Christmas Spirit

Having fun with Christmas decorations and the camera today. These were temporary decorations, if I'm really good, I'll do better and get some "outside" decorations.
















Pretty as they are, I hate to admit that I've left my smokers out in the weather. Might be time to put them away, huh?

Varroa Mite Saga: A Quick Sugar Shake (Part 3)

So my traditional hive has mites, and I'm freaking out that it might be a pretty bad infestation just before going into the winter. This makes no sense. It's so unfair. I did everything I was supposed to do.


So I rationalize. Maybe it's not so bad. Maybe it's just that one frame. Then I start thinking about how long I'll have to wait to find out. Spring. Just when I would want my bees to be bringing home the bacon, er, honey, that's when the mite load will explode and they will murder my poor, defenseless bees.


Ok, maybe that's a bit extreme (ya think?). But the real problem is that I'll worry all winter. It's just not worth it.

The problem is, it's too cold to do much. Hmm, better to do something that may help...or at the least allow the delusion that it helped. So I wait for a 65 degree day, put the screened bottom board (SBB) back on, and do a sugar shake again.

In this picture, I have just finished putting confectioners sugar (aka powdered sugar) between each frame. I put the sugar in a jar, then I shake about a half cup at a time into a small sieve. This allows for pretty good control, and I can do it with my veil and gloves on.



Here is one of the frames right after the dusting. The poor bees hate this, but mites fall off immediately, so maybe some of them like it. Yaaaahhhh, that's the ticket. They know it helps and they like it! Or at any rate, it's natural, the sugar provides food, and I don't think it hurts.

I needed the SBB because I don't want the excess sugar and mites sitting on the bottom board, where the former will attract pests and the latter will find their way back onto the bees.


I was grossed out to see how many mites there were. This white picture is actually a piece of construction paper that I put under the screen. And this picture was taken right after the sugar shake. I noticed that I didn't get nearly as many 24 hours later, so it seems like most of the benefit of the sugar shake happens immediately.







Last but not least, here is what happened after I was done. A few bees were outside the hive when I did the sugar shake. They didn't seem to want to go back in and were festooning outside. Too much work to help clean off the the white bees I guess. Well, I showed them. I threw sugar on them.

Hey, it's for their own good, right?

Varroa Mite Saga and Deformed Wing Virus (Part 2)

According to my records, I did a varroa mite check on September 20th and found one mite. I actually did a lot more checks and found more mites over a 72 hour period, but still very few.

On October 10th, I removed the screened bottom boards (SBBs), replaced with solid boards, and converted my hives to top entrances, for reasons I won't go into here. I was ready for winter, or so I thought.

On November 9th, I had a mess. I had decided to do one more check of my hives to try to add dry sugar and fix the bottom boards. But that went out the window.

As I approached the traditional hive (the one with foundation), I heard a dull roar. The bees were loud, all over the place, and something was obviously wrong. I watched them for a few minutes to make sure they weren't being robbed. I ran down to my other hive to make sure they weren't robbing it. No and no.

So I went in. I was horrified to find bees with deformed wing virus (DWV). Just a few, which isn't horrible according to people with far more expertise than I, but disturbing nonetheless.

And that wasn't the least of it. I took a few pictures. Only a few because of course the camera battery died.

Later, when I looked at my five pictures, I saw 3 mites in one picture. Over the last 6 months, I have looked and looked for mites in my thousands of pictures, and have never seen a single one...until now.

Here's the picture. The longer arrow points to a bee with deformed wing virus. The three shorter arrows point to mites.

As I researched VFW, I mean DWV, I found out that the virus is carried by varroa mites, so what I really have is a mite problem. DWV might actually be a good thing as it alerted me to a problem. (And hopefully I wont need the VFW.)

I probably over-reacted. That is the subject of the Part 3 (next post).

Varroa Mite Saga (Part 1)

Back in September, I did "the right thing." I was so proud of myself, little miss dudley doo-right had built new screened bottom boards (SBB) and had both hives sitting on them.

