Moth Prevention & Winter Preparations

My last preparations before winter: #8 hardware cloth lined with dryer-sheets and covered with cedar chips. The whole feeder cost roughly $6 to build and fill. However, I believe it will prove brilliant on all fronts. The dryer sheets should catch the beetles - the cedar should deter moths - and both should insulate the hive, while wicking away moister.

I also placed a Fat Bee Man corrugated sign trap in each hive, as well as a swiffer sheet and beetle buster trap on the top bars. That's every trick in my bag.

After having the temperature dip into the 20's I thought I might have waited too late to winterize my hives. Luckily, I was blessed by God with a nice warm 67 degree day. Noah was working so I asked my 13-year-old nephew, Zane to help me out. He was a huge help and I wouldn't have gotten done without him.

We staged all of the feeders and traps on top of each hive to minimize the amount of time each hive would be left open.

We then cleaned up the apiary and removed all the unused equipment - a full truckload (which might be part of my pest problem).

Lastly, we began placing the feeders. The first hive I opened was dead and filled with wax moths. I felt sick. The second hive looked good but then the third hive was dead. I could have thrown up!

With no other choice, I carried on. In the end, I lost three hives.

"Expect the best. Prepare for the worst. Capitalize on what comes." Zig Ziglar

Last month, when I extracted honey, I placed the empty supers back onto the hives in hopes that the bees would clean them and refill them. However, the flowers were all but gone and I think this gave the moths a window of opportunity. I think this was the cause of my losses.

I started the year with 7 hives. I made all successful splits and increased to 23 hives and 1 NUC - however, I lost a total of 6 hives in the past few months. Leaving me with 17 hives and 1 NUC. If God is willing and I don't loss any hives over the winter, I should be able to divide 17 into 68 or possibly as many as 136 (that would be 4 successful exponential splits).

My actual goal is 100 hives by the end of next season. So for the rest of the winter, I will be in the wood shop building hives. I'll post on that as I progress.

However, for now my bees are in God's hands - I have done all I can do.

Hive Count: 17 Hives and 1 NUC

My Cup Runs Over

My bees are flourishing like never before. 20 of the 22 hives at Dr. D's place are packed with bees and honey. Two needed some help but still had bees in them.

I am also happy to say, that I didn't see a single beetle yesterday - not that I looked too hard for them. The heat index was well over a 100 degrees and 1.5 hours was enough to exhaust me completely. Noah is younger and fared better than me but he still looked spent by the end.

We added 11 supers to the hives that needed more room but we needed 13. I'll have to make two more boxes this weekend and wax 20 more frames.

By the way, I bought 13 pounds of wax to coat my old plastic frames. 1 pound of wax is enough to paint 10 plastic frames.

I still have lots of old plastic frames but I have used all but a couple of my old supers. So from here on out, if I want to expand anymore, I'll have to build more equipment.

Nonetheless, my bees are doing exceptionally well, as are all the aspects of my life. I have just kept my head down and pecked away at the work and God has done the rest.

"Indeed, don’t try to get there at all. It’ll happen when you’re not looking for it." - The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe.

Nothing in life is promised. Yet, I feel optimistic about the future in a very real way. My cup runs over.

Hive Count: 23 Hives

p.s. The moist black wax in the hive I mentioned in the last blog is gone and that hive looks perfectly healthy. Whatever it was has self-corrected.

Wedding at Dr. D's

My energy is split between what I have to do and what I want to do. However, it is absolutely impossible to devote time to everything. Family, work, and sleep are non-negotiable. So I am left to juggle downtime, beekeeping, writing, and inventing.

While it sounds like a rationalization of my shortcomings, the truth is I accomplish a lot each week - just not enough beekeeping. Of course that is real key to success - accomplishing more than average. I've known far too many people that complain about their lives, lack of money, or lack of success but never do anything more than work 40 hours a week.

Success is achieved when your 40 hour work week is over. But I digress.

My wife and I went to an outdoor wedding at Dr.D's this past Saturday - it was epic. However, since most of my bees are located at his country home (were the wedding was held) I couldn't go bee keeping until it was over.

The horror came halfway through the wedding when my wife whispered to me that Dr. D had been spraying the property for mosquitoes all week. While she didn't catch the problem, it made my mouth go dry.

