71 replies to this topic

[ConcordAntman]

Since they know I’ve had a lifelong interest in social insects, our kids gave me this for Christmas, an 8-frame hive complete with hive managing tools and a full bee-suit!

The tin clad outer cover is for insulation, the inner cover encloses the frames.

 

I’m assembling the frames here. The black foundation material is embossed with a hexagonal pattern for the workers to build out.

Here are the frames in place. 

 

I’m 4 weeks into my 5 week beekeeping course and have a 3 lb “package” of bees with a marked queen ordered for delivery April 10th. I’ll keep you posted on how this turns out. 

[Flu1d]

Wow, this is gonna be really cool to watch as it goes along! Was always curious about one of these online buys, can't wait to watch!

[ConcordAntman]

So, I’ve completed my beekeeping course and my bees arrive April 10th. We’ve learned about the bee’s life cycle, the bee’s nutritional needs, apiary pathogens, and hive maintenance. Of the 4 ways to start a bee colony (capture a swarm, purchase an established colony, purchase a nuclear colony, purchase a 3-5 lb package of bees and a queen), my instructor recommended a 3 pound package and a marked queen as the most instructive for a new beekeeper. The bee package as opposed to the other options, does not have brood or stored honey so starting from scratch, the colony must be fed. The setup requires a brood box that will eventually house the colony with brood, pollen, and honey and an empty medium box to hold the syrup feeder. The colony will need to be fed until enough is in bloom to support a good nectar flow. Here you see the 8-frame brood box with the empty medium “honey” super on top. 
 

 

This is with the top feeder installed

 

 

Here the setup is on its hive stand in our yard

 

 

With the inner cover

 

 

And outer cover in place. The stand helps to keep raiding insects or animals out and the rock on top prevents anything from tipping the hive over.

 

 

All that’s left is for an enterprising beginner to get this project started. Stay tuned!

 

 

[Ernteameise]

This is so exciting!
My granddad was a bee keeper and I was always absolutely fascinated. And loved the honey.
Good luck! I hope there will be plenty of flowers in the spring and I look forward to more updates.

[Flu1d]

Let's go! I remember when I lived in Oregon, how many bees I would see regularly. The first time I heard the swarm, I was like "That sounds crazy, I'd better get inside!". However, after a while, you get used to it and it's actually kinda peaceful.

I think, if one day I have enough land, that I might do one of these online kits myself.

[Daniel]

Excellent! Good luck!

[DRpepper]

If you have any questions at all ask me. I've been beekeeping for 4 years.

[ConcordAntman]

If you have any questions at all ask me. I've been beekeeping for 4 years.

I’m fortunate enough to have my beekeeping instructor house his hives about 5 minutes from our house. I expect to be picking his and your brains for timely advice as issues arise. Thanks DRpepper your offer is greatly appreciated! 

[ConcordAntman]

Yesterday was the big day, my package arrived! I’d spent the previous week preparing. The hive was positioned with a top feeder in place. After feeding my ant colonies and tending our bird feeders, I spent the morning mixing and cooling a gallon of 1:1 sugar syrup and a quart of Reishi mushroom “tea” (the tea colored liquid).

 

My beekeeping instructor has experimental evidence that Reishi or Chaga mushroom mixtures in the sugar syrup can actually be mite and virus repellents for A. mellifera.

 

I was so excited to pick up my bees that I forgot to take pictures! I realized I hadn’t brought gloves or any protective gear. When I arrived, there was just a small trailer with a woman in a bee suit. The trailer was filled with bee packages with more packages on the pavement. There was a sparse cloud of bees flying around. She asked my name, checked a roster and promptly handed me my package of 10,000 bees and a queen. I loaded them in the back of my car and headed home with the sound of buzzing bees in the background.

I commenced to installing the package once I got home. I put the package in a shed and sprayed them with the Reishi/syrup mixture while I prepped the hive. 

I took off the top feeder and removed some of the frames so I could more easily “pour” the package. 

 

 

Then I sprayed the frames with the Reishi/syrup mix to encourage the bees to take residence.