My SBBs are so easy to use when I want to check for mites. I just spray Pam on some construction paper, slide it under the board, then come back 24-72 hours later and examine it.

On my first try, I could barely wait. I think I waited 23 hours before I grabbed that construction paper and found no mites!

Hmmm, what's that spot? One mite. Can you see it?

Here's a close up, thanks to my trusty camera with the great macro lens. Used to be my boyfriend's camera but now it has propolis all over it and, well, he faced facts before I did. The fact that I'm probably buying him his next camera.

Is this thing ugly or what? But only one is great news. Until the beeks told me to do a 72 hour test. Crap. Luckily, my hives passed that test, too. Maybe less than ten mites on the whole sheet.

Still, I decided to do a sugar dusting just to further reduce the mites. I only did one dusting per hive, as it was just a prophylactic treatment.

This was September. In October, I took off the SBBs for winter, put the hives on solid boards, and to top entrances. Note that one hive is mostly foundationless and the other is mostly on foundation. The foundationless is theoretically more resistant to mites.

So everything was good in the garden. And I thought I was done for the Fall.

The hives are both young and small, and I keep checking their honey stores. So I did what I hoped was one last check in November. Can you say "population explosion?"

Feeding in Late Summer/Fall

At some point, you have to switch to 2:1 sugar syrup or dry sugar. I guess this is because you want the queen to stop laying and the bees to use their comb to build honey supplies. What I am doing now is dry sugar (granulated).

I think my bees were starving. I put about 4 pounds of dry sugar in, and it was gone in 5 days. I put another 4 pounds in, and much of it was still there 4 days later. So the poor bees were stressed. Feels like it's been one long dearth around here this summer.

I feed inside the hive, on top of the frames. You can put newspaper down and then the sugar on that. Instead of newspaper, I have been using the paper wrapper that the sugar comes in. It's double width, and the bees tear through the paper pretty quick. I don't want the granulated sugar to fall through to the screen below, so I use a lot of paper. I also like to reuse stuff as much as possible, and of course I don't get a paper anymore. So it's either the sugar wrapper or printer paper for my bees. Or maybe some junk mail.

When feeding dry sugar, you need to get it wet to clump it up. You can use a sprayer, but I've found that this is a great use for used coffee containers. I put the sugar in, add water, put the lid on, and shake until it's clumped up. Then I have a nice container to haul to the hives, and to store any left over sugar.

Right now I'm being bad. I have both dry sugar and 1:1 syrup in my hives. I really need them to draw more comb as they need sufficient honey stores to survive the winter, and they need more comb to store the honey in. Judging from past experiences, I'm sure this will be a disaster. Oh well, another week another hard lesson in the bee biz.

How Much to Feed? Spring and Early Summer Feeding

Turns out, I have been underfeeding my bees. Unfortunately, it's late in the season. So for any newbees out there next year that might have questions on feeding, here are some tidbits that I had to learn the hard way. Maybe I read them and missed the details, but more likely the info was so scattered that I never put it all together correctly. So here's my shot at putting it all together:

For new/young packages
1. When feeding syrup, feed 1:1 ratio in the Spring and early Summer as the bees are much more likely to build comb when they have this light syrup. Feed a LOT. By 1:1, just use a measuring cup, e.g. 8 cups of water to 8 cups of sugar. Use granulated sugar. Do not use confectioners/powdered sugar, brown sugar, or anything else. Plain boring old granulated. Bring the water to a boil, turn off the heat, then add the sugar. Stir constantly until you can't see the crystals, about 2 minutes. Cool completely. If you leave it on the stove overnight to cool, cover it. One-to-one sugar water goes bad more quickly than two-to-one, but it will still last a couple of weeks.

2. Feed inside the hive. Put an empty (that is, with no frames) medium super on top of the hive super. You will put the feed directly on top of the frames of the hive super. Then the empty medium super, then the inner cover, then the telescoping cover.