So Sunday afternoon, when I was confident Dr. D's guest were gone, I did a quick hive inspection. All 22 hive are doing well - with the exception of one that is queenless but has queen cells in it.

Given I have let the other aspects of life prevent me from beekeeping for nearly 3.5 weeks, God has smiled down on me and my bees are thriving in spite of me - as usual.

Hive Count: 23 Hives

"I'm a great believer in luck, and I find the more I work the more I have of it." Thomas Jefferson

2018 The Future Looks Bright

"Never pet a burning dog," - movie quote from, A Good Year.

I do my best to keep this blog purely focused on my beekeeping but something strange happened last week that I don't want to forget - so indulge me and then I'll tell about my extraordinary beekeeping year thus far. Or just skip down past the italic part.

On Wednesday, 4/18/18 I woke up singing the 90's song "If I had  a Million Dollars" by the Bare Naked Ladies. I like the group so that's not really odd. 

However, the first thing I heard when I got to work was a conversation that had this line in it, "You got me F***ed up talking about what I would do with a million dollars." Not an unusual conversation given I work in a casino.

Then I went to Walmart after work and the overhead speakers were playing... "If I had a Million Dollars" by the Bare Naked Ladies! So I drove to Arkansas and bought a lottery ticket - and, of course, I didn't win. 

The time between when I bought the ticket and when the numbers were drawn were filled with pure childlike daydreams. I imagined all the things I would buy, the way I would invest, the people I would help, and those I would shun. I also thought how empty all of my future achievements would be and how lonely my wife and I might end up. In the end, I wasn't even disappointed not to have won the lottery.

I've spent a lifetime looking for signs and have never found one. Nonetheless, if this year proves to be an epic success, then perhaps I'll look back on this day and say, "All the signs were there."

What a great bee year so far:

It has been three weeks since I made my splits and they are all doing well... no, they are all doing awesome!

I didn't realize it had been three weeks until just now. I don't have a great excuse, other than the weather has been fairly cold and rainy. Not to mention that last week, Dr. D's father died - I keep my bees at his family's country homestead.

However, that is all spilled milk. Saturday, I went to Dr. D's and my bees were busting at the seams and about to swarm.

I moved 5 frames of queen cells to a new hives with nurse bees (Hive number 14). I would have split 10 of my hives but I didn't have enough lids and bottoms to do it.

In the other hives, I did my best to cut the queen cells out. This is always risky, as you might miss one.

Queen Cells

I then went home and got more boxes and frames and added a box to the 10 overly full hives. The other two hives were doing well but still had two empty frames each - so I left them single stacked for now.

If all goes well, then Wednesday I will make lids and bottoms and Saturday, I will make 10 more splits.

Hive Count: 14 Hives.

BTW: I had a heart scare two months ago and so I have been meditating in the mornings before work to lower my blood pressure. Well, the bees were fairly cantankerous at first on Saturday but then I took a minute to control my breathing and meditate, the bees calmed right down. I suspect my agitation was putting off pheromones and once I relaxed so did the bees.

2018 First Inspection of Spring

"In winter, I plot and plan. In spring, I move." - Henry Rollins

Is there anything more daunting than the first hive inspections of spring? This was the harshest winter since I started keeping bees. Yet, I am happy to report that I only lost one hive. It was the VSH Hive that was full of drones at the end of fall - of course it was expected. What was not expected was how much honey is in my hives.

The VSH hive still had several frames of honey but was being robbed by the other bees, so I took the 20 frames of wax and honey and divided them between the surviving hives.

On hives A, B, C.1, and B.1: I added a super with five frames of wax/honey and five unwaxed plastic frames. I didn't want to give them too much comb to defend against wax moths and beetles.

Hive-C and Hive-B.1.1 were both very healthy but still had some empty frames. So I replaced the empty frames with waxed ones.

At home, I moved the fence surrounding my bee yard and, in doing so, doubled the area to about 30'x60'. I plan to move my chickens into this area as soon as it dries up a little - as well as some bees.

The Plan:

The plan is to make a lot of splits this year. The question is, when to start? The weather looks warm and favorable but there is still the Easter cold snap to consider. Nonetheless, as soon as I see drones, I will begin the splits.

