Another lessons learned! (Ouch #2)

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Hi friends,

as usual, i optimized my work-schedule and tried to do four things at once:

1. Move my surviving bee-hive from a solid bottom board to a screened one.
2. Inspect the brood boxes for hive beetles, wax moths and other pests.
3. Perform a sugar-roll to test for varroa-mites.
4. Harvest my first honey.

It was a bad idea! - Here is the story:

• First I removed the honey-filled frames from the honey super, then after just four frames i discovered that there was no more honey in there, so i removed the whole box.
• Moved the whole hive about a foot to the left - big ominous hum from the bees - and discovered what might has killed off my other hive: There was a huge ant-nest right under the bottom board of the hive! - My hives are standing on pallets, which are standing on cinder-blocks and bricks to make everything level. The pallet as well as the bricks were full of ants and ant-eggs. Used a hand-brush and the hive tool to destroy the ant nest. Too bad that i can't treat them with any insecticide there.
• After cleaning the other half of the pallet and removing any debris from under the pallet i set up the screened bottom and tried to pry the whole hive loose from its base… No freaking way! - So i removed the upper brood box and set it down on the ground, then pried loose the lower brood box…
• I thought i had freed the box entirely from the bottom board but i had not. Now the bottom board was dangling from the brood box, swinging back and forth before falling off… bumping straight into the side of the upper box, sitting on the ground…
• That's when all hell broke loose! - The bees were already upset, but now they went into full scale attack mode!
  They were all over me, which did not bother me until they discovered that they can sting you through the cloth-sleeves of the gloves. It is weird, usually if a bee stings you, the stinger becomes lodged in your skin and the bee dies, but when they sting through that fabric, their stinger won't get stuck and they can sting you over and over and over. And once they know your weak spot the whole swarm goes for it! These stings are not as painful as a real sting, but the sheer amount made me run. And the bees followed me all the way down the hill around the house into the duck yard - the ducks ran for their lives, quacking loudly when they saw a big headed monster, surrounded by a swarm of angry bees coming their way. Finally i got rid of the bees by using the garden hose in mist setting.
• Went inside and undressed. My forearms look like i received the stinging nettle treatment, no real stings. Redressed with a long sleeve t-shirt and the thick plushy winter jacket (1" thick plush ), pulled the hoodie up, got into the bee-veil and the gloves. This time i pulled the sleeves of the shirt and the jacket as far down as i could and did not pull the sleeves of the gloves completely up. Letting them sit loose and in wrinkles over my wrists, so the bees can still push their stingers through, but can't reach my skin.
• Out to the bees again and i was greeted by lots of very angry bees bumping into the veil.
• Inspecting the bottom hive box: I pulled a couple of frames out and looked at those. I have not been able to spot the queen. Is it possible that i have two different breeds of bees in my hive? There were bees with shorter and longer bodies. None of them had a body longer than their wings (so not queens!). The shorter bees were colored much lighter than the longer bodied bees. And i saw a couple of drones. Can't miss them, even if if haven't seen one before. They are just phat! Compared to the other bees. And yes they also have larger eyes.
• Set the upper bee-box on top of the lower one - how can you avoid crushing bees while doing that? I tried to set down the box as slowly and as gently as i could but still not all bees made it out.
• In both brood boxes there were plenty of capped-brood in the center, surrounded by larvae, eggs, pollen and honey cells. The bees really organize the frames from the inside out!
• I took my sample of brood-bees (hopefully) from the upper box and detained them in the sugar glass. By that time the swarm was again attacking me so hard, that i retreated into the shade of my tulip tree, rolling the bees in the jar in the powdered sugar; they were not happy with that treatment! After rolling the bees for about five minutes ( i felt dizzy from all that rolling motion) i shook the sugar out of the jar through the meshed lid into a white $-store dish-bin and good news, there was not a single mite in the sample!
• Back to the hive, i released the sugar-bees back into the upper brood box, installed the queen separator and the honey super (again some crushed bees) and installed the frames back into the honey super as they were.

Yes, i left that little honey in the hive! I'm not running four medium frames through the honey extractor! Its just not worth the effort of cleaning it afterwards. My estimate is that there is about 4-5 Kg (8-10lbs) of honey in that super currently or about eight 16oz mason jars.

At least for now i know that the hive is doing well, no pests and there's lots of brood, pollen and honey. Hopefully with that ant-nest out of the way, the hive is able to grow more in numbers and catch up with the honey production.

