Beeboy and other BKr's HELP or at least some advice

kace069 · May 24, 2006

Well I guess maybe we do need a beekeeping thread here. Anyways here is my sob story.

So I made a split approximately 3 weeks ago? I think. Had two funerals last week and drank alot so kinda lost track of time. Anyways
I am still kind of new at this, and this was my first split. This colony was very strong and already had about 6 supercedure cells, It was also time to reverse brood chambers. So I decided to do it all at once. I took the bottom super full of bees and moved it to a new bottom board. I split up brood,honey, and pollen between the two. I never found the queen but was sure she was there and in the bottom super. I then put a new deep on each one with fresh frames of foundation and closed them up.
1 week later. Everything looks fine. I didn't disturb the colonies to badly I just wanted to make sure that they didn't reform into one colony every thing looked great.
About 2 weeks later, aka yesterday. No brood, no eggs, all but 1 queen cell open. Both colonies took sugar syrup again, before the split they weren't eating any.
So it looks to me that just about every queen just hatched and flew off! Didn't even bother to kill the others. I had flying drones.
Now what do I do. Is it to late for me to order queens? Just wait them out? Hope they requeen as was the original plan?
This was a complete bummer! I thought I was getting out of buying bees this year. Not sure but this colony looked as if it was getting ready to swarm before the split. Thought I was saving myself of a headache of a swarming colony 20 miles away.

NeadMead · May 24, 2006

Sorry, but I have got to say it.

I guess they are saying that their honey is none of your beeswax. >

(pun deffinately intended) JK LOL

The Honey Farmer · May 26, 2006

Hi KACE069,
You can still buy queens, some queen breeders raise queens all summer.
Starting June 5 BEEWEAVER will be selling queens to the hobbist. Here's a link, info@beeweaver.com check it out.
Good luck, Dennis
Sorry, that was email. www.beeweaver.com

kace069 · May 26, 2006

Thanks Honey farmer

The Honey Farmer · May 26, 2006

Your welcome Brother Beekeeper.

Dennis 8)

kace069 · May 27, 2006

Do they sell queens all summer?

The Honey Farmer · May 27, 2006

I'm not sure, but I know Heitkam's Honey Bees does. They don't have a web site or email and they don't take credit cards. If you have and account with them they will bill you, otherwise they want payment in advance. If you would like there phone number PM me and I'll send it to you.

Have a good weekend, Dennis

beeboy · Jun 1, 2006

You can still order queens, just got Bee Culture in and here are some apiaries that are advertising queens in the June issue;
Weaver Apiaries in Texas 936 825 2333 www.rweaver.com
Queen Right Colonies in Ohio 440 647 2602
Gardener's Apiaries in Georgia 912 367 9352
Hardman Apiaries in Georiga 912 583 2710
Some of them might still have bees also if you want to build up a hive. There are more apiaries advertising but these are some of the bigger outfits, hope they can help.
Would of answered sooner but the hard drive on my laptop started to do the Macarana and then crashed last week, just got it back but lost all my files, pictures, everything. Real glad I keep all my mead recipes in a note book cause they would of been lost also.

kace069 · Jun 2, 2006

Well it has been about a month now since the split. So tommorow I will go through them again and hopefully they have requeened. I don't know what happened to the original queen. she was laying a nice pattern and got me through the winter with a nice colony. I only did all this to avoid buying any bees. Looking back now I should have just ordered some packages. After buying two queens I am not going to come out ahead. Oh well live and learn.
So if things aren't happy in there I guess I will be buying queens. Yuck. Plus I need to track down a nuc soon if I want to get a 4th colony up and running this year.
Thanks for the help guys!

beeboy · Jun 3, 2006

Sometimes package bees just work out easier than trying a split, when you look at the time frames involved it takes most of the season to get a split up and running while a package can get big fast. The big apiaries have enough hives so if they run into a problem with a split they can add more bees or toss in another queen. Us little guys can have a couple bad hives and really get hurt by it. I'm in the same boat with that one problem hive, tried to requeen about a month ago but she didn't take. Was out checking the hives today and there is no sign of the queen or any brood. This was the hive that had a bunch of laying workers in it and was loaded with drone brood before I requeened it. Slipped two brood frames in from the other hives to keep it going and will try one more requeen this week. Seems requeening this hive is a little more difficult than I thought.
The other hives are doing fine, can probably pull a deep super of honey off of them if I pull a full frame or two from each hive but am going to wait to see if the shallow supers fill up. Really don't like extracting less than two deeps or a deep and two shallows cause of all the setup time that is involved.

kace069 · Jun 3, 2006

Well fortunatley one colony is queen right. The one I figured the queen was in. I guess she took a vacation, meanwhile she has set that colony back a while. So tommorow I will take some brood to that one. The other one is full of drones, but it looks like there is no laying workers, but I still need to act fast.
I got some info from Weaver today and some of their claims about their queens seem hard to swallow. No mite treatment! I am also concerned about getting bees from Texas. I'm sure they won't be AHB, but I'm in Michigan, I'm worried about overwintering bees from such a warmer climate.