I also plan to do hive removals this year to help increase my apiary size.

The Goal:

100 Hives by winter. It's a lofty goal but that's how many I need. The remaining 7-hives will most likely split into 28-hives. The rest will have to come from the bee removals. I, of course, realize the flaw of my goal - but "a man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what is heaven for?" -Robert Browning. 

Given how much honey is in my hives after this long harsh winter, I am confident, that I only need one super per hive to survive next winter. I actually feel excited by the thought.

Hive Count: 7-Hives

Queen Cages: (4) living (3) Dead (1) Stillborn

Just a note: The Queen Cells I caged Monday have hatched. As stated in the title, (3) are dead - the cause of death is unknown but I suspect starvation.

This has been a hard year filled with ups and downs. However, I take these setbacks, not as failures but as lessons. This lesson is easy: Queens are fragile and, no matter the weather or life conditions, the queens must be systematically dealt with.

I knew I should have checked the queens on Tuesday but I let the heat keep me inside. Yesterday it rained and I took that as an excuse to again avoid the extreme heat (92 degrees - 60% humidity - 105 heat index) - though I did at least check the queens.

Of course being a better beekeeper doesn't mean I have to have a heat stroke. If queens are fed, they can be kept caged for a week before mating them (They must be introduced to the hive the same way that a mated queen is introduced). Yesterday I dripped a little honey on each of the four remaining queen's cages - Noah is going to do the same today while I'm out of town. Then Saturday, I will get up early and get my beekeeping done before the heat sets in.

The two lessons here are:

1. Pre-plan all queen rearing activities.
2. Regardless of the weather, the show must go on.

Before you win big. you have to lose big...

"If you want to win big, first you have to lose big. So what are we doing now? We're losing big!" Some Kind Of Wonderful, 1987. It was odd line that has always stayed burrowed in the back of my mind. Yesterday it seemed to fit more than usual.

My queen grafts didn't take, so Noah and I both agreed that we should remove the excluder and give the queen more room to lay. However, since she is so hard to find, we also agreed we should mark her with a yellow dot. See how I am allocating half the blame to Noah - that's what friends are for.

We had already captured the queen in a hairclip cage but needed to move her to a marking cylinder. Nervously, we started to open the cage but I stopped everything and said, "Wait! Lets do it over the hive just incase something goes wrong we won't lose her."

Good thinking, huh?

So we moved over to the top of the hive and slowly opened the cage. In a flash, the queen flew out and landed on Noah's arm. I lurched for her but in an instance she was in flight again.

Even now, I can see it so clearly in my mind as if I were flying right behind her in a CGI movie. The bold rust colored queen soaring in a straight line towards the emerald backdrop of ivy that covered the fence. My heart pounding and the slow motion "N_o_o_o_o_o_o_o_o_o" ringing in my ears.

I told Noah to stay put on one side of the fence while I rushed to the other side... yet there was no sign of her and, like so many other redheads in my life, she was just gone.

I've been fervently praying for peace in my heart and I am beginning to think that God is answering that prayer... by sending such an elaborate excess of equine excrement that I am simple ceasing to give a fuck!

Anyway... we drank wine.

Moving on:

(15) Grafts (0) Success. I really felt like I did everything right. Nonetheless, possible things I may have done wrong:

1. The wax I used to make my cell cups came from an old hive that I had used Maverick mite chemicals on. This chemical could have been impregnated in the wax.
2. I put all of the brood in the cell builder side of the hive. I doubt this was the issue since the bees didn't draw out any of the other cells either.
3. I did a poor job grafting my larva. Possible but I really think I did a pretty good job. The larva was very tiny and adjacent to the eggs. I took my time and made sure not to flip the larva.
4. I took too long. It took me (26) minutes to make the (15) grafts. It was a very warm day (about 80degrees) so I don't think the brood got chilled.
5. I didn't give the hive enough time to feel queenless. I segregated the queen at 5:00pm Saturday and placed my grafted cells around 7:00pm Sunday. (26) hours should have been enough time but if it was, then why didn't the hive draw queen cells from the larva I didn't graft?