3. You can feed in ziploc baggies or jars.
JARS: The problem with jars is that you can't feed that much. I put in multiple, short wide mouth canning jars (with small nail holes poked in lids). Four cups of syrup might be gone in 4-5 days, and they need much more.
ZIPLOC BAGS: I found that even the name brands can leak around the seal. If you use ziplocs, seal multiple times and test to make sure it doesn't leak. Then when I put it in the hive, I lean the ziploc end against the inside wall so it's elevated. Also, be careful with poking holes in the Ziplocs. Don't overdo it.

4. Don't worry about the "organic nature" of the hive and whether you should feed or not. You need to get your bees started before you can worry about that. Dead bees aren't going to make you feel better about going natural.

5. Bees do tend to draw out comb faster in foundationless frames. This is one component of a natural hive that you can do now. But make sure the hive is level. Otherwise you'll have to destroy some of the comb. Also, if you go for natural beekeeping, don't just go frameless. Get familiar with IPM, or Integrated Pest Management. (I say that and I sure haven't done enough in that regard.)

6. Keep hive shut tight enough to prevent robbing. You can put a thin (1/2") rock between the inner cover and the telescoping cover to add ventilation, but no more. When it gets hot and the bees are on the outside of the hive washboarding, know that this is normal. Don't be stupid and open up the top to aid ventilation. That would just be dumber than dumb. Otherwise, you'll quickly learn what "robbing" looks like, as I did.

Robber Barons and the War of the Roses

This week, my hives are called York and Lancaster. York is currently in power.

Yesterday, York got greedy.

I'd noticed that the hives hadn't produced any new comb since I slowed down the feed, so we must be in a dearth. I fed the bees, putting large ziplocs full of sugar water inside each hive. Then I put small slits in the tops of the baggies.

Three hours later, I noticed a surge in activity outside York. This hive is visible from my back deck, a useful setup for a newbeekeeper.

They seemed fairly organized. They were bunching up in front of the hive, flying in tight circles by the entrance as if there was a backup on the landing pad.

As I watched them, I realized that the bees leaving the hive had changed their path...from a straight flight path across the valley to one of three new paths: up and to the west, down into the valley and to the west, or straight into the trees just west of the hive. You guessed it--Lancaster is to the west, and down in the valley. I ran down to check out my other hive (formerly known as the "natural" hive).

Sure enough, it was busier, too. But there was no organization. More like a circus with all the acts going at once. Bees flying around the front of the hive, bees flying around the whole hive in a big circle, bees flying straight up 30 feet above the hive and then straight down again. There was even a cirle of bees flying 30 feet above the hive. It was like hula hoops of bees going every which way. And bees were entering the top and bottom of the hive at an alarming rate.

As I snuck up, I saw dead bees at the hive entrance, and in the weeds in front of the hive.

This hive was clearly being robbed. And I knew who the robbers were. The other hive, and now newly christened Yorks. (I may be reading too many novels about medieval times.)

I waited until early the next day and shut both hives down, closing top entrances and putting a cleat in the bottom entrance. The cleat shrinks the entrance, allowing the Lancasters a smaller gate so they have less real estate to protect from intruders.

Nowhere is it written that I should do anything to the robber bees, but I shrunk their gate as well. Might as well make it difficult for them!

Seemed to work. Activity slowed at both hives. Today, before I added more feed, I watched the Lancasters. They were bringing in lots of pollen (but no nectar), so I guess all is well. After all, when the castle is under siege, the farmers are fighting, not working.

Maybe I won't have to paint the Lancaster's hive red.

Doin' the Two Step

It's been hot out here, in the nineties and humid as all get out. My poor bees seemed really stressed, they were on the outside of the hive doing what beekeepers call washboarding. If you watch this video, you can see why they call it that. They moved back and forth, just doing the two-step. It's as though they are cleaning the outside of the hive, or maybe a line dance. Not much is known about why bees do this, but mine have been doing it since it got hot and humid. Of course, we are also in a dearth (lack of nectar producing flowers).