 

Now for the installation. 

 

After again spraying down the package, I pried off the top panel, quickly lifted the syrup can, and removed the queen cage. I’d ordered a marked queen. I checked her health and set her aside. 

 

 

 

 

Another spray and a few bangs on the ground disloged the swarm. I poured them into the brood box, gently replaced the sprayed frames, tucked the unplugged queen cage between the frames, filled the top feeder with a syrup/mushroom tea mixture, and buttoned up the hive. An apparently uncomplicated installation!

 

 

 

 

 

 

I went out this morning to add some mixture to the top feeder and came upon a disturbing unexpected find. The queen had been killed and dragged out!

 

 

The vendor suspects there is a second queen in the package and the marked one was killed. I’ll be checking for brood over the next few days. If there’s no brood, they’ll replace the queen. Not the way I hoped to start…

 

 

 

[ANTdrew]

Oh no! That’s terrible. I hope they replace your queen ASAP.

[DRpepper]

 

If you have any questions at all ask me. I've been beekeeping for 4 years.

I’m fortunate enough to have my beekeeping instructor house his hives about 5 minutes from our house. I expect to be picking his and your brains for timely advice as issues arise. Thanks DRpepper your offer is greatly appreciated! 

 

Your welcome sir. I would wait longer then a couple days though. wait like 5-7 to see if there is a queen in the package. The same thing happend to me when i bought bees last year. In any case i would try to get a free queen from the seller for a future split 

Edited by DRpepper, April 11 2023 - 12:15 PM.

[Ernteameise]

Oh no. What a bummer.

Hope you have a second queen, and if not, that you get a free replacement.

[Flu1d]

Very cool process, thank you for all of the great pictures and detailed explanations! I am sorry to hear about your queen, I am hoping that it turns out they accidently had an extra queen in there and that's all it is. I look forward to the updates.

[dspdrew]

Interesting read. They can just swap out a queen in a colony that big?

[DRpepper]

Interesting read. They can just swap out a queen in a colony that big?

yes with proper methods.

[ConcordAntman]

Interesting read. They can just swap out a queen in a colony that big?

Sorry just seeing this, between my ants, our bird feeders, and now my bees, I’m pretty busy! As DRpepper said, queen exchanges do occur. In a fully functioning colony, an unexpected death causes the workers to create an “emergency queen” by increased feeding of royal jelly to an early instar larva. In the case of a queen in poor health, the colony can supersede the queen in the same fashion while killing the reigning queen once the new queen ecloses. Finally, in an overcrowded hive, workers create queen cells (larger irregularly oriented cells usually at the bottom of frames) in preparation for the reigning queen to swarm taking a significant fraction of the hive. 
 

In my case, I don’t yet have a fully functioning hive. Going back to the ways to start a colony, catching a swarm, getting someone else’s functioning hive, or buying a nuclear hive, all have the components of a full hive; a mated, laying queen, workers, brood, stored honey, and pollen (or in the case of the swarm, bees full stomachs with knowledge of the resources in the area). A 3 lb package of bees (what I purchased) is 10,000-12,000 workers from a colony bred for sale paired with a random mated queen (not their founder) also batch bred for sale. There’s no brood, no stored honey, or pollen. In theory, from the time the package is assembled until it’s installed, the workers “forget” their original hives’ smell and accept the new queen. Sometimes they don’t. With no brood to make an emergency queen and no fertilized worker, no eggs or colony unless you get another queen. 

[ConcordAntman]

A New Hope (with apologies to George Lucas )!

Once I’d noted the demise of the queen, at the vendor’s instruction I planned to inspect the hive in a day or two for brood. I emailed my beekeeping course instructor Mel, and he generously offered to come over to help since he keeps his hives nearby. As a retired physician, I saw it as a house call and final exam combined. Considering I’d managed to get the queen killed in less than a day, I hope he’d give me a gentleman’ s Bee at least!

 

At about 10 am yesterday, Mel came over and we inspected the hive. 

 

We found no brood but I was surprised that in less than 24 hours they’d started to build out comb. 

