The Healthy Honeybee

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Today I'll be taking my observation hive to my daughter's class! Should be fun. I took a sweet photo last night while checking them out (above). It was late and dark, and the hive was backlit by my back door light.

Why late and dark? Because everybody's home then. I need to lock them all in for safely transporting and showing the kiddies in the class. If I had waited until this afternoon, a lot of the bees would be out foraging (provided it's not pouring down rain like it is right now) and they would be very confused upon returning home to where their house once was.

Grade 2 here we come....
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I took a little trip to Better Bee Supplies today, to pick up some frames for my honey supers and some gloves. Gloves were not something I really wanted to work with; it's great to have the sensation in your fingertips and be able to 'pet the bees' with your bare hands. However, my allergist tells me I have a Colophony allergy, which is basically an allergy to coniferous trees and products made from them.

This is an issue because the propolis - the super sticky gummy glue that the bees make and use to seal and weatherproof their hive - is made using things like pine or spruce sap. Too much touching that stuff, and I'll end up with a major rash like I did last summer.

So - on go the gloves. Monogrammed, even - see the 'S'??
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Here's another reason why I thought the blue hive was dead: no dead bees on the outside. Bees are such tidy insects - they'll haul out their dead so the hive is kept clean. No dead bees on the outside made me think they were all dead on the inside! Not the case, though, as I mentioned in a previous post. They're all happily working away at building their colonies, and in a month or two they should be up to about 50,000 bees or more in each hive.
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Here's a fantastic bee video:



Thanks to Insectamonarca's Blog for posting this TED talk first.

Happy New Year!
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Sort of ready for winter, here - not sure if I did this right, but November is 2 days away and I thought I better at least provide some cold protection for the bees. I want to add some straw bales for added protection, too. I'm thinking the tar paper should cover the bottom a bit more - but I didn't want to block the entrance....

Definitely still learning. A lot.
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On Saturday the 3rd, I went to the beeyard to feed one of my hives sugar syrup. They hadn't filled out the frames as well as they could have, and it's important for winter survival that they are full to maximum capacity. So, despite not wanting refined sugar in my life anymore, back in it came. In the top picture you see the hive with a honey super on top - I had to leave a space for the ziplock bag of sugar syrup between the frames and the lid. After Ken's comment on a previous post, I thought I better follow his recommendations, so I built myself a rim. I went to the beeyard today to feed them again, and switch over to the rim. That's the next pic, showing the rim I made, and the inner cover on top:


It makes more sense to have the least amount of empty space possible, because the bees have to heat up all the space in their hive. More space to heat means more energy expended by the bees, so they'll be eating more honey, and as a result they'll have less honey for the winter. The less honey they have for the winter, the more likely they are to die before the nectar flow in the spring.
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It's been quite a few years since pennies held any fascination for me, but beekeeping has brought them once again to a significant place in my life. My first sting as an adult was in Ken's beeyard, and right away Steven put a penny on it for me. No swelling or pain. Weird! But wonderful. I started telling everyone who had the potential to be stung by a bee, that they should put a penny on it because it really works. My second bee sting, same story. Penny to the rescue yet again.

Along the way, people questioned what it was about the pennies that gave them these magical bee-sting-soothing powers. Some wondered if it mattered whether it was Canadian or American, or whether older or newer pennies were better. I had no idea, I just knew it worked for me.

Then.... my day of foolishness, tearing apart a beehive with only a veil as any significant sting protection. Well, the pennies didn't work so well that day. I thought because I had so much venom pumping through my system, perhaps the pennies were no match for it.

Well - here's a new piece of information from my fellow beekeeper Margaret, who also started beekeeping this spring:

I discovered the copper content of pennies is less than 5%, except the older coins (pre 1982 for the American ones) are 95%. I'm still skeptical about the copper cure.

Perhaps the level of copper makes a difference, or maybe it's all in my head, but I'd rather put a penny on it than a piece of onion. (That was Todd's trick.)

The photo above is of Margaret, scraping off the inner cover of one of her beehives. She rides her motorcycle to check her bees, and finds that the leather makes a good bee jacket!
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Well, the results of the poll are tied between counting until my age, or counting forever. So I guess I'll keep track for now. If I'm going to keep accurate results, though, I should mention that I actually had 9 stings last time, not 8 as previously posted. Once they all started to swell I noticed I had another one that was overlooked in the original counting.