I have a new plan. I plan to make a starter colony out of a (5) frame nuc and place it next to my grafting hive. I will keep the starter hive queenless and give it a new frame of brood every two weeks. I will use the grafting hive as my finisher hive and place the cells in that hive once they have been capped.

I was really hoping to do the cloak board method but I think a more traditional setup might work better.

I'll sort this out Saturday.

No Queens - What to do?

I finished up teaching classes on Saturday and so Sunday I finally had time to check my backyard bees -- The two Mini Nucs and Hive-D.3 -- sadly not one of the three had a queen.

That being said, I suspected the queen was gone from Hive-D.3 as soon as I opened it because when I gave my first puff of smoke the hive began to roar with the sound of flapping wings. I also got stung (6) times - those queenless hives are cantankerous.

The last time I checked D.3, I couldn't find any young larva or eggs but there were (3) frames of brood. I told myself that it was just late in the afternoon and it was too dark to see - but it wasn't. The queen was gone and now there is no brood left in the hive.

The two mini nucs are building comb but there is no eggs, larva, or brood - so no queens either.

I think I have reached a turning point because none of this bothered me. Not because I don't care but because I am sure I can fix the problem.

Wednesday is my beekeeping day and so I think I will bring home a hive from Dr. D's and take Hive-D.3 out there. If Hive-D has a new queen (Which I pray it does), then I will bring it home (assuming it has now calmed down).

If that goes according to plan, then I can start grafting queens right away from Hive-D.

As for Hive-D.3, I will place a frame of eggs from Hive-D.2 into it and let it re-queen itself.

While I have a queenless hive and two queenless nucs, I am still leaving my count at (9) hives and (2) mini nucs.

Attack of the Small Hive Beetles

Brood Comb destroyed by Small Hive Beetles

Wikipedia: "The small hive beetle (Aethina tumida) is a beekeeping pest."

Now there is an understatement. I've always had issues with hive beetles. For the most part I have used dryer sheets with a fair bit of success (though I am trying Don the fat bee man's traps with less success). However, when I split Hive-D, Hive-D.1 was very week.

In my last blog I tried to add a frame of brood to strength Hive-D.1 but it proved disastrous. The extra frame of brood and not enough bees to cover it gave the hive beetles a chance to spread - and by God they did.

The hive had a stagnant water smell but given all the rain we have had in past couple of days, I assumed I was smelling the wet ground. I also noticed all the larva was gone. Not just the frame I placed but all the larva my new VSH Queen had laid on the new comb... and the beetles were everywhere.

Then I saw the beetle larva but I mistook it for wax moth larva. There were only (3) of them when I banged the empty frame onto the lid of an empty nearby hive - though I think there might have been a lot more but the others were very tiny. (later when I was home, I YouTubed Wax Moths and realized the larva was not the same and so I checked hive beetles and confirmed my diagnosis).

The hive was nearly empty - no more than 50 or 100 bees and my precious little VSH Queen. I knew it was a matter of time before she either left or died so I decided to act. I placed the queen in a plastic queen cage with one attendant. Then I took the top box off of Hive-A and banged it onto Hive-D.1 filling it with bees. (I honestly did not look for the queen but I will before I release the VSH Queen tomorrow.)

Then I fed all the hives and went home. However, knowing I had to go out of town for work on a (48) hour overnighter, I worried that the queen might starve before I could release her. The more I thought about it the more I realized I needed to make sure she had food.

So I drove back out to Dr. D's and pressed a chunk of honey comb against the side of her cage and put her back in the hive. BTW, this was about (2)hours later and the hive was still packed with bees. I am hopeful the hive will now recover.

On Friday, I plan to use mineral oil traps I got from Mann Lake - that with dryer sheets and Don's boric acid traps should overwhelm the beetles. If not, I may have to consider some sort of pesticide or research other alternative methods.

As for Hive-D: I placed a frame of eggs in it on Sunday and by yesterday I had (5)to(7) new queen cells. I plan to cut all but two out on Monday and split Hives A,B,C in half with them.

I got stung 9 times through my suit in the shoulder, on the ankle, and on the ear - all on the right side for some reason. For what ever reason, Hive-A has become more aggressive with me, while completely ignoring Noah who is only a couple of feet away observing. (7) of the stings came from Hive-A but with the pheromone already on me, Hive-D instantly attacked when I opened the supers.

