Im wrapping up this years beekeeping duties and getting ready for the winter. This season Ive been able to harvest 70lbs of honey so far and I think I have another 10-15 coming on Sunday. This has been one of the most rewarding and fun hobbies Ive started. Lots of fun but lots of work too. Between the bees and the wood I stay pretty darn busy!
I had a colony last year but they abandoned the hive this spring. I found them swarmed in a tree two springs ago. We had a warm spell in April and they ended up stranded in that tree as the weather turned cold again. They were dieing off with each night that passed so I decided to intervene. Built a top bar hive and loaded them inside it, covered it with a tarp and let them be. They took to the hive well, building comb on 16 or so of the bars. All was fine and come November they were still there. The hive had been located near my wood stacks which I believe contributed to their upcoming move. All winter long I was having to recut splits to accomodate a new stove with a smaller firebox. Every other day my 576 was barking just a few feet from the hive. Well come spring, they were gone. Left me about 6 quarts of honey though. I cleaned the comb out and left most of the empty comb and residual wax on the bars, and reassembled the hive. All with hopes another swarm would find it. Well they did. See picture. These new inhabitants were a bit larger and tenfold more aggressive. It took me a few weeks of small attacks with a wet-vac to clear them out and remove that nest from inside the hive. They have basically ruined the hive. I f0und a lot of rot from something they were doing inside. The hive had a tin roof and was very clean and dry when the honeybees lived in it. I was very fond of having them around. I would spend time just watching the busy little buzztards come and go. I will have more someday, just won't locate them near the wood pile again.
Honey bees are definetly the some of the cleanest creatures God put on this planet. I really enjoy just standing around the hives and watching them come and go. Or walking through the fields and watching the jump from flower to flower. Those wasps that moved into your hive sound like they really wrecked the place hopefully youll be able to start over again. Have you looked for a local beekeepers club in your area that would be a great place to get a lot of the stuff to start over and a great resource for information and help.
Do you have your own honey centrifuge? It would be interesting to see all your setups. I just bought my house in January and have a friend at work that has bees and I am super interested. He told me centrifuges were expensive but looking around they don't seem to bee..... (bad pun )
I don't have any bees yet... Plan on building some top bar hives this winter in hopes of catching a swarm or too.
I have two hives. local bee guy has been helping me out.. Last year we got some nice honey, he has all the equipment... Having 65 apple trees the bees are great to have... I have to get a book and read cover to cover. Just looking on line at all the equipment , types of hives, etc is crazy.. A lot to learn. What pizzes me off, first few times I got stung no big deal, now I swell up for 3 days and itch terrible... Now I guess I need a bee suit!
You should probably talk to your doctor about getting a couple of EpiPens, just to be safe. That could easily turn into anaphylaxis. I have thought about it a lot, and done a fair amount of research. I just don't have the time to commit at this point, so we just keep buying honey from a local guy. What I need to do is spend a bit of time with him. He is old, and not in the best health
The guy that set me up with Bees is like in his late 70's as well... As far as swelling it would be just my hand where I got stung, but my whole hand, like you couldn't see my knuckles.. and before this happened I was holding racks of honey with the bees on! Here's pictures of my bee guy George getting the smoker ready and checking the hive.. I'm holding a rack with no protection... not anymore
The in-laws keep bees and almost talked us into it, but I think we would just bee asking for trouble keeping them in town and processing all our wood in the yard. If I could get them off of the property.
My name is Steve, and I am a honey addict. Evening ritual for me is two slices of toast dripping with raw local honey. It's how I weened myself from sweets.
I am allergic to stings, but I read these beekeeping posts with interest. I really wish I could keep some. I just bought some beeswax candles and honey sticks last weekend at farm show to support the local beekeeper. I also use a beeswax cake to coat hot iron when forging.
I do not have my own right now I am using a friends she lives just down the road from me and lets me use a lot of her equipment that I dont have yet. I hope to be able to buy my own for next year just because I really hate borrowing stuff and bothering people for things. As far as the price of extractors they seem to range from $150.00-600 the higher end generally being a kit with lots of extracting stuff included. They are also smaller geared for the hobbyist. The commercial extractors run up over $1000.
Yes I looked into the price of equipment too... You can spend well not a little, and you can spend a lot... My luck I would buy some nice equipment to make harvesting the honey enjoyable and the bees would leave!
Charlie go get a suit and some gloves! I have one of the ventilated suits from Mann Lake and I love it. I can wear shorts and a tank top under it and I catch a good breeze through it so its not to hot when Im working the bees in the summer time and its virtually sting resistant. I have plans to get an epi pen for just in case if one day I have a reaction or somebody else does.
Charlie bees are going to do whatever they want all we can do is take care of them and try to make them as comfortable as possible so they dont leave and we can steal their honey. Today I finished up the honey harvesting for the year and it looks like I should have a grand total of about 90-100 pounds of honey off of my two hives. I pplan to expand a next year and make a third hive and a NUC or two to sell. I am definitely going to do my best to get my own extractor that will be better than borrowing and carrying honey supers down the road.
