left. I was mowing the lawn during the last week in September. I always like to check out the bees when I mow past the hive. I knew something was wrong when I kept seeing wasps fly into the hive and there weren’t any bees to stop them. I stopped mowing and watched for about five minutes. I saw a few bees drinking water nearby, but they  never went  into the hive.  I saw wasp after wasp fly into the box. I wanted to look into the hive to see what was going on, but I didn’t have the equipment to look. Everything was up at my dad’s. Andrew couldn’t make it because of work, so my dad came down. Sure enough the bees were gone and so was their honey. We were so sad. They were doing so well. We were really looking forward to having a strong group of bees for the next year. Now we have to start back from square one.

I just called Jones Bee Company and am getting some more Italian Honey Bees this April. They will be here on the 18th. We are really excited to have them again. Our yard last year was amazing. We had more flowers, fruit, and vegetables. I neighbors loved them too.

I apologize for not writing for awhile.  I started a new job and haven’t had much time.  Anyway, we harvested the honey on Wednesday, September 3rd.  Emmy and my Dad pulled the top supers off of both hives.  We had about 9 frames with honey on them, although they weren’t entirely full.  The package hive at Emmy’s was a bit odd.  The bees had made very strange comb on the frames.   I think it was because the wax foundation was pretty flimsy.  We brought all of the frames inside my parents kitchen.  I had rented a three frame extractor and a heated knife.  We took turns cutting off the the top of the comb and putting the frames in the extractor.  Emmy and Will (mostly Will) spun the extractor.  All in all, we got about 2 gallons of honey.  Not bad for the first year.

Here are a few pictures of pulling the supers off of the hive: