Banana Report

A few weeks ago I put a banana in my hives to see if this would help with the chalkbrook issues in all three hives. Our big hive, Sun's, got a whole banana and the other two each got a half.

Well this is Serenity's hive- this was the split we did earlier this year. You can still see the blackened peel at the top and bottom. There was a PILE of chalkbrood mummies on the bottom of this hive. The bees were doing a great job of cleaning them out of the frames, just not out of the hive.

The banana peels had mold on them and looked nasty. Yech, but I will tell you that two out of three hives are looking pretty chalkbrood free. I am now wondering if we need to move the third hive to a sunnier location as they still have wicked chalkbrood. Sigh.

So will I do this again- sure it didn't hurt the bees and along with better ventilation, might help. It certainly didn't hurt the bees.

Along with all this crazy chalkbrood I have been waiting for the bees to supercede Sun. She's three years old and is starting to lay in a patchy pattern. Perhaps my talk to the bees worked because what to my wondering eyes should appear today but a new queen. She was camera shy so I only got an iffy shot but like her mum, she's all golden. She is lighter than Sun but she has no marks on her abdomen.

Serendipity- our swarm hive- is building slowly. Partly this is the chalkbrood but I think they are just not in a good location. They are off the bee deck (my hives sit on a deck originally built for a hot tub) and it just might be too cool.

Getting Stung

I got stung last week while I was checking a fellow beekeeper's hives while he was out of town. This is a critical time of year for many hives with lots of swarms and supercedures (replacing the queen). His hives looked good but on the last hive check I got stung. 

My ankle swelled up so more that it did when I was pregnant and it was very hard to move.  This is a fairly typical response to bee stings for me and a number of other beekeepers I know. 

I've been asked lots of times if I get stung often and truthfully I do not. This was the third time I've been stung in three years - yes, once a year is my average lately. Given that I am in my hives about every 10 days from March to November, I am feeling really good about that. 

How do I not get stung often?

I am calm around my bees and pay attention to the moment. It is a very meditative experience for me. I do wear gloves and a veil but they are more as an aid to me to remind me to be in the moment. My gloves don't get stung either. 

What do I do when I get stung?

First, I take out the stinger. I usually use my fingernail to make sure I have it out. The venom is excreted in less than two minutes, so be quick.

Then, if possible, I chew plantain leaves and get them on the sting. Plantain grows in most people's yards and looks like spinach. This can help to neutralize the venom.

Finally, I use spray antihistamine to relive the itch. The itch is primarily from the swelling, so if you don't have it, don't use it.

Bananas!

I did feel a bit bananas to be putting bananas in my hive. As a beekeeper for just over five years, I have been hearing for just over five years not to eat bananas before going into the hives because the smell of bananas is very very similar to the alarm pheromone of bees. Twice I have smelled the banana oil alarm and packed everything up and left the bees within moments. The smell is quite distinctive and I am sure that I reeked of my own alarm pheromones at that point as well. 

So it was no surprise when a fellow beekeeper suggested I give my hives bananas to help them with the chalkbrood that I thought he was bananas. Nonetheless, I decided to give it a try. This is the top of Sun's hive and since there are LOADS of bees in that hive, they got a whole banana, sliced in quarters atop the frames. The other two hives split a banana.

How did the bees respond to this unorthodox use of fruit?  They were very curious. They crawled all over the fruit but didn't act alarmed or fly around. 

Why does this work?  All my research online and in books suggest this may work by triggering a cleaning behavior in the bees. When they finish with the strange fruit in the hive, they may continue to clean out the infected brood. Honestly no one really knows and no scientists have tracked it either. The state bee inspector was very curious and agreed to recheck the hives later this summer.

Can this lead to some scientific proof? No, for two reasons. First I treated all three hives so there is no control. 

Second, I also removed the mouse guards from the two hives that still had them in place - so I also increased the ventilation. Serendipity's hive only has a partial  entrance reducer so I left that on for now. I wanted to make it as easy as possible for the bees to remove the infected larvae. 

Time will tell.

Annual Inspection Report

I contacted the bee inspector and asked him to check the hives. I've been seeing chalk brood in the hives lately which is normal here in this area in the spring. Unfortunately  the chalk brood is getting worse not better. And it has advanced to a serious level.

Chalk brood, what is that? I hear you say.

