My next adventure... Beekeeping

[Boone]

Last year I expanded my apiary (bee hive space) to 6 hives which is about as much as I can handle or should have in a neighborhood area even though my house does back up against major woodlands. Several hives swarmed repeatedly last summer and I ended up with 2 empty hives. Of the remaining 4, I know for certain that 2 are dead outs (bees did not survive the winter). I am fairly certain I have lost the other 2 as well since I saw little to no activity last weekend when the weather was in the upper 50's. I will confirm this weekend but I'm probably looking at a total do-over. This unfortunately is not uncommon these days, but it is disheartening as up until winter before last, I'd never lost a hive. This is the first year I have lost all of them and the irony is, it's been one of the most mild winters we've ever had in the 25 years we've lived here. I'm thinking that with warmer temps, they may have run through their honey stores and starved. I am replacing at least 4 of the colonies. It's quite expensive to purchase that many replacement hives, so I may put out some scent traps and try to catch a couple of swarms to put in the other 2 vacant hives.

 

[Elephant]

Last year I expanded my apiary (bee hive space) to 6 hives which is about as much as I can handle or should have in a neighborhood area even though my house does back up against major woodlands. Several hives swarmed repeatedly last summer and I ended up with 2 empty hives. Of the remaining 4, I know for certain that 2 are dead outs (bees did not survive the winter). I am fairly certain I have lost the other 2 as well since I saw little to no activity last weekend when the weather was in the upper 50's. I will confirm this weekend but I'm probably looking at a total do-over. This unfortunately is not uncommon these days, but it is disheartening as up until winter before last, I'd never lost a hive. This is the first year I have lost all of them and the irony is, it's been one of the most mild winters we've ever had in the 25 years we've lived here. I'm thinking that with warmer temps, they may have run through their honey stores and starved. I am replacing at least 4 of the colonies. It's quite expensive to purchase that many replacement hives, so I may put out some scent traps and try to catch a couple of swarms to put in the other 2 vacant hives.

I hope you succeed,. I would like to give it a shot, but have too many other things going on to care for hives. We need more bees!

 

[Win4us]

Is there any type of food supplement you can give them to sustain their energy, like sugar water?

 

[MikefromOH]

I wanted to do honey bees now that we are out in the country; but it seems that most of the neighbors here are doing it.

So, instead I just let the dandelions do their thing so they can get food without worrying about poison

 

[Boone]

Is there any type of food supplement you can give them to sustain their energy, like sugar water?

You can feed bees fondant (sugar that’s been heated up and formed into a paste like cake icing) on the winter and sugar water in early spring. I will definitely go back to doing it in the future as I had few problems when I used to do that. A healthy hive shouldn’t require it though.

 

[Boone]

After not having the time to spend on my hives over the past several years, I lost my last one this spring. I checked in February and had an active hive but they swarmed a few weeks later and the bees left behind did not make it. I have totally redone my backyard garden so I am installing a couple of new hives on a new hive stand just at the back of my garden. Will order two colonies this winter and put them in their new homes in the spring.

Doing something different this time - and using Betterbee polystyrene hives. Basically, they are made out of super heavy duty styrofoam. I got my two hive kits yesterday and glued them together today. In the process of painting them. Will be curious to see how it goes with them. The polystyrene has a much higher insulation rating than a wooden hive which should help the bees work less hard over the winter and is also supposed to keep them cooler in the summer. It has the added advantage of weight a lot less than wooden components. We'll see. Pics of my finsihed hives to follow.

 

[Boone]

At my peak, I had 7 hives in my backyard. I have had less time to spend on them in recent years, and most of my bees either succumbed to especially cold winters, or swarmed and the hive remaining failed. In February I still had 1 remaining colony, but they took off once warm weather hit.

My original hive equipment is old and breaking down and needed replacing. I decided to start over next spring with all new hives and bees. I bought a hive stand that can be adjusted for uneven ground and installed it at the back of my garden in a sunny spot. I am going to try Betterbee polystyrene hives (think very dense styrofoam). The hives come unassembled but fit together like a jigsaw puzzle and glued. They have to be painted with exterior latex/acrylic paint to keep the polystyrene from breaking down. They are much less expensive than regular wood hive bodies and have a couple added benefits. Obviously they are lighter. That is a nice aspect because hive boxes can get very heavy if they have a lot of comb, bees, and honey. More importantly they have 6-8 times the insulating ability of wood which means the bees have to work much less hard in winter to keep the hive warm inside, and they also stay much cooler in summer. That means less stress on the bees and better production and hive health.

I am finishing up painting these and then I will be ready for bee installation in the early spring.

 

[Boone]

Got them assembled. Going to have to use some hive straps to hold them on the stand - the polystyrene is much lighter than wood hives and I think a strong wind would blow them right off of it.