Some of the highlights from the last two weeks of bee school -

 

• Bees need to be in full sun and facing the rising morning sun. When the sun passes beyond the hive and it goes into shadow, the bees are done working for the day. If the bees are in shade, they may not work as much.

 

• Two thirds of purchased packaged bees will die before the queens new eggs start hatching. This puts the colony at a disadvantage as opposed to if the colony was purchased as a functioning nuc.

 

• Only 10% of swarming hives will survive. It is mainly because old bees are in the swarm, and it will take 31 days before new worker bees are hatched and ready.

 

• Cypress is the best wood for bee boxes while pine is best for frames. Pine bee boxes must be painted.

 

• The standard hive setup is two deep boxes for the bees and three medium boxes for the honey.

 

• It takes a frame of food to make a frame of brood.

 

• A shared honey extractor is no good because it also shares disease.

 

• Use as little smoke as possible when manipulating a hive.

 

Saturday morning was the first session of the beekeeping class that I signed up for last month. There were over a hundred people in the class, which is a very good sign of the current interest in beekeeping. At the end of the class (in eight weeks) there will be an opportunity to take a written and practical test to become a Certified Beekeeper.

According to the North Carolina State Beekeepers Association master beekeeper webpage, there are 3,500 individuals in the master beekeeper program of which seventy five are Master Beekeepers and twelve are Master Craftsman Beekeepers. The rest are Certified Beekeepers, the entry level.

The instructor outlined three basic rules for beekeeping -

1. Never go into the hive without a reason.
2. Never go into a hive without seeing either the queen or eggs. Seeing eggs means that you had a queen at least 72 hours prior to opening the hive.
3. There are a hundred ways to lose a queen.

The instructor also outlined some basic expectations for the beginning beekeeper. Based on what he said, I should have reasonable expectations about hive success and failure. I should expect to lose a hive at some point, but I should also expect to learn from it. I should not expect honey the first year, and I should not expect hands on help from an experienced beekeeper.

Some more highlights from the first class -

1. From 1984 to 2004, 50% of the genetic alleles (options) in the honeybee have been lost.
2. The state of North Carolina is considering passing a law preempting municipal banning of beekeeping within town limits. This law would help in promoting backyard hobby beekeeping.
3. Every human being is allergic to bee stings, and there is no rhyme or reason to the severity of the sting at any given time.
4. Bees cannot navigate very well when it is overcast.

If you want to follow along at home, our text book is Beekeeping for Dummies. Read chapters two and four.

A newly formed beekeepers association is starting up in New Hanover and adjacent counties. The first meeting is Tuesday February 19th, 7:00pm at the Arboretum (County Extension).

In addition, there will be an eight week beekeepers school starting on March 15th. Here is the info:

For information on other beekeeping classes in North Carolina, check out the North Carolina State Beekeepers Association.

I am pretty much fascinated by pollinators, not just honeybees, but moths, wasps and the big bumblebees that get drunk on nectar, sitting immobilized on a swaying branch of flowering basil. For many years I have wanted to get involved with beekeeping simply because I want to watch the bees go about their routines.

My first brush with a beekeeper came last year when Kristin bought her car from a guy who kept bees in his backyard. He also happened to be the Star News reporter who took a picture of me in front of a biodiesel tanker. Half a year later at another photo shoot I asked about checking out his bees. Unfortunately I never got to connect much further than that initial question about the hives.

A few months ago some friends let me know that they knew folks who kept bees and also lived in my neighborhood. They each gave me the beekeepers’ contact information and left me to it.

I don’t usually hesitate when contacting strangers, but in this instance I was paralyzed for some reason. I was about to actually get involved with something that I had talked about for several years. Critical mass… I had a phone number and an email address, so, after a few weeks of deliberating, I sent off an email. Sporadic correspondence came and went, and I finally met up with the beekeepers at a friends wedding. I had plenty of questions for them, and it seemed like we talked about bees for quite a while. We left the wedding with promises of going to check out the hives in the next few weeks and to sit down and discuss equipment.

They called the next morning… That afternoon I was riding in their car out to the hives. They brought along an extra bee suit so I was able to get up close when they inspected the hives. Through the process of opening the hive I was able to see all the parts I had been reading about in various beekeeping books. I finally understood what I was reading, and it all started to make some sense.

The keepers were looking for signs of wax moths, a hive pest that can destroy a weakened hive in a very short time frame. The beekeepers were also winterizing the hives, adding food and removing supers that did not have much comb and honey buildup.

The process of opening the hive starts with smoking the entrance and the top of the hive. This induces the bees to gorge themselves on honey, making them too heavy to move quickly and less likely to get rapidly agitated.

Next they removed the super, which holds ten frames on which the bees build a comb and insert honey or brood.

The wire grate is the queen excluder which prevents the queen from entering the upper parts of the hive. This prevents her from laying eggs in that part, which gives the beekeeper access to the extra stored honey.

Another insect problem that the hives fight is the small hive beetle, a recently introduced pest that can also cause bees to abandon the hive. Small beetle traps are placed in the hive to keep the beetle in check. The trap is the black square in the above picture.

After they put the hives back together, confident that the bees were healthy and ready for the winter, my head was full and a bit overwhelmed. I feel confident that I can take on beekeeping, and I look forward to learning more of the hands on details of working with these awesome creatures.