Making Pollen Patties

Why would someone want to feed their bees pollen patties? To build the population of the colonies of course. Beekeepers have different reasons for wanting an early spring build up. The reason I am doing it is so hopefully I'll be able to start some nucs sooner and have plenty of bees in each colony to do so with. Some beekeepers do it to build the colony population so they can demand top dollar on pollination contracts. Other beekeepers do it to have higher populations of bees in order to collect a greater surplus of honey. Some build up their bees to make packages or shook swarms from them. Whatever your reason be sure that you implement some preventive swarm management if you give your colonies stimulative feed unless you just like catching swarms.

Making pollen patties for yourself is fairly simple. You may choose to feed a store bought pollen substitute or or mix your own. I bought some pollen substitute to mix into patties instead of mixing a bunch of different ingredients and to keep things simple. When I made my pollen patties all I needed was pollen substitute and sugar to make into syrup. High fructose corn syrup can be substituted for sugar syrup. The amount that you need depends on how many colonies you plan on feeding.







After I open a bag of sugar, and in this case also pollen substitute, I like to store it in a five gallon bucket. The lids to the buckets have rubber o-rings and are airtight. I don't have to worry about the contents drawing moisture and becoming ruined.

I have only sixteen colonies that need patties on them so I'm trying to make only enough for each colony. After doing some math I decided that a gallon of 2:1 syrup mixed with some pollen sub should be ample. To get a gallon of 2:1 you need to stir in eight pounds of water in to two quarts of boiling water. Be sure to add some cream of tarter to invert the syrup. The pollen patties will retain their moisture longer when using inverted sugar syrup.





After making a gallon of 2:1 invert syrup I measured out approximately one gallon and a half of pollen substitute.



Then I added the syrup.



After adding the syrup I began mixing the syrup and pollen sub with a paint mixer attached to a drill.



I used the drill and mixer until the ingredients were well mixed. The mixture was too thick so I added another pint and a half of 2:1 syrup so the mixture would gain the the texture of dough.



The best way I could think of scoping the mixture from the pail in which it was mixed was with a drywall finishing knife. One pound of the mixture will make a sizable patty when flattened to fit between the frames within the brood chamber of a colony.



Before scooping out some of the mixture it best to already have a piece of waxed paper ready and waiting to receive the mixture.



After I flattened out the patties I weighed them and was pretty consistent in making each patty close to one pound. I adjusted the tare on the scale according to the weight of the plate being used.



Below is a picture of the last four patties I spread onto the waxed paper. The patty on the right is for a little four frame nuc that I'll be building up over the next few months.



I did rather well with my guesstamation of how much syrup and pollen substitue to use. I did not have much left over after making sixteen patties. What I had left over was used to make some heavier patties for the bigger colonies since they can got through them quicker. I hope this helps you if you are thinking of making some patties and haven't before. They are really easy to make if you have some time and the right ingredients and equipment. I'll be sure to let you know how good my bees build up between now and when I split them.

If you enjoyed the information that I have passed along in order to help you make your own pollen patties, please click on one of the Google sponsored advertisements to show your appreciation. It would be like Throwing a few cents into the "need a penny, take a penny" tray at the gas station, only that it isn't your pennies!!! Thanks for taking the time to read this post.

Recipes for Beekeepers

Occasionally it becomes necessary to supplement a colony’s diet. This may be due to lack of food stores, to encourage a particular behavior, or to medicate the entire hive. Here are some recipes that are considered to be bee safe. Each of these recipes may be of benefit when supplied at the correct time and prepared properly.

HONEY

Though you may think it because they make it, honey is not the best feed for bees. Honey is in essence bee food that has been processed so that it won’t spoil. Bees prefer to eat nectar when given the chance. Be sure to know the source when honey is used as a feed or as an ingredient in one of the following recipes. If at all possible only re-feed honey to the same hive it was harvested from. Never use store-bought honey. Store-bought honey may contain AFB or other such spores that can be deadly to bees.