I think I'll be wearing more protection next time I do some radical shifting - so the numbers should stay low for awhile.

Speaking of which - Ken checked the hive that I was worried about, and he thinks I'll get away with leaving them as is, and not re-organizing their home. Yay!
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This picture comes to you courtesy of Todd, a fellow newbie to the world of beekeeping. He and I, along with a few others, met at Little City Farm when we attended a small workshop on beekeeping. Those few of us that went on to take a more in-depth course at the Townsend House, University of Guelph, keep in touch on a semi-regular basis. We thought it might reduce the collective number of painful mistakes, if we could share our newbie experiences with the group of us. Still, we've all had our own 'learning moments', and it's been good to grow together in this endeavor.

Anyway, back to the pic - this was Todd's experiment: he tried using some top bars, rather than frames with foundation, to allow bees to build their own comb. This method is used by beekeepers who want to go even more natural with the bees. Unfortunately it seems these bees were a bit confused, and started to build from the bottom frames up, instead of heading up to the top and building from the top down like they would normally do in nature. I asked Todd if I could use the pic, because I think the comb is pretty. Functional? No. I would tear it up too, as Todd did, but I like this pic because it represents the more wild and natural side of the bees. It's a good reminder that the bees are still wild creatures, after all our attempts at "domestication", and they do have minds of their own, however small.
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Not much happening with the bees - other than me trying to figure out what I'm going to do with them. I've been talking to Ken about how I should deal with the hives - well, the one hive in particular. My two hives have very different personalities, which I think can be attributed to genetics in a large way. The first hive does a really good job of reproducing - the queen lays eggs like no tomorrow, and the workers take care of them. Not so much honey, though. The second hive, full of honey! But not very many workers, when I compare it to the first hive.

So - the second brood chamber that I put on top of the second hive may not have been the best idea. They're so slow to fill it. AND - they haven't even filled the bottom chamber yet. So, I think I may have to rip apart the hive, yet again, to rearrange the insides and squish them into one box for the winter. It's better for them to be crammed than have empty space that can be invaded and has to be kept warm. This was the same hive that went kamikaze on me, so I'm not really looking forward to this event, scheduled for tomorrow morning.

I'm hoping for rain.
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One of my favourite things so far about the bees - showing them off! Bees are so important to our food supply, it's essential that as many people as possible learn why. I really enjoy taking people to see them, and explaining how they live together and stay alive, while keeping us alive as well.

There's much talk of the declining bee population, but I'm not sure how many people realize how this will affect our lives if allowed to get much worse. Bees (and other insects) pollinate a very large portion of our food supply. Yes, fruit, but also 'vegetables' that are technically fruit, like squash, cucumber, peppers, eggplant, etc. With no pollinators we would be in serious trouble. And that's just the vegetables that are technically fruits. Others may need pollinators to make seeds, even though the vegetable is a true vegetable.

This is part of why I'm getting into beekeeping - the more people with bees, the better chance they have and the more other people will hear about why bees are important.
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The above photo doesn't much relate to the exact topic of this post, other than to show how wonderfully peaceful the bees were before they turned into suicide bombers.

The results of the penny experiment: well, I reacted more than I usually do, and I think it's because I got so many stings at once. My forearms were swollen between my wrist and elbow joints, and my upper left arm (stung quite close to my armpit). Two of the three of those stings had pennies on them, but that didn't seem to help as much as it normally does. Other places, like my leg and back, didn't swell up that much, but still more than usual. Again, I think because I got such a high dose of venom. I'm taking some allergy meds to keep the swelling down - I don't want the swelling to move past my joints.

That's why there's no pic of my popeye arms - it wouldn't show up very well due to the medication keeping things under control. You'll all just have to imagine my pumped-up, muscular-looking forearms.

Take my poll, if you haven't yet!! .... to the right in the sidebar:
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So... had an eventful time in the beeyard today. Apparently bees don't like it when you take apart their home. 8 stings today brings my running total to 10. When do I stop counting?

Take my poll!!! ....in the sidebar to the right.

Should I explain myself? I was on a mission to get rid of some burr comb between the frames of the upper and lower brood chambers. They had sealed together and it was hard to put them back into the hive once I took them out to inspect them. I took the upper brood chamber off, smoked the lower chamber, started doing a bit of gentle scraping, and ended up with a bunch of stings - right through my jeans, even!!!