Naturally, I was concerned with my beekeeping skills. Slumlord that I am, I apparently wasn't providing sufficient a/c. So I increased ventilation by putting a good 1/2 inch vent between the top super and inner cover. Previously, I had a vent between the inner and top cover but this didn't allow much ventilation.

I was so proud of myself! The bees kept washboarding, but they looked happier with all that ventilation. And there seemed to be fewer of them on the outside of the hive.

This is what is called "projecting." Turns out, I was happier. But I was about to learn about robbing behavior.

Trouble in Paradise?

Turns out everything is fine.

I was concerned when I looked in the natural hive. After reviewing the pictures, I found some dark cells and dark larvae, as well as some larvae that seemed mushy. Apparently, though, as the bees reuse the cells, they get darker.














I also noted that some of the capped cells were turning a greyish color, as at the top of this frame. However, that is just the older larvae that are about to hatch. I was excited to catch a couple of bees just emerging in this picture, too! They are just north of center, where the greyer cells begin.

Living in La-La Land

I decided that the best way to calm my bees down was to fill the goldfinch feeders that sit next to the hive. I can't find anything on the web that talks about locating bird feeders next to bee hives; but then again I am afraid to click on most links that come up when searching on the birds and the bees.

Having all those birds flitting about the hive is beautiful and entertaining to watch from my kitchen window. And it seems like the hive did calm down a bit.

Bees Are Getting Testy

My traditional hive is decidedly less pleasant.

When I first went in, they were noisy.

I had a veil on and was smoking the heck out of them. As I was working them, I thought maybe I should put on my gloves. Just then, a bee stung my knuckle. Hmmm, should have listened to my intuition. So I ran and put on my gloves.

Then, as I was pulling frames closer to the center of the brood, a bunch of bees flew out and were flying in circles around me, buzzing loudly. I walked away, smoker in hand, and blew smoke all around me. The bees went back to the hive. I approached the hive and they stayed put.

But every time I tried to pull a frame, a bunch of bees, maybe 50-100, would fly out of the hive and buzz me, doing circles around my head. They didn't land on me, but they seemed to be flying right in front of my face, telling me to GET LOST.

I took the hint and abandoned operations for that day.

Next day, I went back in. This time, I made sure I wasn't over-smoking the bees. I managed to pull the last three frames, but they were still decidedly unpleasant. The hive is stonger, filled out 7 of 10 frames in a deep. They have more honey to protect, so maybe this is normal and I'm just not used to bees? Or perhaps the new queen is laying a more stressed out bee?

I have two foundationless frames that I added a couple of weeks ago, and one of those is drawn out. I had to cut a piece of crazy comb off one end and rubber band it into a new frame, but that went well.

While this "free comb" was laying on top of the frames, the queen crawled onto it. Glad I checked it, and I'm really glad I have a marked queen so I didn't drop her during the rubber banding procedure.

Also, the brood pattern is beautiful. So the hive is stronger, but hotter, too. I hope I don't have a mean hive brewing.

After all this, I checked out my other hive, and it was calm and enjoyable by comparison. When does the steep slope of this learning curve start to level out?

Foundationless Stick-to-it-iveness

Ahhh, the messiness of the foundationless hive. After applying the triple fix, I waited ten days to reinspect. I only found minor improvements. Even though a reader named Grumpy had prepared me for this, disappointment and frustration ensued. I understood the Grumpy moniker! Little Miss Perfection was not getting everything her heart desired. Luckily, perfection and obsession seek each other out (not to mention organization).

How does the saying go, "When in doubt, try, try again?" I think I'm learning that with Foundationless, a little stick-to-it attitude is important. And after cutting out comb, everything is sticky indeed.

So I continue with the three fixes:
1) Push comb around to straighten it
2) Cut out comb and put in rubber banded frames
3) Move frames around to alternate foundationless with foundation.

This Just Might Work
After another two weeks I reinspected, and WHOOHOO things are looking up.

