Hot Hot Summer

So, I'm not blogging as much as I meant to...

Just over two weeks ago, my neighbor hollered at me to come over after I was done taking honey. I went over and they explained that the bees were very abundant at their house. Not good for a party they had the day before. I asked if there were foods and sweets around, which is why the bees were going over. They denied, but I knew better. The party was the day before.

I apologized profusely. I am a bad bee-haver, and neighbor. I really didn't realize they were going over there. I explained that I will look for a new place to move the bees, but that it may take a short while. I offered the epi-pen that I picked up, since at least one person that frequents the house is known to be allergic to bees. Then I gave them a big jar of honey, in hopes that it will help smooth things over.

The matriarch, an elderly black woman who enjoys having grandchildren around, didn't want to kill my bees, and wondered if there was a way to keep them in, or move the hive further from her yard. I explained that bees travel up to two miles, and that she should feel free to kill any bees that came over. Bees communicate, and tell each other were the food is. The younger man on the porch pointed out the ice cream he and his kids were eating as an example of the sweets they are after. Bees only live a month or so in the summer anyway. Kill em, before they tell the other bees where the food is.

What did I do? Let me back into that from a different angle.

Bees make honey by ingesting one kind of sugar, and regurgitating two other kinds of sugars, which we call honey. 'Regurgitating' is a word that makes it sound gross, but that the best I can come up with. Sucrose, makes Fructose and Glucose honey. Cane sugar is primarily Sucrose. So I feed my bees 50/50 sugar/water and the hive thrives, and they make me plenty of honey. The bees need water anyway, and I like the honey.

Is it really honey? Sure it is. The thought that it is from cane sugar rather than flower nectar, well, I can understand how it might seem disingenuous. This honey is for me, and me alone. I have given honey to friends and family, free of charge, and everyone loves it. It's just as healthy and natural, it just doesn't have the flavors of honey that I experienced in Northern California. Wow, that was different.

In Northern California, I visited a farm market in the town square. There were different flavor honeys. For example, Strawberry. But the honey didn't taste like strawberries. It tasted like the nectar that came from strawberry plants, which doesn't taste like strawberries. Just imagine all the different flavors from the different plants that grow, but the flavors aren't the same as what you would think. Really cool.

Anyway, my 'cane sugar' honey doesn't taste like any of that. It's sweet, and everyone tells me that it is the best they've ever had. It doesn't have the acidic bite that some honey has. It's hard to explain, but it's darn good honey, even if it doesn't have the exotic flavors I would like to have in my cupboard.

So, I've been feeding the bees cane sugar water, and they give me lots of honey. The hive is strong, even in the record high heat of July 2010. We are in a drought, for sure. I haven't cut my grass in about 6 weeks now. The grass doesn't grow.

I observed for two weeks, and changed up my feeding of sugar water. Doubled the feed, and cut it off completely. As I experiment, I see my neighbors swatting less bees when there no feed. After two weeks, I see much less activity at the hive. I suspect, that with the lack of food, the bees are dying. They don't have energy to go all over tarnation looking for food. They don't get feed, and have no reason to think there is food out there. All in all, I think the population is getting smaller. The bees, in their starvation, conserve energy and don't out so much.

From a great and experienced beekeeper who came and taught our club a class, I learned what bees are doing at different times of the year. Going by memory, a new colony won't make it through winter if the queen isn't established by early July. Through July and August, the queen is laying the first of the winter bees. So cutting the hive back in July is good, because having too many winter bees may may cause them to exhaust their food stores too quickly. Maybe? I don't know, but I guess I'll find out soon enough.

So I cut the sugar feed. The neighbors don't seem to swat so much. I had hoped to be ready to move the bees this past weekend. Don't have any 'safe' new locations for them yet, and the weekend was kind of spoiled with an odd situation, that I won't get into here. So in the coming week, I hope to secure a 'safe' place for the hive, and a truck to move the hive with. Next Saturday, I'll ask the neighbors if they are still having problems. If there is any complaint, I will move the bees immediately. Three weeks, is more than patient of them if the problem is bad. I strongly suspect that the matriarch will decide that the bees aren't such a problem, and tell me to keep them here. Maybe I can help that decision with another big jar of honey. One can only hope.