Sugar Syrup

Check out my previous post for making invert sugar syrup.

High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS)

It is not uncommon for a beekeeper with many hives and little time to use high fructose corn syrup in place of 2:1 syrup, however this method is not cost effective or practical for small-scale beekeepers. Pollinators are more prone to feed with corn syrup because most of the crops that they pollinate doesn't produce enough nectar for all the colonies in the field. Be sure to check the list of ingredients when purchasing high fructose corn syrup not specifically packaged as bee feed. Many suppliers often add extra ingredients that may not be desired when feeding bees. Your best bet is to buy from a supplier of beekeeping equipment such as Mann Lake.

Bee Candy

Occasionally it is not advised to feed bees syrup. Sometimes when emergency feeding it is best to use a dry or semi-moist food. Some times bee candy is used because it is not as messy as feeding syrup. Even though bee candy may be convenient to use as feed, it is not recommended as a complete substitution to syrup.

Un-prepared Sugar

The simplest bee candy is crystallized cane sugar. Pure sugar is generally only fed during dire emergencies. Bees will sometimes carry it out of the hive rather than consume it. In the winter when syrup is not a preferable supplementary food source,s ome people place it over the top bars in a hive on newspaper. If the colony runs out of stores it can eat its way up to the sugar. I have a good description and pictures of this method of feeding in the post entitled, "Are Your Bees Alive, Do You Need to Feed Them?"

Fondant Bee Candy

Fondant bee candy can be fed directly to the bees once cooled. Fondant is a good food source for mini-mating nucs because there is no drowning involved when you have a small amount of bees. It is also common to use this recipe in small quantities to plug the hole on a Queen Cage.

> 4 parts (by volume) white sugar
> 4 parts (by volume) 2:1 Syrup or HFCS
> 3 parts (by volume) water

Boil water and slowly add the syrup and sugar until dissolved. Continue heating until the mixture reaches 238°F (114°C). Without mixing allow the solution to cool until it is slightly warm to the touch. Then begin to mix and aerate the solution. As you do this the color should lighten. Pour into shallow dishes or mold and save for later use. I prefer to make the fondant thin enough to where I can work it into an empty frame of drawn comb.

Quick Candy

If you are pressed for time quick candy can be used in place of Fondant Bee Candy. It is easier to prepare but may not be as easily workable.

> 1 part (by volume) confectioner’s sugar
> 1 part (by volume) 1:2 Syrup or HFCS or Clean Honey

Just knead the two ingredients together like bread dough until it is mixed thoroughly.

Pollen Substitute

Sometimes there is a shortage of pollen or a beekeeper may want to stimulate the queen into rearing brood before the spring flow. Pollen substitutes can be used in such situations. Despite its name pollen substitutes are no real substitute for genuine fresh pollen.

Dry Pollen Substitute

Dry pollen substitute can be placed directly into the hive or used in bird feeders to attract local bees. If you wish to not order or purchase a prepackaged pollen substitute from a beekeeping equipment supplier you can make your own with these ingredients which should be available locally.

> 3 parts (by weight) Soy Flour (expeller-processed soybean flour)
> 1 part (by weight) Brewers Yeast
> 1 part (by weight) Nonfat Dry Milk (Not instant milk)

Simply mix the powders together and use. Occasionally bees may refuse to eat pollen substitute, most often when fresh pollen is available. It is however possible to trick bees to take the substitute when necessary by adding a small amount of Vitamin C into the mixture. Often 1 teaspoon per 5 cups can be added. If a powered form is not available, it is possible to crush a Vitamin C tablet to add to the mixture.

Pollen Patty

To make a pollen patty mix the Dry Pollen Substitute with enough 2:1 Syrup or HFCS to make a putty or dough like consistency. Some beekeepers will add other ingredients to increase the amount of certain vitamins or amino acids or will add the extra ingredients to make the patty more palatable for the bees.

