In today's video, I teach two 10 year old boys how to install packages. I'll be doing updates throughout the season on the progress of these colonies and their young beekeepers.
That was fun to watch. I sure hope they stick with beekeeping. We can use all the beeks we can get. I thought I would share an adventure I had with my bees this year with you. You might be able to use what happened as a teaching tool. I am a 2nd year beek using top bar hive. My first hive died when we had those -40 temps roll through here back in January. They had been left with all the honey they made and I added some fondant to the bottom of the cage on the right side. That hive was a 2nd hand one with a bunch of issues. We tried to fix them all but apparently we missed some. The hive was insulated and then wrapped in some Styro foundation frames so it looked like a castle out there. One entry was left open and protected with a lean-to board. When I opened that hive, most of the honey was left and it looked like they didn't touch the fondant. This year I got myself a brand new top bar and a new package of bees. Got them all set with the queen cage. Made sure they had a quart of sugar water and a pollen patty then left them alone for a week. Went out there Monday to see if the queen was out, could not find the cage anywhere. These knuckle head bees had built a massive comb around her and buried her alive. All the comb they had built already is crossing over itself and on the bars at a left leaning angle. I broke the bar free that had the queen and dug her cage out. Man, they had that thing in there so tight I almost destroyed the whole comb. Queen was still alive but very skinny. I dug out the candy plug and placed her under the comb 3 bars over from where she was . Went out Tuesday morning to check. It looked like she was still in her cage and that was covered with bees. By the time I got them all moved out of the way she was walking across the bottom towards the comb on the left side. I still need to go fix the broken combs and make sure Queen Knucklehead is still alive. Was going to do that this morning but it's raining and it is supposed to do that for the next 4 days. Last year was so much easier than it's going to be this year. Very crazy and rocky start. The good news is I have bees that love building comb. They are better than the Doozers of Fraggle Rock.
One of my mentors used to say that the bees keep us guessing because they don't read the same books (on beekeeping) that we do. Glad your queen survived, and good luck this year.
That was fun to watch. I sure hope they stick with beekeeping. We can use all the beeks we can get. I thought I would share an adventure I had with my bees this year with you. You might be able to use what happened as a teaching tool. I am a 2nd year beek using top bar hive. My first hive died when we had those -40 temps roll through here back in January. They had been left with all the honey they made and I added some fondant to the bottom of the cage on the right side. That hive was a 2nd hand one with a bunch of issues. We tried to fix them all but apparently we missed some. The hive was insulated and then wrapped in some Styro foundation frames so it looked like a castle out there. One entry was left open and protected with a lean-to board. When I opened that hive, most of the honey was left and it looked like they didn't touch the fondant.
This year I got myself a brand new top bar and a new package of bees. Got them all set with the queen cage. Made sure they had a quart of sugar water and a pollen patty then left them alone for a week. Went out there Monday to see if the queen was out, could not find the cage anywhere. These knuckle head bees had built a massive comb around her and buried her alive. All the comb they had built already is crossing over itself and on the bars at a left leaning angle. I broke the bar free that had the queen and dug her cage out. Man, they had that thing in there so tight I almost destroyed the whole comb. Queen was still alive but very skinny. I dug out the candy plug and placed her under the comb 3 bars over from where she was . Went out Tuesday morning to check. It looked like she was still in her cage and that was covered with bees. By the time I got them all moved out of the way she was walking across the bottom towards the comb on the left side. I still need to go fix the broken combs and make sure Queen Knucklehead is still alive. Was going to do that this morning but it's raining and it is supposed to do that for the next 4 days. Last year was so much easier than it's going to be this year. Very crazy and rocky start. The good news is I have bees that love building comb. They are better than the Doozers of Fraggle Rock.
One of my mentors used to say that the bees keep us guessing because they don't read the same books (on beekeeping) that we do. Glad your queen survived, and good luck this year.