It is a nasty little infection in hives that kills the larva. If it is bad enough, more babies die than become adults and a hive dies. And we are in a bad way here.

Now some bees - or I should say some hives - just seem to deal with it and keep it at bay. My girls are having trouble doing this. Could be there just aren't enough hive-keeping bees or mortician bees to remove the corpses. Some hives just are better at getting rid of dead bees than others.

It is important to get the bodies out quickly so they are less likely to continue to give off the disease. However it is still in the wax.

Soo what can I do?  Truthfully, not a lot. The bees need to knock this out themselves. I have heard of a folk remedy which I am going to try tomorrow. But regardless, if you have a moment, wish the bees well and hope that a good nectar flow starts here soon. The stronger the bees are, the better they can fight this infection. Time will tell and in the next few months the story will fully unfold.

Other than wicked bad chalk brood, the hives look fine. The inspector and I found two of the queens. And I got to not only see Serenity but I held her. It was a huge moment for me. She is soo beautiful. She looks exactly like the honeybee queen from all the books.

Sunshine showed herself too and she is still just as golden red as always. She's clearly getting older and I expect the bees will supercede her soon. Her laying pattern is still good but not as good as it was last year. She is starting to leave a few holes every now and again. This could be due to chalk brood or her age. Not sure yet what is going to happen, but something is going to happen.

Very mixed report this year and lots to watch. I learned so much this year. I really felt ready and open to all the knowledge that the inspector had to offer. Go bees!

Five days later

Five days later, I get a call from the fabulous Rob who is off at some family function. He had gotten a call from the police that someone had reported another swarm. Did I want them, he asked.

Well, OF COURSE! It is just me this time and my wonderful handy husband screwed some wooden ware together for me so it would be easier to manipulate alone and off  I go - me, a box, brush cutters and LOTS of bungee cords.

The address I was given must give the postal carrier heartburn. There are two houses with the same number on that street. So here I am, in full bee gear, knocking on the wrong door. Friend to bees and nice person she was, she directed me to the bees. I see a few small balls of bees - hardly worth coming over for. Nonetheless, I gather these poor girls.

Then the other family at that house number, but in a different house, came to see what was going on. They had been the ones to call. As I am ambling over to say hello, I pass a ball of bees about the size of a basketball. Oh, THOSE are the bees!

They had been up in a tree, but thankfully had fallen. Into a brush pile. On a down hill slope. It took a while to get all the bees. It was like a giant game of pick up sticks. I had to cut the branches into little sections and carry them to the box. Shake the bees in and I stacked the brush next to the box.

Once I had the queen, the bees settled a lot. It took about an hour from start to finish. I bungeed the hive in the back of the truck and drove home slowly chuckling to myself. If only the guy in the red truck behind me knew why I was driving slowly, he probably wouldn't have tailgated me.

So now we have three hives and it will take some time to readjust the bee-deck to accommodate all three. In the mean time, here is the set up.

The new queen - is Serendipity.

Swarm Season

 I got a call two weeks ago from a local beekeeper who works at town hall. There was a swarm outside the second story window and could I come help him get the bees. Of course!  It would be my first swarm and his too. This is what it looked like when I got there. It was pretty high up, but so far that we couldn't manage. 

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After a ladder and some clippers were secured, Rob pulled the branch down over the box, I clipped the last 2 feet of the branch off, and shook the bees into their new temporary home.

Clearly we had the queen and she was safely in the hive. All the bees not already in the hive, began to circle the box and soon moved in. Rob switched out the wooden ware and the bees are in their new home happily making babies.

Guess what happened five days later?

Mentoring

I love putting in packages of bees. It is such a fun experience. Here is what a package of bees looks like. The small box in front holds about 3 lbs of bees, a queen and a can of sugar water. We have to get those bees out, install the queen properly and close the big box behind - without getting stung.

That is the plan. It worked out pretty close to plan as well. These are Owen's bees. The only hitch we had was that the tab holding the queen broke and she fell into the mass of bees making it a bit harder to install her cage properly.  Thank goodness for duct tape is all I am going to say.

Owen did a tremendously good job with this. It is a scary thing to do the first time. However the moment it is over, you just want to do it again! Over the next week or so the bees will chew the sugar candy holding the queen in her cage and they will start building wax. It will be a thing of beauty.

And before any experienced beekeepers out there have a cow, he did paint his other box and swap these frames into that box.

Go bees!