Grease Patties

Grease Patties that contain both wintergreen oil or tea tree oil and mineral salt appear to have an effect on varroa mites and tracheal mites. These effects can be seen when brood is present and has a devastating effect on mites when brood is not present. Remember that grease patties with essential oils should not be used during time of honey collection for human consumption. When the bees are making a surplus of honey grease patties without essential oils can be used to a lesser effect. For any noticeable effect a grease patty of some form should be used at all times. Replace any consumed patties. Grease patties are awesome to use in the winter time and if mixed to the right consistency can easily be pressed into an empty frame of drawn comb or placed on the top bars above the cluster on a piece of waxed paper.

Simple Grease Patty

> 1 part (by volume) solid vegetable shorting (such as Crisco)
> 2 parts (by volume) white sugar

Mix sugar and shortening until well combined. Split into approximately quarter cup (~6 centiliters) portions and store excess in the freezer sand witched between sheets of wax paper.

Grease Patty With Mineral Salt

> 2 lbs solid vegetable shorting (such as Crisco)
> 3 lbs whites sugar
> 1 lb 2:1 Syrup or High Fructose Corn Syrup or Clean Honey
> 1/3 cup pulverized mineral salt (~1/5lb Depending on mineral content)

Prepare the same as you would a simple grease patty recipe.

Grease Patty With Mineral Salt and Essential Oils

> 2 lbs solid vegetable shorting (such as Crisco)
> 3 lbs whites sugar
> 1 lb 2:1 Syrup or HFCS or Clean Honey
> 1/3 cup pulverized mineral salt (~1/5lb Depending on mineral content)
> 3 table spoons wintergreen oil

Prepare the same as you would a simple grease patty recipe.

Extender Patty

If a grease patty contains terramycin, it is called an extender patty, and is considered one of the best ways to control American Foul Brood. Some research has shown that the Terramycin will stay at strength for up to 6 months in this application. Extender Patties can be used in fall on over wintering colonies or during early spring. Extender patty use has been sanctioned by the FDA. Despite this approval, caution should still be used if taking this route of medication as spore resistance has been noted with this form of application.

> 1/3 lb powdered sugar aka Baker's Blend Sugar, not to be confused with confectioner's sugar
> 1/3 lb solid vegetable shortening (such as Crisco)

2 tablespoons Terramycin TM25

This patty can be used to eliminate three weekly dustings of powdered Terramycin, but should only be used to medicate and not as a prophylactic measure.

General Purpose Essential Oil Mixture

A well known commercially available general purpose essential oil product for bees that is similar to the following recipe claims many benefits even though many of those claims have yet to be proven. The following recipe should work about as well as that product and is way cheaper. It can be added in small quantities to feed to encourage feeding. It has been known to occasionally cause robbing behavior due to its great appeal to bees.

> 5 cups water
> 2 1/2 pounds of sugar
> 1/8 teaspoon lecithin granules (used as an emulsifier)
> 15 drops spearmint oil
> 15 drops lemongrass oil

Bring the water to a boil and stir in the sugar until it is dissolved. Once the sugar is dissolved remove the mixture from the heat and quickly add the lecithin and the essential oils. Stir the mixture thoroughly. This solution should have a strong scent and not be left open around bees. Cool before using.

Use the Essential Oil Mixture in early spring and during periods when no nectar is available and to build up packages, nucs ind swarms. Two teaspoonfuls in a quart of 1:1 sugar syrup delivers a total of one cc of both essential oils. The essential oils are evenly distributed throughout the syrup. The Essential Oil Mixture helps produce rapid build up of bees when used as a feeding stimulant. In addition, using 4 teaspoons in a quart of one to one sugar water of the Essential Oil Mixture as a spray instead of smoke helps calm the bees, and spraying caged new queens and bees helps with queen acceptance during cage introduction and reduces balling during direct release when sprayed on new queen and bees. It also helps to reduce stings: mix a little on your hands and watch the difference in bee behavior-very few or no stings at all. Acts as a bee calmer when sprayed on the bees and helps prevent fighting when combining nucs, swarms, and colonies. Spray on a colony while doing a cut-out for some extra calm bees! When sprayed on new foundation helps encourage the bees to draw out new comb or plastic comb.