I am now feeling much better about this hive. I have some frames with the most gorgeous, straight, foundationless comb. As any frizzy-haired girl knows, straight is where it's at. I've spent my whole life pursuing straight. No stinkin' hive is going to best me, at least not yet.

Of course, it's still not perfect. But there is a silver lining to every cloud. In this case, it is the opportunity to take better pictures of the rubber banding method.

Here is a picture of the rubber banded frame with no comb in it (with popsicle sticks glued in to the top to provide a guide for the bees). In the next picture, you can see the comb in the frame. As a new beekeeper, I'm sure there are other methods, but this is working pretty well for me. I pull the rubber bands apart to drop the comb in. Before I do this, I'm careful to lay the cut comb on top of the frames, in case the queen is on the comb (I actually found her on it, and had to shake her into the hive before putting the comb into the frames...don't want to accidentally drop her in the grass). Also, I probably don't act quickly enough, and thus am a little worried about chilled brood. But judging by the sweat dripping down my neck, the days are plenty warm.

As an aside, a close up of some of the rubber-banded comb reveals an unusually nice picture (for me) of larvae and eggs. The green tinge worried me a bit, but I think it's just the green grass in the background.

Does rubber banding work?

This frame used to have rubber bands on it (you can see the lines at the top where the bees stuck propolis between the rubber bands and the frame). It is now has straight, drawn comb. And no overlapping comb, I'm happy to see.

Interestingly, the rubber bands all break away for some reason. I remove them if they are still stuck to the frame. If they aren't stuck, the industrious bees kick them out, and I often find rubber bands at the hive entrance. Clean little buggers. I LOVE that.

I do have some overlapping comb on some foundationless frames that didn't ever have rubber bands on them. It seems to maintain the bee space, but maybe I'm wrong about that. So much to learn. Can I leave it, or should I cut it?

Foundationless Failure...and Attempted Solutions

WHEN FOUNDATIONLESS FAILS

Two days after discovering the mess that was my new natural foundationless hive, I went back into the now-leveled (better late than never!) hive on June 8th. Boy oh boy, what a mess. The bees had produced too much comb--a nice problem to have. But this was not going to be an easy process.

I'd had lots of good advice from Beemaster.com.

1) Michael Bush said that if the hive was level, I could unattach the comb from one frame and just push it over to align it with the other frame. Unfortunately, I thought I had a bit too much comb to do this, as you can see from this picture. However, I've been heavily influenced by his Beekeeping Naturally web site to try a more natural approach to beekeeping, so for some frames, that's exactly what I did.

2) Others suggested rubber banding the comb into the frames. I pulled out the first frame and immediately had the new comb come unattached...and drop on the ground. This seemed like a good time to test that rubber banding idea...and pray my queen wasn't laying on the ground outside the hive. Later, I used multiple rubber bands, including one big one going vertically, to hold in the comb.

But here is a picture of my first feable attempt. The single rubber band method is pretty precarious. You judge for yourself.

I think I managed to take this picture right before the comb fell out and on the ground again.

Moments later, I find myselft with two chunks of comb on the ground, bees crawling all over it; a frame precariously perched on the hive; rubber bands everywhere, not to mention bees; and my hands are a sticky mess from accidentally crushing honey comb as I tried to pick it up. So I'm trying to clean up, sucking honey off my fingers. My first honey, yum!

This of course is when the smoker goes out. I figured that with all these bees exposed, I better get that going again. All I had was dead grass, but I got it going...for a few minutes.

3) The third suggestion was to put foundation in every other frame or every third frame. I did this, too. However, it was kind of random. If it looked like there was going to be an awful mess, I put in every other frame. If it looked like the bees might be able to figure it out, I put foundation in every third frame.

Here is another picture near the end of the process, when the hive is highly exposed. You can see two pieces of comb laying on top of the frames. Two frames are perched on top; one of the frames has straight comb! This frame was just beginning to be drawn out when I leveled my hive a couple of days ago. Seems to have made a difference, though a few beekeepers have told me that the level was not the problem--sometimes bees just do this.