Hive Count: (9)

A Swarm Is Like Manna From Heaven

I caught my first swarm last night and it was like God just handed it to me.

But first... I’ve decided not to post so much about my personal life on here. I imagine if you are reading this, it’s because you are interested in bees and not in me. That being said, I have to tell this part before I tell you about my swarm:

On January 25, 2017 a collection agency accidently froze my bank account for a bill I had paid in full two years ago. They’ve admitted their mistake but my account is still frozen while they take their sweet time sorting it out. IT'S CRIMINAL. Yet when I called Morgan and Morgan (for the people law firm) to file a lawsuit yesterday, they said my case was "too complicated" for them and then wished me luck.

I can’t believe someone could do something like this without some sort of legal ramifications. Nonetheless, I was surprisingly not that upset - I think it might be because I feel conflicted about suing anyone.  However, I still think these people should be held accountable, whether I benefit or not. So I prayed about it and then emailed a local lawyer. That is the end of that story for now.

Now back to my swarm story:

“So there I was,” (You ever notice how often redneck stories seem to start with that line and end with, “hey - watch this”). Well anyway, there I was sitting at home feeling sorry for myself when my sister-in-law texted me that she had a friend with a swarm of bees.

I have never caught a swarm before so I didn’t know what to expect. I mean sure, YouTube makes it look super easy but I've also see YouTuber’s working their bees without a veil and I call horse shit on that too.

Just the same, I grabbed my gear and headed after it. It turned out the swarm was only a block from my house and, to my surprise, was only about twelve feet in the air.

Well I got my veil and gloves on and climbed up a ladder. Then, using my bee brush, I just swept the bees off the limb and into my box. It couldn’t have been easier! Of course half the bees went back up to the limb, so I repeated the process, this time using my gloved hand. Then, Bibbidi-Bobboidi-Boo, I had a new bee hive.

The two greatest parts of this story are:

First... at the very moment I felt like God wasn’t listening to me, he sent me this swarm of bees like a low hanging fruit. It felt like God was giving me a little nudge on the chin.

The second great thing about this story is that I caught the hive in one of my new beehives that I made from a repurposed pallet. That means I actually have a hive that cost me ZERO dollars.

So just like that, I now have 10 Hives. Hey - watch this... video. :)

p.s. sorry for the vertical video. :(

Another one bites the dust

I'll keep today's post fairly short.  For starters, this past Friday I visited the apiary.  I was shocked to find that the very hive I found the queen in last week was completely empty 7 days later... Damn the luck.  I am now down to 7 hives.

Also, since the bees have not built any wax on the frames I had bleached, I decided to place uncleaned frames in the hive and see what happens.  I did this by marking the frames with a "G" like in the picture here.  I then placed them in the hive with one bleached frame between each.  I did this to see if they build on the unclean frames and still avoid the bleached ones.

Lastly, in years to come when I am a successful beekeeper, i will look back on these early days and remember just how far I have come.  I want to remember that it wasn't easy and that the bees were not my only hurdle.

That said: I still have not finished cleaning the 400 frames I have in my trailer.  It has been over a month.  The truth is, I just feel so... I don't think it's depression but something like that.  I am still waiting to hear back about the USDA job.  I really want this job.  It is good pay, interesting work, and it would be here in the Delta.  Though it is hard to tell who wants me to get the job more; me or my wife.  I am very qualified for the job but it was open to the the whole country and so I don't know what the talent pool looks like or what my chances are.

The whole thing keeps me in a constant state of anxiety.  Even now, my palms are sweating and I have a headache.  If I don't get this job, I don't know what I will do next.  My wife has been working a lot of extra days at the hospital and so we are financially okay for now.  I am so proud of her but I feel equally awful putting such a burden on her.  She really is a God sent blessing.  We both pray constantly for this job.  I want to be optimistic but no one knows God's plans.

Tomorrow, I plan to muster all of my will power and finish cleaning (without bleach) those 400 frames.  My wife and I are also planning to go and collect honey from The Beast on Friday.  For that I need my trailer.