Smokeless Smoke

A solution of the above general purpose essential oil mixture and 1:1 syrup can be mixed and used in a spray bottle. This solution has varied effects depending on the specific history of the hive. Because of differences between each hive it is best to try a ten to one [1:10] mixture of essential oil mixture to syrup and vary the ratio as necessary. Have your smoker readily available during your first few trials in case the bees don’t react to the solution. The bees will stay more calm when this mixture is used as compared to simply using the sugar syrup by itself to spray the bees.

Essential Oil Scent Masking Syrup

Nearly any essential oil can be mixed with a 1:1 syrup solution to mask an undesired scent in the hive. A masking syrup can be used during queen introduction or when joining two hives. Simply add the desired amount of oils to the spray bottle before using the syrup. The stronger the scent the better it will serve to mask other scents. Since essential oils have a strong smell they should be used sparingly. One of the more common oils to use is peppermint oil, but be sure not to use banana oil.

Scent Masking Syrup

A cheap scent masking syrup can be used in the same way as the recipe for essential oil scent masking syrup. Prepare a 1:1 syrup and add one or two crushed peppermint candies for every two cups of prepared solution. Load the solution into a spray bottle and use as needed.

I hope these recipes help you out with your bees. Maybe you can help them in the winter if their stores are low, feed them stimulatively to begin brood rearing a little early, use pollen substitutes for rearing of brood, and employ the other uses that these recipes come in handy for during certain situations. I hope you appreciate the time I have shared with you to help you and your bees.

What to do with a dead-out?

I made a sad discovery yesterday when I found a colony that had recently been visited by the Grim Keeper. I don't get upset like I used to when I have a dead-out. I have come to expect them in the winter and almost every beekeeper experiences them from novices to experts. Since I have not been using any chemical treatments against parasites, pests, and diseases dead-outs are sometimes unavoidable. However I feel that maybe this dead-out could have been prevented if it had not been for my lack of better judgment as beekeeper.

The best thing that I could have done for this colony would of been to requeen it last August. The colony was outperformed by my other over winter colonies. I feel that the queen had lost her fecundity and her ability to to produce queen mandibular pheromone due to her age. Not only had the queen lost her fecundity, or ability to lay a large amount of eggs, but she also shut down earlier than the other colonies. This resulted in a smaller size winter cluster. By lacking the ability to produce a sufficient amount of queen pheromone the hive began to have a sense of queenlessness and became hot and harder to work. I was going to requeen the colony in the spring when I raised some queens but for now on I'll go ahead and purchase a queen to requeen in the fall. That would have been the smart thing to do because the colony would have had a large enough population to overwinter successfully and would have been going into a new season with a new and more vigorous queen.

When I inspected the colony on the 6th of this month the cluster was in the upper deep. The upper deep had very little stores in it but the lower deep was pretty much full. I should have reversed the positions of the hive bodies then but thought I would have been better off waiting until the first of February when I was planning on putting some pollen patties in the hives and giving them syrup. It may have help the colony to survive but I feel at this point it would of only prolonged the inevitable. I know better than to procrastinate when it comes to the bees but I still inadvertently make mistakes. Now I can honestly say that a winter cluster will not move down to food stores and a beekeeper should definitely make sure to keep stores directly above the cluster. If you can't use honey as stores above the cluster be sure to at least put some sugar or fondant above them.

I originally obtained this colony form an older gentleman who had become unable to care for his bees. He told be that he hadn't been in his colonies for three years. Being confined to wheelchair and partially paralyzed from multiple strokes he could only sit on porch and watch the bees work. When I picked up the hives from him in July he told me he probably had about twenty swarms that spring. He said it broke his heart to see the swarms cluster in one of the trees in his yard to only leave for a new home a few hours later. I hate to even think of it.