Looking at this is when I decided to add another medium super. I had a lot of comb, and not really enough room for it. Adding a super motivated me to save all the comb I could (with rubber bands). Of course, I wasn't prepared. I had to go back to the house, glue some more popsickle sticks into frames (for more foundationless), get the smoker going again (this time it was a bonfire, sucker did not go out again).

~~~~~

That was on June 8th. It's now June 12th and I can't wait to get back into the hive to see if these approaches worked. A couple more days, as it's raining now.

Hive 1: Beautiful but Weak

So my first hive, the conservative one (with foundation), is struggling. It's requeened and she is laying well, with a great pattern, but they aren't drawing new comb. Only four of ten frames drawn out. It may be that there aren't enough bees to keep any more larvae warm, but I'm getting impatient. Especially after seeing the other, natural hive that is only twelve days old.

But Hive #1 has one thing going for it. It is neat and tidy! A beautiful rainbow pattern, just as promised. A half moon of yellow brood, with an arc of orange pollen/bee bread above that, and capped white honey above that (in the corners).

Someone will probably yell at me about those bird feeders. I moved them to the shade garden when I first installed the hive, but the finches dropped tons of tiny thistle seed all over my hostas. Hostas looked diseased. It was disturbing, really it was. So I moved the feeders back to their old spot. I've surfed and surfed, haven't seen that it's a problem to have bird feeders next to a hive, but then again, this hive isn't doing so well.

One fine day, I watched a carolina wren cleaning up all the dead bee carcasses. I haven't noticed any other birds under the hive, and none eating live bees. I did see a tanager in the tree above, a rare site indeed at our house. I also saw a nuthatch hopping around on top of the hive when his feeder was empty. Darn smart, the little blackmailer! Feeder was refilled pronto hasto.

I wonder if the hive will attract some new birds? After all, the chickens attracted new birds--hawks, actually, and all kinds of other sneaky predators. Ew.

The Appeal of Beekeeping

Beekeeping has all the hallmarks of a great hobby.

1. It's easy to get into but has a steep learning curve, and people continue their education for years.

2. There's lots of stuff to buy. You don't have to buy it, but you will. Or at least, I will. Reminds me of horses that way. They nickel and dime you to death. Bees might be a little better. Or not.

3. Bees are unpredictable (particularly for a newbee like me). There is no failproof formula for raising them. Bees are exciting, buzzing with energy, short-lived so they have to make the most of every day. They generally follow certain guidelines, but not always because, hey, they are a bunch of insects. Ok, that isn't really fair, I hear goats are worse.

Even the best beekeepers are losing their fair share of colonies every year. Bees are much less productive than they were twenty years ago. New pests and possibly pesticides, and maybe two or three other things are combining to weaken the bees. It's a mystery...and a challenge.

4. I just realized one of the other things that make this hobby cool and more appealing to me. It's organized. Nice neat frames, lined with comb, that I can pull out and inspect. I take pictures of each side of each frame and then pour over them at night. I can monitor the bees progress via dated subfolders of pictures and now this blog. Hey, no one ever accused me of not being nerdy.

Of course, the reason I realized the appeal of a nice, neat organized hive is that I have a hive that is in complete disarray. Naturally.

Hive 2: AAARGGGHHHH (Or, the importance of the level in foundationless frames)

Having forgone the medications that made it unsafe to operate the Suburban at any speed, particularly in the post office parking lot (which I figured out after I hit the curb twice and then cussed out my car; gee, thanks for the warning Mr. Pharmacist), I was finally well enough to examine hive #2 today, my "natural" hive. I'd set up the new bench for it and we'd had some good rains, so now I just had to level the bench and then move my new hive onto it...oh and check the new queen and add feed.

I leveled the new bench, got the smoker going, then prepared to check out my new foundationless frames, hoping for perfect comb on at least two of them, maybe more. Who am I kidding, I had envisioned four frames started, filled out halfway down, maybe a little uneven near the bottom but nothing I couldn't deal with.