So i try to be patient and will check on the honey-super again in about two to three weeks, the next nectar-run is just around the corner, as the autumn-olive shrubs are about to bloom for the second time.

The big lessons learned for me is that bees can sting through the sleeves of your beekeeping gloves! My forearms still look like i encountered stinging-nettles and it is itching. Hope it helps with my joint-pain! Fun fact: There is a large hole in my old jeans and i was wearing just open slippers. Not a single bee stung me into my legs or feet.

The other lessons learned, personally for me, is that i should only do one single thing at the time with the bees. I got stuck in my hot protection dress for about 90 minutes in 30° (90F) weather. I have lost so much water, that i felt dizzy after that.

Just another lessons learned, enjoy the rest of your weekend!
Buzzing regards from Big Chimney in West Virginia!

 

[Field Bee]

Did you have a smoker lit? I would seriously look into a local beekeeping club or beekeeper that will inspect your hive with you. Or maybe allow you to watch them inspect and work a hive in their apiary. You can pour a bucket of soapy water on the ants. You'll see different color workers because queens mate with 10 to 20 drones. If the smaller workers are lighter and fuzzier, they just recently emerged from a cell and are very young. If they have very short abdomens thats a sign of disease caused by mites.

 

[Margali]

Be safe and rehydrate! The heat is why I just got out of beekeeping.

 

[Mini Horses]

I found a large ant hill at my front walk recently. Emptied a few cups of ammonia onto it. . Haven't seen them since.

When I had bee hives many, many years ago, I was fortunate to have no issues -- except they swarmed 2X. That's how I found an experienced beekeeper to handle them, collect honey and share some with me.

I then gave him the bee hives...got honey still until I asked him to stop as I rarely ate it.

They were started for my DD who had 2 hives and wanted more -- which I bought and set up. She was to tend. Then she decided to have a baby, got rid of her hives and I still had these!!!. No way I was gonna go thru what you did!

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Did you have a smoker lit? I would seriously look into a local beekeeping club or beekeeper that will inspect your hive with you. Or maybe allow you to watch them inspect and work a hive in their apiary. You can pour a bucket of soapy water on the ants. You'll see different color workers because queens mate with 10 to 20 drones. If the smaller workers are lighter and fuzzier, they just recently emerged from a cell and are very young. If they have very short abdomens thats a sign of disease caused by mites.

¡Don't get me started on my smoker b¡tch! - I had it lit and it was smoking the sun away, but when i really needed it, i dropped it, the lid popped open and the embers rolled into the dry grass around the bee-hive. Had to perform a special dance ritual to extinguish the starting forest fire.


Those short and long worker bees are not that much different in length, so it is entirely possible that the smaller workers were just hatched. I saw those only in the brood boxes and they did not look crippled or so, just shorter.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Be safe and rehydrate! The heat is why I just got out of beekeeping.

After a gallon of iced tea, i'm back to normal! Thank you very much.

 

[TheCluckyClucker]

This is all very interesting! Keep us updated!

 

[Mini Horses]

You sure had a bad day there! . Glad all is ok now.

 

[R2elk]

That's when all hell broke loose! - The bees were already upset, but now they went into full scale attack mode!
They were all over me, which did not bother me until they discovered that they can sting you through the cloth-sleeves of the gloves. It is weird, usually if a bee stings you, the stinger becomes lodged in your skin and the bee dies, but when they sting through that fabric, their stinger won't get stuck and they can sting you over and over and over. And once they know your weak spot the whole swarm goes for it! These stings are not as painful as a real sting, but the sheer amount made me run. And the bees followed me all the way down the hill around the house into the duck yard - the ducks ran for their lives, quacking loudly when they saw a big headed monster, surrounded by a swarm of angry bees coming their way. Finally i got rid of the bees by using the garden hose in mist setting.

If there is a next time, go crawling through tall grass, weeds, leafy branches etc. You will "lose" more bees this way than any other method that I know of.

 

[Ridgetop]

Glad you were able to keep one producing healthy hive! And glad you weren't seriously stung. The smoker tale is really delightful. DH and I got a good chuckle visualizing you in your bee keeping clothing dancing around the hives!

DS1 did beekeeping for 2 years in 4-H with a friend's father as leader. We had 3 hives. The leader was very experienced, he had bee hives for many years and had made lots of honey. We never got any honey, the bees swarmed, and wax moths took out any stragglers. It was an interesting project though!

Can't wait to hear what happens next!