 

 

After a quick call to my vendor, New England Beekeeping, I headed off to pick up my replacement queen, this time with pictures! The Colony, AKA New England Beekeeping is about 35 minutes from my house. It has a full complement of beekeeping equipment. They also carry a variety of honey and even brew their own mead!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now to get milady and her attendants back home and in the hive.

 

 

Time to unbutton the hive again. Mel advised me that my bees are quite docile. Since I thought this would be a quick peek I didn’t wear the pants to my bee suit or gloves. I find the gloves make it tough to handle the tools and it was a tad too cumbersome to pull on the pants for a quick peek (note, elastic at the ankles keeps bees from finding access to pant legs!). Considering I’ve only been at this 2 days, I haven’t been stung yet but common sense argues to wear protective gloves and pants to prevent stung fingers or at worst, inflamed private parts

 

 

 

 

Here you can see the top feeder in action. There’s openings under the screen in the center bar that allows the bees to fly up from the frames. They can walk down the screen to the syrup, drink, and fly back down to the hive frames. No escapes, no drowned bees!

 

 

Ok, a confession is due here. It was my nubie error. I had inadvertently unplugged the wrong side of my first queen’s queen cage resulting in her immediate release to the hive and killing by 10,000 workers that hadn’t forgotten the “smell” of their founding queen. In retrospect, I sure wished the original cage had been labeled like this one…

 

 

 

 

After hanging the new queen cage on a center frame, again I got things buttoned up. Let me add a word of thanks to my wife who in addition to taking most of these shots from a safe distance, allows me to feed ants at the kitchen table and keep cricket and Dubia roaches in our freezer. Thanks for letting me indulge my hobbies for the past 44 years!

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by ConcordAntman, April 13 2023 - 5:48 AM.

[DRpepper]

 

Interesting read. They can just swap out a queen in a colony that big?

Sorry just seeing this, between my ants, our bird feeders, and now my bees, I’m pretty busy! As DRpepper said, queen exchanges do occur. In a fully functioning colony, an unexpected death causes the workers to create an “emergency queen” by increased feeding of royal jelly to an early instar larva. In the case of a queen in poor health, the colony can supersede the queen in the same fashion while killing the reigning queen once the new queen ecloses. Finally, in an overcrowded hive, workers create queen cells (larger irregularly oriented cells usually at the bottom of frames) in preparation for the reigning queen to swarm taking a significant fraction of the hive. 
 

In my case, I don’t yet have a fully functioning hive. Going back to the ways to start a colony, catching a swarm, getting someone else’s functioning hive, or buying a nuclear hive, all have the components of a full hive; a mated, laying queen, workers, brood, stored honey, and pollen (or in the case of the swarm, bees full stomachs with knowledge of the resources in the area). A 3 lb package of bees (what I purchased) is 10,000-12,000 workers from a colony bred for sale paired with a random mated queen (not their founder) also batch bred for sale. There’s no brood, no stored honey, or pollen. In theory, from the time the package is assembled until it’s installed, the workers “forget” their original hives’ smell and accept the new queen. Sometimes they don’t. With no brood to make an emergency queen and no fertilized worker, no eggs or colony unless you get another queen. 

 

i count say it better myself. 

[Ernteameise]

How exciting, love reading about your progress. And thank you for sharing all these pictures.

Hope the new queen quickly takes over!

 

And what a neat bee keeping store you have there!

[ConcordAntman]

I did a queen inspection April 15. It had been 3 days since I’d installed the new queen and I wanted to check to see if she had been released. From here, it didn’t seem she’d been released!

 

 

It’s been a week since she was installed and it doesn’t look like the sugar candy has been eaten away yet. The bees are filling 2-3 frames and building out comb on 1-2. There’s honey in some of the cells near the top bar. You can even see some bee bread in the comb on the backside of the frame with the queen cage.

 

 

 

The queen is still in her cage. Since we’re having a string of cooler days coming up, I’ll plan a re-check later in the week. If she hasn’t been released by then, I’ll release her. 

 

Edited by ConcordAntman, April 19 2023 - 7:14 PM.