I pinned my hopes high, but I'm also a realist. My hive has been a little unlevel, so I was curious, and not a little concerned, that the cone wouldn't be hanging straight at the bottom. Ahem. Not only is it not straight at the bottom, it isn't straight anywhere, unless perhaps you are a bee. As a wanna-beekeeper, I'd kind of like it to line up with the frames.

In this picture, I have pulled a couple of frames apart to show what is going on. The comb stretches from one frame to another.

Interestingly, I don't think the problem is the popsickle sticks. The angle of the comb matches the angle that I saw the sugar water coming out last week. I think this is about how level my hive is NOT.

I didn't know what to do about this, so I did what any now-significantly-less-confident gal would do, I ignored it! I didn't look for the queen. I don't know why, other than the fact that I had plenty of other things to do. Also, I may have forgotten all about the poor girl in the face of such utter foundationless failure.

Hopes dashed, I got to work moving the hive over. I also added a screened bottom board.

I was dripping with sweat so I decided to pass on the veil and gloves. For the first time, I actually managed to keep my smoker lit. So one thing went right. Also, I didn't get stung. I'm happy to say that in spite of many problems, I haven't been stung yet. Knock wood (but not the hive).

I learned a lot today, and not just the importance of perfectly level hives. I also started to experience the joy of having hives that are not vehicle accessible. I thought the vehicle was really for hauling honey, and Ahll worry about that anothah day, thank you very much. Hmmm, I got some exercise today. Here's my layout in the picture. I had to haul a lot of things down to that valley: screened bottom board, veil and gloves, smoker, smoker fuel, lighter, hive tool, level, sugar water, knife, marking pen, shims, and a box to carry it all in.

I already had the shovel and rake down there. They are still down there, truth be told. It's a steep hill.

And here's the hive on it's new stand, all level and purty. But inside, all you-know-what has broken loose. Another freakin' bee-ophyte smears the good name of natural beekeepers. I'll be turning to the blogs for support yet again. I hope they'll forgive me, and I really hope I don't have to combine my two hives just yet...

Oh, and yes I did remember this time to put the rock back on the cover, even if I did forget to take the shipping tape off the cover.

Why Can I Never Follow a Recipe?

With all this newfound confidence, I've decided to start a second hive, and do all natural beekeeping. That is, foundationless frames, bottom screens, and just a little thymol and honey-b-healthy on the day they arrive. Just to get rid of any old varroa mites that may have hitched a ride.

Not that there aren't other hives within two miles of me, probably teeming with mites, but I am determined to let weak colonies die out and build up stronger ones. Survival of the fittest. As my boyfriend is a geneticist with the USEPA, and I am an organic gardener, natural beekeeping is a no-brainer.

That is, if I can keep either colony alive for this first year.

So I ordered another package, glued popsickle sticks into the frames, set up another hive down in our valley, and leveled the hive. Not as convenient as the first hive, but I'm already starting to see problems with the placement of that hive.

The valley isn't ideal, as it's not accessible by vehicle, unless you count Mark's tractor. Mark would rather you didn't as he's hoping I'll buy a gator. These bees could get expensive real quick.

The new package arrives and I install it oh-so-successfully, at least, compared to my last installation this one goes swimmingly. Then I put in the sugar water. 50/50 by volume I believe, though no site is all that clear. I just use my measuring cups, e.g. 8 cups of water to 8 cups of sugar. Very easy, just boil the water, add the sugar and stir about 1-2 minutes until dissolved. As a hummingbird feeder extraordinaire, no problem. I can easily tell when the sugar is dissolved, even with my forty-something eyes. I am careful to keep stirring though; one of these days the phone will ring and I'll have burned carmel or something.