I didn't have enough pennies to cover all the carnage, so we'll see how the stings compare.

The worst part? Putting the hive back together, dodging the indignant sisters.

Are there beekeeper fairies? Or elves? We came back from vacation today, and I found 3 beekeeping catalogues in a bag on my front door! They look interesting, I'm looking forward to giving them a proper look once the camping clutter has disappeared from my dining room. And by 'disappeared' I'm referring to the process whereby I am the one who cleans said clutter. Hopefully it won't take too long.

We should have camped out for a few more days, I think. I find it takes about a day on either end of camping to transition in and out, so the longer we go the more worthwhile it feels. Although, I'm glad to be done with the Pinery. There is Poison Ivy everywhere you look. I was getting tired of hearing myself tell the kids not to play in the bush for fear of coming into contact with it. Next year: somewhere else. Suggestions welcome! Beaches and bike trails are mandatory.

I should also mention - I didn't see a single honeybee. A few bumblebees, though. Can't wait to see my bees tomorrow!
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Thanks to my wonderful sister for carpet!

It's a good way to keep the thigh-high grass from crowding the hives. Yet another trick I learned from Ken. There's so much value in learning from someone who has many years of experience! I'm very grateful to have accidentally stumbled upon this family during my research days. I've learned something from each member. Even Jill, who gives good (usually) directions.
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Here is a pic of my screen bottom board. Normally it's under the brood chamber and I only see the front entrance part of it, but it's on display here because we were cleaning the bottom board. (And by 'we' I mean Ken.) The screen bottom board is there to enhance the health of the hive. Mainly as protection against varroa mite, which can be incredibly damaging to a colony of bees. The screen mesh is wide enough to allow the varroa mite to fall through, but narrow enough to keep the bees away from them. Varroa mites will wait there on the bottom board for a bee to come along and grab onto it, but it won't try to climb back up the sides through the holes.

I don't think I have any problem with varroa yet. I didn't see any on the bottom board. Keep your fingers crossed....
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Here's my little beekeeper smoking the bees, in her new hat and veil! I finally went and got the kids hats and veils of their own, and they enjoyed having them the last time we visited the beeyard. Especially this one. She wanted to do everything and see everything. So, she used the smoker until someone mentioned that she should stop, and she was right in there underneath me so she could see all the action. The smoker had to go, though - smoke rises, right? Yep. And she was right under me... I couldn't see or breathe for a few minutes, until someone set it somewhere else.

I love watching my kids with the bees. I thought they wouldn't want anything to do with them, but they've been right in there with me, enjoying themselves and learning along with me.
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The penny comes in handy again. Kid #2 ended up with a bee sting this time.

This eases my mind, having both of them stung now. I've heard that beekeepers' children and spouses tend to develop allergies to bee stings, due to being in contact with low levels of venom that would come off clothing worn by beekeepers. Being stung is the best way to ensure that they're getting higher levels of venom and allowing their bodies to develop resistance without developing an allergy.

So: two down, one to go. Hubby still needs to come see the bees and get himself stung.
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The bees were ready for a second brood chamber when we checked on Thursday, so here they are! Should make my next inspection more interesting, since I haven't done an inspection on a double yet. I originally thought I would use only one brood chamber, because it sounded like it would be easier for me. However, after talking with Ken and other beekeepers, I've come to realize that double is probably better for the bees. If they have more room to raise brood, they'll be a stronger colony. If they have more room to store honey for themselves, they'll last the winter without me having to feed them (hopefully). It's my intention to keep the bees as naturally as possible. No harsh chemicals or antibiotics or sugar feeding. However, if it looks like they won't have enough honey to last the winter, even without me harvesting any, I may have to feed them. If it's between feeding them sugar and them dying.... well, it's not a hard decision.
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A big thanks to Ken and Steve for coming out to my beeyard yesterday! Here you see Ken scraping the junk off a bottom board - something I hadn't thought to do since getting my bees.

Here's what came off them:



You can see different kinds of pollen - the different colour pollen comes from different flowers - and other random junk that fell to the bottom of the hive. This kind of thing attracts Wax Moth and other nuisances, so it's a good idea to scrape it off every once in awhile. When you remember. Or when someone else remembers for you.
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