I have another blog called, 5 Things I Am Thankful For.  I started keeping it back when offshore work began to get rocky 18 months ago.  I don't write in it very much but I wanted to post the 5 things here today... it always makes me feel better and it is a good way to openly thank God for all he does for me.

1. My wife has made so much overtime that we are actually in the black.  Even in these hard times, our cup runs over.
2. My wife... just that... she is the greatest mate I could ever imagine.
3. My dog... Mabel is often on my 5 things list but it is because her kind face and loving nature always helps to brighten even the darkest of days.
4. Both my kids are in college (well my youngest starts this month) but I am thankful that they BOTH have academic scholarships.  This eases our burden (we used to pay $5000 per kid for private school) and I am so proud that they are so smart.
5. Had I never gotten laid off, I would have never considered looking for a job on land.  God is always so active my life that I have to believe that even when things look bad, they are for a good reason.  I don't know for sure I will get this USDA job but I feel like I will.  God is always kind to me.  Over the past 4 years I have been off work two other times.  Each time, when it was over and it had all worked out just fine, I always looked back and would say to myself, "I wish I could have just relaxed and let God deal with it."  So I am thankful that God has a proven track record in my life and that even though I have problems with my faith, God still takes care of me.

God, Family, and Bees

My oldest and dearest friend, Chip Burnside (who is also my cousin) came for a visit.  So of course I
took him to my apiary.  He had a great time and took lots of pictures.  However, that is not what this blog is about today.

Today I want to talk about God and prayer.  I have a hard time imagining a beekeeper who is an atheist.  However, I suppose for the same reason a Christian looks at the wonders of bees and sees the divine - the atheist sees evolution.  Nonetheless, I am a man of faith - a foul-mouthed, perverted, angry, often self-serving sinner - but a man of faith just the same.

My cousin, Chip (I refer to him in that way so much, I think his proper name should be My-Cousin-Chip).  Anyway, Chip is a devout Christian of amazing faith - he's delightfully flawed but I know he is close to God.  I feel that he is more loved by God than me - though as I write this, I can see the error of that sort of thinking.  Just the same, I rely on Chip for spiritual guidance (even if I don't always agree with him).

This brings me to the point.  I have applied for a job with the USDA office.  I am perfectly qualified for it and the opening is right here in my own community.  The pay is very good and I would be home every night (unlike my offshore job).  So I have been praying for this job.  Praying constantly - since there is no job I have ever wanted more.  My family (especially my wife) are praying for this too.  I should know the full outcome in the next 41 days.

I of course asked Chip to pray with me about the job -- and of course he did.  But he prayed, "God, if this is your will, then let it be done."  My father-n-law echoes this same prayer each night at supper.  They both believe we should not pray for what we want but only for God's will.

Before I go any further, I know that God knows what is best for me.  I know that his will is better for me than mine.  I truly believe in Romans 8:28

King James Bible
And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

However with that said, I question this notion that we should pray for "God's will".  To pray for God's will is like praying for the sun to rise.  Only God's will is ever done!  I believe that God is in control of everything (though I don't believe he controls everything - some things he allows to happen without causing them)... but his will cannot be overcome.  So to pray that God does whatever he wants is like praying that the sun will rise... pray -- don't pray... it will still be done.

My point is this, Mark 11:24 says "...whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours."  The same is echoed in Matthew 21:22, 1 John 3:22, and many others.

Luke 22:42 Jesus prays "Take this cup from me.  Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done."  In this verse, Jesus asks that God change his will but agrees to be okay with his will no matter the outcome.

God's "will" is always accomplished - so I do pray that I will be okay with whatever his will is.  However, I also pray that he will give me this job and make it a blessing to me and my family.

I'm not a preacher, and I am sure that there are people that will both agree with me and others that will think I am a moron (if not a heretic).  I think I am writing this blog today, as a way to walk through my feelings on the subject.

I have prayed and I am confident that my prayers will be answered.

BTW:

The moth infested hive has died.  I am now down to 8 hives.  One of my other splits has hive beetles. And the three hives that contain my new Italians are doing well if not still a bit slow.  I also found the queen in one of my hives.  It is the first time I have found one all year (I normally look for brood rather than disturbing the hive for a long period of searching).  I'm glad I got to share that with Chip.