I opened the colonies before I bought them home and gave them a good inspection. The supers were only half filled with frames and the bees had drawn comb in all the empty spaces. He said he had a neighborhood kid to rob him a few frames of honey every now and then and neglected to put any frames back in. The supers were a real mess and were very hard to remove from th top bars of the brood chamber. The brood combs were old and black but there was not any signs of disease. I would not have been surprised to find Apistan strips in the colonies but when asked he said he had never treated against mites. After inspecting the colonies I decided to start culling the old comb as soon as I got them home. That was four years ago.

Last October I sent some samples of bees to the Beltsville Bee Lab for disease diagnosis. In this colony that died out there were no traces of nosema disease or tracheal mites. However they did find one varroa mite in the sample from this colony. I numbered the colonies as I took samples so I could easily identify the colonies with the results from the lab.





I'll usually write info about the colony on the back of the hives but this year as my apiary numbers increase and with the addition of a few outyards I will be using colony strength and health record sheets in order to keep up with all my colonies. If I would have been keeping records last year maybe I would have requeened the colony simply by reminding myself about it every time that I would read the record sheets.

So now I'm looking down into the dead colony and wanting to know why this colony died when there was only one mite in the sample. I don't even think that were enough bees left to stock a mini-mating nuc with.



One of the big reasons is that the colony dwindled away to a very small cluster outlined in the picture above. Maybe when I collected the sample to send for diagnosis all the mites were in the cells with capped larvae. I physically examined every bee as I removed them from the comb. I counted sixteen mites from the bees on the combs and four mites from the ones on the bottom board.



I wish I would have taken better pictures. All the pictures I took with a bee in my hand are blurry. You cant see it but there is a mite between the scales on this bees abdomen.

Before I get too far ahead of myself, here is a picture of part of the cluster and the queen.



I removed the queen and placed her in a ziplock baggie. I placed all the bees in the same bag as I removed them and inspected them. Pictured below is where the bees starved out. The arrow pointing to the left is pointing to some bee bread. The bees were watering it down so they could eat it. I tore open the abdomen of some of the bees and the contents were the same color as the bee bread. I guess bees can't live on bread alone. The other arrow pointing down is pointing to a mite. You can click on the picture to make it larger and you should then be able to see the mite.



Here is a picture of the other side of the comb where the cluster was.



After I removed all the bees from the surface of the comb I proceeded to remove the ones that were head first in the cells with tweezers. When bees die head first in the cells it is usually indicative of starving but there could always be other factors just like in this case.



Looks like the bees had built a supersedure cell cup in preparation to replace their old failing mother last autumn. Maybe it got too late for them to replace her or it was one of those cell cups they start "just in case" they need it. I unintentionally tore apart a lot of the bees as I pulled them out of the cells but some came out easily and ended up in the baggie with the other bees. After I got finished with the combs I moved on to the bottom board.



On the bottom board I found three bees that had mites on them. One of these bees had two mites on the underside of her abdomen between the scales. I found a couple more mites on the landing board and I wish I would of had a magnifying glass handy. I don't think they overwinter very well when their host dies. I also put the bees from the bottom board into the baggie.



The reason I put them in the baggie is that I am going to send them in for testing. I am very curious to learn if they had managed to acquire any nosema or tracheal mites since I submitted my last sample. When you collect a sample you need to add some alcohol to preserve the bees while they are in the mail. They can not use decayed bees so if you wait too long to collect samples they can not be tested. Since we have had freezing temperatures here for the last few weeks I believe the bees are in good enough shape to be tested. When you add the alcohol to the bag you don't need to drench the bees. You only need enough to get all the bees wet.



I had been culling comb from this colony for four years. This year I would have had all the old comb replaced with new comb. Here are a few pictures of the frames with honey from the lower deep.





