Strawbarries Season

This morning for breakfast Aleena picked about a pint of strawbarries. We will be getting about a pint a day out of the garden for the next week or so. There is nothing as good a berry freshly picked.

Managing a Swarm

We placed a board on the front of the hive, then we dumped the bucked of bees on the board. The bees then send out scouts to find a new home. Since the hive is right there a scout would be bound to find the new hive. Music was provided by Nisha.

Once the bees find the home, the guard bees take a position above the entrance. They stick their rear end up in a defensive position... they now have a home.

This video is of us capturing a swarm of bees. The bees swarm in May or June when the early broods hatches. The great part this they do not sting since they do not have a home. We were able to knock the bee into a bucket.

First Hive Check

It's all about the queen. This weekend we open up the hives and check for the queen. She should be laying brood (babies). In the photo you can see the queen in the center. She is larger than the rest of the bees.

Since we are invading their home we use a little smoke to calm the down. We are dress to avoid any stings. We did not seem to upset

them too much. We removed the first frame and inspected it. Then set is aside. Then we inspected each frame and moved it down. The removed frame was then entered on the other side. This allows the bees to have more room to move around.

Dumping Bees into Hive Video

One of the coolest parts is watching the bees get dumped into the hive. I get lots of questions and it is really quite simple. Since the bees do not have a home they do not want to sting, they just want a home. The queen is in a separate cage that had a cork in the end. We exchange the cork for a marshmallow and place the cage in the hive. In about an hour the bees will eat through the marshmallow and free the queen. Since the hive is closed by then she will not escape. The tin can contains the sugar water that came with the bees. The spray bottle is also sugar water, once it on the wings it harder to fly.

We Got Bees

The weekend of May 1st we got three packages of bee, s0 we are now beekeepers. We have two hives in our backyard and one behind Dan's garage.

Once we dumped the bees in they started right away looking for food cleaning any dead bees out of the hive.

It is really neat to have them around. We are feeding them sugar water until they find enough food. It is really amazing how much they can eat.

Blog First Post

This blog is the share the our family adventures with our family and friends. We have many activities going on, Beekeeping, Music, School, Garden, Beer Brewing & Travels.