So anyhoo, here I am in the valley having installed my bees and their sugar water feeder, and I turn around for one last look...and notice that the sugar water is draining out the front of the hive. All that and my bottle leaked. More disturbingly, it's abundantly clear that my brand new, all natural hive is not level. The sugar water is leaking out the bottom board at an angle. It was level yesterday. Sigh. So I decide that I need to do more than just prop it up on two bricks, I need four bricks and at least two 2/6/8 boards. That'll be harder to level but easier to keep level, right?

But then a number of problems develop before I can get back to this hive:

PROBLEM #1: I have to buy the boards and bricks, then I have to get Mark to bring the bricks down in the tractor. I have to carry the boards down myself, on a steep trail.

PROBLEM #2: I am sick. Not too bad, except I've been studiously ignoring my mild vertigo for a month and haven't been to the doctor, and now I also have a cold and a sinus infection. Oh and I don't have a regular doctor. But heck, I really haven't been sick enough to get one in the four years I've lived here.

PROBLEM #3: I can't get out of my chair. I found a doctor, the only one that would take me on short notice. Being sick and all, I didn't ask enough questions. Next thing you know, I'm wasted on medication that just treats the symptoms, and honestly, I'm feel worse from the drugs than the cold.

PROBLEM #4: It's stormy and humid and hot, bad bee handling weather.

So I don't get back to my hive for ten days. My dad was a bomber pilot in three wars and an instructor pilot. I am soon to be reminded of what he told his guys (and me) over and over, "It's not the first emergency that kills you, it's the fourth or fifth."

Why oh why can't I follow the same recipe twice?

Success! I'm a beeeeekeeper!!!

On May 24th, I examined my hive and found the queen. I even marked her. This was a shockingly successful event in my humble opinion, and just what the ol' ego needed. A real shot in the arm. Plus, I'm no longer the queen bee murderer, now I've raised a new queen. Well, the bees did all the work, but I am feeling a bid more confident.

I decided that I thought she was laying well. Of the capped larvae, the pattern was pretty tight, and what wasn't capped was filled with a new larvae. She seemed to be laying wherever she could. Plus, the frame I found her on was only partially drawn out.

If only the bees would draw out more frame. Only four frames were filled out (on both sides) but that's probably all the colony could keep warm. Some of the larvae were capped, so I thought I'd see more frames filled out in a couple of weeks. On that subject, I was to be disappointed.

Early release queen allowed to live long enough to lay a few eggs

About ten days later, I found larvae and queen supersedure cells, but couldn't find a queen. Someone was laying though. A few days later, an experienced beekeeper came by and also couldn't find the queen. His impression was that they had let her lay a few eggs and then killed her off, or she died. The good news was that I had queen cells. The bad news was that the hive was shrinking with no living queen.

Everything that could go wrong...

Did! My first package of bees arrived April 22nd. I had read and reread everything on inserting the package. I had practiced with my smoker. I knew not to be nervous and to move slowly and deliberately. I was Miss Ready Freddy.

The first thing that went wrong was the queen cage attachment broke before I got the can out. I pull out the can and looking into the package, I see the queen cage immersed in a GAZILLION bees. Maybe more bees than a gazillion.

Then, I noticed the buzzing. I hadn't thought about the sound a thousand busy bees make. Nothing like all that buzzing to distract a girl. So...I rushed. By some miracle that I now cannot recall, I got the queen cage out and stuck the can back in. I looked at it for only a second, and then pulled out the cork...from the wrong end. Instantly, bees ran into her cage.

I knew enough that I had to get her into the hive before she escaped so I dropped her in...kerTHUNK. Hmmm. Oh well no time to worry about her, I have all these other bees that I have to get in there. And by now my adrenalin has used up what little energy I had and my blood sugar is plummeting. With shaking hands I remove the can and hold the package over the hive to pour the bees in. But they don't pour.

I don't understand. In all the pictures, bees can be seen pouring out of the package like honey out of a jar. Cool, easy, beautiful. Not my bees. They are stuck. Drat. I shake it a little and still nothing. Double drat. I shake hard and pound the package on the hive...out they come.

Only later do I realize that I should have watched a Youtube video on this. And now I don't know if my queen will be killed. So sad.