While culling the old comb I mostly gave the colony starter strips cut from Dadant's thin surplus wax foundation which is 5.05 mm and the most cost effective starter strip when using wax. The bees in this colony seemed to consistently draw out 5.0 mm cells for worker comb. When using foundation I use Kelley's crimpedwired wax foundation with hooks which is also 5.05mm. Below is a picture of a frame of the original natural comb that was going to be culled this spring.



If you count the cells between the arrows you will see that there are ten cells to five centimeters. This works out to 5.00 mm per cell. I would like to know why the bees picked one of the oldest combs in the hive to cluster and die on, especially when they had freshly drawn comb to cluster on. Maybe the cocoons in the wax absorbs and holds heat and makes it easier to keep the cluster on or the older comb has more pheromones embedded into it and is more attractive to them than newer comb. Hopefully someone in college who needs to do a thesis might read this and decide to do a study on it.



Above is some natural comb that was drawn out last spring. The cells are still very near to averaging 5.00 mm. Below is some natural comb drawn out last year as well. Where the tape measure is it looks as if the cells are closer to 4.9mm than 5.0mm.



After working on this colony for the last four years to cull the old comb and to help keep it healthy I am quite disappointed with myself for letting this happen. I can't blame the bees because I knew to do better than I did in my management of this colony. The only good thing I can say about this dead-out is that I had the opportunity to share it with you so that you can learn from my mistakes. The only other thin that is good about it is that I know have two deeps full of drawn comb with some honey. The best way to store drawn comb or honeycomb is in a freezer.



Do not ever store comb that has honey in it with Para-Moth or Para Dicholorbenzene Crystals. I no longer use any chemicals so I either freeze the comb or use blue painter's tape from 3M. The painter's tape will seal the supers together and if you do it right the moths can not get in. I really don't know what I'm going to do with the drawn comb. I do have some options. I could use them for swarms, packages, making nucs, bait hives or swarm traps, or could use them bolster existing colonies. Whatever I us them for I need to make sure they are protected form pests until I use them.
I hope that by reading this that you will requeen your colonies as soon as they need it. It is a part of practicing good beekeeping management. Keeping a young queen helps to prevent swarming, provides more bees from a queen with a greater fecundity, and will give a larger surplus of honey. Be sure to feed you bees early in the autumn or summer until the colonies have enough stores for your area and climate. Here we need about 70 pounds of stores for overwintering. Make sure your bees have their stores above them and can remain in contact with them while they are clustering. Just by doing these few simple things this will help your bees avoid the Grim Keeper. Don't make the same mistakes that made with this one colony. I hope you enjoyed the post. Thanks for letting me share this with you. Keep checking back for new posts.

Making Invert Sugar Syrup

There are times when you may find it necessary to feed your bees some sugar syrup. Feeding syrup can be done for different reasons. You may need to feed syrup to administer fumigiln to help your bees combat nosema disease. You may want to continuously feed syrup to new package to help in the production of wax and to provide an easy source of food to help the colony get established. Some beekeepers feed in the early autumn to help a colony gain extra stores for overwintering. Some beekeepers will start feeding two or three brood cycles before the spring flow to help stimulate the queen into laying eggs. Pollinators need to feed their bees to help maintain strong populations of bees so they can fulfill the obligation of their contracts. These are just a few examples of why beekeepers feed sugar syrup to their colonies.

Different ratios of sugar syrup are fed depending on what you wish to accomplish.

A 1:2 mixture, one pound of sugar to two pints of water is used by some beekeepers as a stimulative feed to get the queen laying eggs.

Some beekeepers prefer to use a 1:1 mixture, one pound of sugar to one pint of water, for stimulative feeding. A 1:1 mixture more closely resembles nectar and stimulates the bees to build comb and provides food for the larvae.

A mixture of 2:1 , two pounds of sugar to one pint of water, is typically fed to administer medications and fed to help build winter stores.