So the extended honey flow of this summer, is over. The bees and I have plenty of honey. I have about a gallon or two, and the bees surely have 3 gallons of honey. If they run out, I will give them food.

Observations and Getting Stung.

My bees are very calm. The hive is against a 6 foot wooden fence, well about 4 or 5 foot in around a bush and tiny tree. The entrance is facing away from the fence. When I approach, I approach from behind and do what I have to from the side of the hive. Usually replacing a jar of sugar water feed, or just going out to sit and watch them.

Once, I tried to replace a mostly empty jar that they bees were feeding on. They didn't like me trying to knock them from their food source, and since I was unprotected, I left as soon as they made it known they didn't appreciate it. I still go out with no veil or sleeves, and even in dark colors, but I don't replace a jar if they are feeding on it.

Sometimes when I am sitting there, a bee will buzz around as to tell me she doesn't like me sitting there. She buzzes louder and hovers close and around me, back and forth so as to make it difficult for me if I was to strike her. The more irritated she is, the closer she will get, and/or louder. After about 5 minutes, she gets tired. At that point, there are two options. Either to land and sting, and die. Or to go elsewhere to get some rest. I obviously am not too much threat, because she always goes away. The other hundreds of bees about 3 feet away didn't mind.

I stung last week, got jumped actually. Earlier on Saturday, I had taken a honey frame and pulled some propolis. Then I tried a different method of creating a propolis trap before I left. I left the inner bottom slightly propped with a tiny branch from the ground, about 1/8th of an inch. Just enough of a gap that the bees would use more propolis to fill it. I went away when I was done and all was cool.

5 hours later, I saw that the weather had changed and it was about to downpour. The telescope cover was above the inner cover, but I thought some rain would get in the gap I created. I went out to remove the tiny sticks and close the gap to protect the bees. When I got to the hive, unprotected and in dark colors, I saw that the inner and outer cover had shifted back, just slightly. 'OK, I thought that was straight when I left it.' I lifted slightly, too much. The bees started coming through the crack. I lowered slightly. 'no, no, go back' Then I raised again hoping they would realize the danger of being crushed and go back. But no, they decided to come out. A few bees got out. I didn't want to crush them. They immediately started attacking me. There was no warning. It was an all out attack.

About 10 were out of the crack and they were pissed. I closed the inner cover back on them after removing two of the makeshift shims, and crushed the rest of the bees when they started in on me. I ran. They were getting into my hair. I swung my hand wildly at my hair, hitting myself in the head even, trying to knock them away. But they were holding on to my hair.

By the time I made it to the door, I had been stung at least twice. Once in the side of my head, and once on my bicep. There may have been another light sting on my head. The sting on my bicep started one blister over the sting. I dropped a drop of home made propolis tincture on it and it immediately knocked the blister down. I actually watched it for a few minutes before I added the drop. An area about the size of a half dollar coin toughened and turned red around the sting. I wider area than that was slightly red and weakened, but the half dollar area of skin was starting to die under the angry bee venom.

I'll live. Not like my skin is rotting off. That was 4 days ago and I know some skin cells died, but it will heal naturally and will be fine. The lymph node under my ear actually swelled up a little, and even hurt a tad. The other one on the other side of my head was only bothered slightly. Proximity to the sting. Still slightly swollen, but less now. Maybe I should go to the doctor? Probably won't, but thought about going just to get a prescription for an epi-pen just in case someone else gets stung around my hive. I'd only use it if they were obviously allergic and unable to breathe due a bee sting. So I may go for two reasons, which is worth while.

I don't ever remember being stung. I'm sure I was stung as a kid. Mom is allergic to bee stings. But I wasn't really sure if I was. I'm not, by the way. Some may think it was stupid to go uncovered, but I wasn't worried. I've escaped death a few times before, and just am not worried.

The bees are neat to watch. They stand at the landing board, hold on tight, and run their wings hard to move the air through their hive. They circulate from the top of the hive where the open top cover is over the inner cover, and from the lower landing board. They will stand one in front of the other for efficiency and to tighten up space. After all, there are still dozens of bees coming and going, so the fanning is done on this side, and the traffic is on the other side of the landing board.

