nucs

Life is for each queen a solitary cell

I spent some time in the apiary yesterday with some nice weather. Not too hot and very sunny. The bees were happy, as far as I could tell. Foragers are all over our cherry trees, and I saw them working the holly, dandelions, and viburnum this weekend as well. The nectar flow has definitely arrived, so an update on my hives seems appropriate.

The cherry trees just outside my apiary (the flowering bushes inside the fence are viburnum). The trees are in full bloom, with the smell the flowers and the buzzing of bees when you walk beneath. ©Erik Brown

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May the force bee with you (A New Hive)

This has been a busy month. Work, bike riding, yard tending, getting ready for a high school graduation, and of course bees. That last one has made for a rather interesting month. I have three updates that I will split into three posts so this doesn’t get too long. A Star Wars theme is never bad, so we’ll do this via the original episodes.

Ten Nucs

Ten nucs ready for pickup.  The back 7 are from a friend; the front three are mine

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Great hives from little nucs grow

We have had a few weeks of spring lately, with the air full of pollen and the bees going crazy. Rain and cool weather returned this weekend, so I am not able to work outside. I am instead sitting inside and writing this early spring update. A year will come when I  feel that my springtime work with bees goes well and the hives are buzzing along, so to speak. This is not that year.

Apiary

The expanded apiary on April 14. ©Erik Brown

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A world without nucleus hives would be less stable and more dangerous

After my success at reducing a standard deep nuc to a medium one (see Busy beeks are always metaling), I decided to take on the more daunting task of building a top bar hive nuc. After an adventure with hardware stores (yes, plural) and some minor angst on my part, I deem the effort a success.

170115e-tbh-nuc Continue reading →

Busy beeks are always metaling

A quick post about a small project this past weekend. If you are following along, you know I am interested in making some nucleus colonies this spring, or nucs for short. Our local beekeeping club (PWRBA) coordinates sales for new beekeepers and this should be a good way to help prevent swarming in my existing hives.

One problem for me is that the standard wax cardboard nuc box is only available for deep frames, while I am trying to move to medium frames. So I kind of want to fit medium frames into a deep nuc box. I found a solution this weekend. Continue reading →

CCBA Honeycomb: The Appetite of Laborers Works for Them

The post continues my summary of the presentations at the CCBA Conference this past weekend. The prior post discussed the presentations from Tom Seeley, this post shares the two presentations from Vermont beekeeper Michael Palmer. I should state up front that Palmer gives these presentations around the world, and both are available on YouTube.  While I knew of him as a beekeeper, I was not familiar with his theories and found the sessions quite enjoyable. Continue reading →