beeboy · Jun 4, 2006

Seems most of the bees on the market come from the southern states, don't know how much of a difference it makes on thier wintering ability. I alway had trouble getting hives through the winter when in Pennsylvania, either the hives were weakened a little by mites by August or they just didn't build up as fast as needed. Now you can laugh at me and say that I'm nuts but for the last four years I installed one of those flat bird bath deicer/heater in each of my hives for wintering. The only hive I lost during winter since I started was due to the heater failing. Don't know if you have any power handy near your hives but if you do think about putting heaters in them. I'm advocating doing something that just isn't done with large scale operations but worked for me at a hobby level. I got real tired of loosing hives during the winter so I ended up thinking outside the box. The advantages for the hive are less moisture in the hive, the hive stays warmer so the bees can move around the honey comb easier and the bees end up needing less honey for wintering. I'm assuming that the Michigan winters are a lot worse than any thing that I had to deal with in Pennsylvania so your bees will need all the help they can get. Some of the queen producers tend to blow thier own horn a bit, haven't tried any Weaver Queens yet so can't be much help there.

kace069 · Jun 4, 2006

Well winters should be long and cold here but, wait whats that I hear? Global warming?
We had a rather short mild winter. I think I open my hives one day in January, I think it was 63 degrees out! I really need to start keeping records! Just like with my mead.
I don't laugh at all about the heater idea at all. Its not the first time I have heard it.

storm1969 · Jun 5, 2006

Do you guys think it possible to have a hive in a townhouse community? I would love to try my hand, but don't have much land.

Brian

The Honey Farmer · Jun 5, 2006

Hi STORM,
I'm also a Real Estate Broker and I would check my CCR's first and then with the county Ag. Dept.

OK all you beekeepers out there, I just purchased two All Stars Queens from Bee Weaver Apiaries. I have two colonies with lazy queens and both colonies have mites that I can't seem to get rid of. I will not use any medication in these two colonies just bee weaver queens and I will post the result.
Mite resistance or not.
Gentle or not.
Good honey production or not.
The queens were a little pricey but if you won't have to treat for mites twice a year you save $20.00 + on meds alone. And just think of all the ORGANIC honey you will have. If what they say is true it will be worth the $49.00 for bees and shipping.
I'll keep you posted, Dennis

beeboy · Jun 5, 2006

Just ordered another queen from Gardener's Apiary for that problem hive, The first queen didn't take so I'll try it again. Don't want to loose the hive, have been able to keep it going for three years so far which is a personal record.
Don't think bees would be allowed in a town house, they don't even like boats in the parking lot so I would guess that bees are a real big no-no.
Let us know how the Bee Weaver queens work out, any little bit of mite resistance is a plus, might try some Russians once I get the hives established, heard that they can control the mites and are gentle. Really don't know how to get rid of mites except by treating for them. I use screened bottom boards which helps a bit, the mites fall through the screen and cant get back into the hive but by late summer the mites are at a panic level in the hives. Has anybody tried tobbacco in the smoker?, heard that nicotine kills mites.

kace069 · Jun 6, 2006

I look forward to the results Honey farmer. Where are you at? Beeboy is in Florida?? I think.
I think geographical location in the country BKr's have different problems and severity. I read on Bee foruums about ppl having problems with Hive Beetles. As far as I know Hive Beetles are not and issue here in Michigan. I don't even know what one looks like., but my mentor has never mentioned hive beetles before.
I would really love to have queens that performed like that. Varroa are definetly a problem here. I don't know to what degree the tracheal mite problem is.

Hope fully I will be fixing my problem hive friday. I should be getting some queen cells that are supposedly ready to hatch. As in that day from Canada. I think it will be $8 and has a 60% chance of taking. So as long as I don't have a laying worker by then or I finally have a queen emerge where there are like 6 cells hatched and all I have is empty brood and 1/2 colony of drones.

BTW Farmer. How long do you think it will take before the colony will all be the Weaver queen's brood or are you going to start a nuc?

Anyways I plan on buying a nuc later from this guy and I would imagine they will end up being the Canadians too.
And I might have a chance to buy out another hobbyist out, not sure about the details yet but I am excited.

beeboy · Jun 6, 2006

Yes I'm in Florida, just south of Daytona and have to agree with you on how different locations have different problems with bees. The newest bee pest is the small hive beetle which poses no real problem as long as the hive stays strong. They are little black or dark brown beetles about 1/4 the size of a lady bug. The damage done to a hive is simular to a wax moth where the grub tunnels through the comb. I don't think that they are winter hardy so that is a plus for northern beekeepers.
Hey Honey Farmer, found an article about different things to use in the smoker as mite control. Here's the web address, couldn't get a link to work
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/AR/archive/aug97/beemite.pfd
Says that grapefruit leaves in the smoker will knock almost 95% of the mites off of the bees in under five minutes but won't kill them. If you have a sticky board set up bet you could clean out most of the mites in your hives with two or three treatments. I've got a medium sized grapefruit tree in my back yard that needs trimming and I'll be happy to send you some dried leaves for the cost of the postage. Let me know if you are interested. Gotta go, just got called by the Post Office and my queen is in ;D

The Honey Farmer · Jun 7, 2006

Hi KACE & BEEBOY,
I live in Dolores Co. We are putting the finishing touches on our new house and will be moving in over the next two weeks. Haven't had much time for the forum.
Thanks for the site beeboy, I'll get into it when I can. I'll look for a back issue of Beeculture that talks about smoker fuels, I think it said that tobbaco smoke does the same thing as grapefruit leaves. The guy also said that cedar shavings kills mites. I buy them at our local *Wally World* for $2.50 a bag. I think that might be part of my problem, I haven't had time to work my bees this spring so they haven't had there smokes.
Gotta go meet another sub contractor, Dennis

kace069 · Jun 8, 2006

Well My trouble colony is queen right. All this worrying for nothing. Plus I doubled the yard.
Unfortunetaly my mentor can't get the queen cells after paying money and jumping through hoops for the governemnt to transport them over the border. Bueracracy! What is even worse is that he has 50 queenless nucs waitng for a queen.

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