I've seen bees buzz ants off. Wild to see a small bee, become relatively huge to a small black and. Walk right up to the and and kind walk/kick right over it. Buzz for a second, and essentially move the and an inch away all at once. The ant takes off, and the bee goes back to her business.

There are of course, dead bees in front of the hive. I have heard that they will take the dead out of the hive if necessary, but that generally bees don't die in the hive. They leave to do so. One day I took some of the dead bees and dropped it on the bottom board by the entrance. Within 1 second, some of the traffic starts checking the bee. As soon as 2 to 5 bees review and confirm that it's dead, one grabs the dead bee and starts crawling away with it. Have dragging, and half hovering for all it's wings are worth, the dead bee is carried 1 to 2 foot in front of the hive. Until the bee can't carry it any further, then lets go and flies away.

I found a sickly looking drone and dropped him in front of the entrance. He was dragged out. He tried to crawl into the hive, but the ladies hauled his butt away as if he were dead. Took two or three ladies to haul his big butt away, but they wouldn't let him in the hive.

On other days, I see plenty of drones going in and out as they please. But they may have been reacting to me taking some honey the day before. I made a mistake in shaking the bees from the honey frame outside the hive. The bees hit the ground and huddled together in the leaves on the ground there. They didn't know what to do, or to fly off and go in the hive. So I grabbed the bees and leaves and put it in front of the hive. Yes, I was in white, gloved, and veiled. I didn't get all of the bees, and left after finishing up.

The next day, after the rain, I found some ghost white bee carcases on the ground. The ants where starting to eat. The bees died there. I don't know if they turned white as a result of the rain, if the ants attacked and killed them, or what. But I strongly suspect that the honey tenders and nurse bees are generally so young that they don't know how to fly, or where to go if they end up outside the hive. They are 'inside bees', and don't know how to live outside the hive yet. So they stayed there and died. The bodies looked full, but white. I suspect that is the protein degrading. Lesson learned.

I also think that the day I got stung, the forager bees had come back because they knew it was going to rain too. When they found the crevice and knew the rain was coming, they were anxiously working to seal the crack I created as a propolis trap. They also lost some honey that they work so hard for. They were angry and protecting their hive when I came along, thus they ran me off.

It is possible that the neighbor hit the top cover with his soccer ball, and that's why the cover shifted. That would make the bees angry for sure. I have a hard time imagining that the bees had some how shifted the top in trying to address the crevice I created, but is it possible???

Oh well. Just trying to catch up on the many things I've learned in the last 10 weeks. Wow, they have made gallons of honey in just 10 weeks. I estimate that I've taken 2 gallons total, and they have a couple more that I left. I'll have to explain my first honey extraction another time. Good night.

1st Post

So this is a late start to a BeeKeeping journal, but oh well.

I decided to keep bees this year in January. Ordered, built, painted, and otherwise prepped the new hive for a package of bees, which I installed on March 28, 2010. Today is June 13. I harvested about a gallon and a half of honey last weekend, and took a full frame of honey today. I also found out last week that a friend has breast cancer, and immediately jumped into a study of propolis, and made a propolis tincture. I bought a propolis tincture from a health foods store for comparison, and gave her both yesterday.

This journal is an effort to put my observations down as I learn. What will become second nature to me over time, will surely be harder to relay to others as I become more 'expert' on the subject. It will also help me remember and learn from what I observed.

Surely, my own personality and personal life will enter some post. This is my personal journal and I feel free to do so. In some ways, this will save me the trouble of explaining to people around me some of the many things they aren't interested in.

I'm happy to promote anything that will benefit beekeeping, and may mention public personalities in the field. Though I have no interest in promoting anyone or anything for benefit outside of beekeeping. That's not the purpose here. I intend to keep private people private. And people who establish themselves publicly, surely won't mind a good mention anyway. I will never speak negatively of anyone. I'm finding that to be a good policy for life in general.

So with a tad of background done and a sort of purpose for this blog established, I'll excuse myself for a moment with an explanation of why. I'm a paper-pusher for 40 hours a week, and am working on an MBA degree by taking 2 classes a semester. Motorcycling is a hobby I started 5 years ago, but it has taken a back seat in life over the last two years. General housekeeping, classes, work, homework/study, socializing, and hobbies keep me moving at a good pace. And now, it is time to invest some more time in schoolwork.