I'm currently in the process of making 1:1 invert syrup for stimulative feeding. The reason I like to invert the sugar in the syrup is that it breaks down the sucrose into glucose and fructose, the two main components of honey. Since it closely resembles honey by being made up of the same two components it is more easily digested by the bees and larvae and can be more readily consumed. Opposed to regular sugar syrup, invert syrup is less likely to crystallize, it retains moisture longer when used in pollen patties, helps to prevent mold, and robbing is less prevalent when invert syrup is used for feeding. Invert syrup is easy to make by simply adding some cream of tarter or lemon juice to the sugar syrup.

To make some inverted syrup to get a 1:1 ratio I simply put eight pints of water into a large pot and bring to a boil.



I then slowly add eight pounds of granulated sugar to the water and stir the mixture to completely dissolve all of the sugar.



Once dissolved cream of tarter is added to the mixture. One teaspoon to one gallon of syrup is sufficient to invert the sugar in the syrup.





When using eight pints of water and eight pounds of sugar you need to add one and a half teaspoons of cream of tarter because you will end up with a gallon and a half of syrup.



When making your invert syrup it is important that you boil the mixture for twenty minutes to invert as much as the sucrose as possible. Be sure to stir the mixture a lot and don't let it sit or it will carmalize in the bottom of the pot. When done properly the invert syrup has a shelf life of up to six months so don't worry if you make extra because you have six months to give it to your bees.

For stimulative feeding my favorite way of feeding invert syrup to my bees is in a one gallon paint can. When placed over the cluster the bees can remain in contact with the feeder when it is too cold to break the cluster and can continue to eat from the can.



If you click on the picture above you can see that the can is close to eight inches tall. When placed on a couple 1/4" or 3/8" sticks on the top bars over the cluster the lid provides a large are for many bees to feed at. Also since the can is eight inches tall it will fit nicely inside of an empty deep hive body.

I like to use jars for feeding as well.



The quart and half gallon jars work well with boardman feeders. There is also an inside feeder that works well with quarts. Half gallon jars are too tall for an empty deep hive body the work well with two empty shallow supers. The gallon jars work well with two shallow supers.

Hopefully this info helps out those of you who have wondered what invert sugar syrup was and why it is more beneficial to you and your bees as opposed to regular sugar syrup.

Colony Extraction from May, 2007

I'm sure that if you are keeping bees that you would like to have more colonies, right? Of course you do. I don't think I've ever met a beekeeper who would turn down a free swarm if it was presented to them. I'm sure that if you are like me that you already have empty equipment sitting around begging you for bees. The easiest way to get bees without effecting your own colonies by making splits is to collect swarms. If you want to collect swarms you need to get your name out there now!!! Inform your local pest control businesses, real estate agents, landscapers, and tree trimmers that you would perform this service. The best thing is that there is no need to do it for free!!! Exterminators get paid for their services and all that I know will not poison bees. It is hard for a real estate agent to sell a house with a hive of bees under the eave. Landscapers are on a lot of different properties while they work and a busy hive isn't to hard to spot if it's around and is sometimes difficult to work around. Tree trimmers have a hard job to do if they are cutting down a tree that has a colony in or on it. They all will pay for your services or will recommend you to the property owner and they will pay to have their fears absolved by having you remove some bees. It is much easier to make a nuc or a split from one of your own colonies than it is to waste your gas and time running around trying to catch swarms that may have already left. You also don't want to cut out a colony with diseases or diseased brood for free when you don't want it anyway. This is the main reason you should be compensated for your efforts.

One of the big things about collecting swarms, removing bees, doing cutouts, or colony extractions is that you may inadvertently introduce a new pest or disease to your apiary. I collected a swarm while working near Carbo, VA a few years back and brought it home. The colony did great. I had no reason to suspect it had anything wrong with it. After I sent some samples to the Beltsville Bee Lab last Autumn I discovered this colony had tracheal mites. It had not infected my other colonies but the potential was there. Having a call about a swarm here in southern West Virginia is not common but having calls for doing colony extractions are.

Prior to doing the cutout you should asses the site and collect some samples to send to the Beltsville Bee Lab to have the sample diagnosed. After you get the results back you can decide what you need to do to the colony after you extract it. While you are cutting out the brood comb be sure to examine it closely for any brood disease. If you don't see any signs you should be alright. But if you see something out of the ordinary send it in for testing.

Here are some pictures from a colony extraction I did last May in the county east of here. The first picture is of me getting set up to look into the colony entrance.





After looking into the entrance and listening to the humm of the colony I was glad to discover the colony was in the wall on the front of the building and not on the side. This was a great relief as I did not wish to work off of the rickety extension ladder I had. Since the colony was in the front wall it made the work of removing it much easier as I could work off of the front porch on a step ladder.



After removing in the asphalt siding in a manner in which it could be reused I proceeded to cut the wall panels up the center of the stud so the could easily be nailed back into place. Pictured below is my first good look at the colony after I removed the planking from the wall.



After smoking the bees to move them to the comb deeper in the colony I started the slow tedious process of cutting the brood comb to fit some deep catch frames. I removed my gloves while doing this. Manual dexterity is of utmost importance when cutting out comb. I only got stung six times during the entire time and was all my fault because I put my hand or fingers on a bee. The bees were very docile which relieved my anxiety of possibly getting stuck like a pincushion.



Here I am coming down the ladder with a deep catch frame full of brood to put into a deep hive body.





Here's nice picture of a swarm catch frame partially filled with brood comb. You can see where I have removed about half of the comb from the wall at this point and there are still a bunch of bees in the wall.



At this point during the cutout I discovered the colony was making swarm preparations. This was evident by the presence of two swarm cells which were uncapped and still under construction. If I would have waited a week later I would have lost the mated feral queen and half of the bees in a swarm. The swarm cells were later used to make some nucs.





There was a lot of brood in the colony. If I remember correctly I made up eight frames of nothing but brood during the cutout.





This is a picture of the piece of comb I cut out that had the queen on it. The five gallon bucket in the background is where I put all the honey comb. It was nearly full when I finished.



Here's a closeup of the queen. It looks as if she was slimming down to fly off with the swarm within the next couple of weeks.



One thing that excited me about these bees was how quickly they started to remove damaged larva from the comb and hive after I put the comb into the deep hive body. This is indicative of hygienic behavior and was confirmed later when I tested them for hygienic behavior.



It took about five or six hours to remove all the comb from the wall and another two hours to remove and reinstall the sheeting and siding on the wall.



After a little more scraping of burr comb and removal of straggling bees I fixed the wall back to original condition. Too bad my photographer was in cleanup mode and forgot all about taking some additional pictures when I was done. I took all the bees I could and waited until after dark to make sure that I did. I feel sorry for the bees that got left behind but seeing how they were old enough to be foragers they didn't have much longer to live anyway.

I monitored the progress of this colony closely over the rest of the Summer and and it did not take them long to repair what I damaged. This picture was taken about two weeks later.



This next picture is what the upper deep looked like on the colony before winter. I was also fortunate to have this colony make a super of honey which I gave to a weaker colony for the winter.



This picture is of the winter cluster as of January 6, 2008. You can see that the colony only has three of the catch frames left in it because I used the rest for the split that I transferred the queen cells into. That split was later divided and the colonies that resulted are overwintering well so far. You can see in the picture that I used nine frame space frame rests in the hive body. This helps to hold the frames together until they are propolised and eliminates the need to use rubber bands or tie the ends of the top bars together. As of January 6th the bees had not moved into the upper deep and it is still full of winter stores.



If you are interested in doing any cutouts and would like some swarm catch frames feel free to contact me at my email address; ccohenour@hotmail.com

Also, if you are in southern or central West Virginia or near the state line around the area and have a colony you need removed from your property please feel free to contact me as well.

I have a few colony extractions scheduled for the later half of May. Hopefully I'll be able to take some pictures of those as well and post them here for you. If you are doing a cutout on your own just be sure to take plenty of beekeeping equipment, tools, take your time, and be careful. I hope you have enjoyed this. Happy Beekeeping!!!