The Treatment-Free Beekeepers' Forum

GregV

Ya; we can talk some plant exchange in spring, what not.

The currants make a good early spring bee pasture - though my bees totally ignore my own backyard.
I mean these bees of mine are worthless pollinators as for me.
Thanks God for the bumblebees and the like for all my fruit...

GregV

If we made honey the new gold standard, I'd still be broke. :mrgreen: I like barter, though. My neighbors and I have an unspoken agreement in that regard. They supply me free range eggs and I give them honey when I have it. It's a good deal. Barter rules in many ways and I like it too, a lot. This ...

GregV

Grappling Coach wrote:Does anyone know if sumac is a short or long flow?

Go here: https://honeybeenet.gsfc.nasa.gov/Honeybees/Forage.htm
Look up your region.
Find "sumac".

GregV

I got to think.. Where I grew up - geese were one staple we raised. The village geese were sturdy and compact, self-sustaining in summer, and even could fly from a fox when ambushed in field. These were true hardy, local mutts. The most I liked about them - various plumage they had, from pure white ...

GregV

Since this topic of money making from the bees came up, I wonder...

Honey makes for a good alternative currency (very long shelf life) and can be used to barter directly for things.

GregV

SiWolKe wrote:.... I started a propolis tincture now...

Sibylle, will you share the details?
The more propolis I get a hold of now, the more I think of making some home medicines out of it.

GregV

I know of this really cool homesteading website. Being a homesteader-type, I really enjoy reading and finding some good ideas. Some of these can apply to TFB ways as well. After all, good old traditional beekeeping has always been TFB and nothing else. Look for the library of articles here: http://h...

GregV

... But instead of making me money, they're costing me money for a couple years. ...or costing money every single year. I feel your pain. This is my 6th year and they have never made me any money. Maybe...maybe...next year. But I'm not holding my breath. Well, put it this way - you don't have to mo...

GregV

I really mean my hives to be mobile and easily movable by a standard vehicle using a standard luggage carrier. Idea is to be able to manage several separate, remote sites with few hives each. The hives can be left unattended for long stretches of times (including year around). Robust, well insulated...

GregV

OK, things are finally slowed down enough for me. Garden/orchard work done for now. First - a camping trip is needed to give the kids some break. :D Then time to build at least two new mobile hives (I have these two large swarms sitting in temp plywood boxes). I just scored 80-90 nice wooden Lang me...

GregV

........Well, Alaska because there were no honeybees in America at all before European settlements.... Yes; we know this. If you are in the USA/Canada, this is the given context - all honey bees are imported in Americas. But we also know that Alaska is probably about the last place in the continent...

GregV

I´m not so pessimistic like you are, Sol, about the shipping, how about moving to another location and taking your bees along? That´s the same. Did you start with local bees once again, Sol, or did you use your old ones?. I think you do the right thing in your circumstances - trying to establish fr...

GregV

35C is nothing.
Try 45C.

Meanwhile our heat wave is over.
We have 10-12C nights ahead.
Keeping my nucs under several blankets, nice and toasty.
This is June in WI, mind you!

GregV

Google: "honey bees non-native species alaska" - lots of resources.

Or Google more directly to: "Introduction to Alaska Insect Pollinators - NRCS - USDA"
Look for non-native pollinator paragraph and find the "honey bees".

GregV

Solomon wrote:Are you certain they were shipped?

Absolutely.
Bees never existed in Alaska historically.
They physically were not able to make it there on their own (yet).

GregV

I feel like people are to anxious to get going often so they'll blow money on bees that won't survive. There are already bees in Alaska, but maybe they are impossible to purchase. I guess the other option is to buy a bajillion southern packages and hope some of them randomly survive. Naturally, I d...

GregV

........

GregV

.....Greg, to a certain extent you are correct in your tiger sourcing model. ...... Hey, Solomon! A great fan here, btw! Just during this AM commute I finished listening to yet another podcast. I am here trying to develop (or rather restore?) the old, low-maintenance ways of homestead beekeeping th...

GregV

This would be a good opportunity to learn how to winter nucs. I would recommend you do it, in fact. Especially down in MO, this would be easier than up here (the North). Ability to winter backup, redundant nucs is highly desired now days if you want to succeed. PS: check Michael Bush's website for l...

GregV

Next week will be the hottest in June, 35°C, lets see it they are able to climate with closed floors. I am sure they will be fine. :) We just had a week of 30-35C non-stop and thunderstorms. High humidity too. I have three nucs now - all are in cardboard, computer boxes and under blankets. This nuc...

GregV

..I believe Italian honey bees were kept successfully in fairly far northern latitudes before varroa and pesticide pressures bees deal with currently. Latitudes and climates much different than the areas they were originally from. To me this is a testament to the honey bees adaptability... Over tim...

GregV

Yes, stay away from screened bottom boards. Well, one of most successful member of our local community here does exact that - screen bottom boards year around. So......... The more I think/research about it, the more I think top or bottom ventilation is less of an issue. The more important negative...

GregV

The problem is, Greg, that honeybees are "livestock". If a race brings more honey, beekeepers will try to import and migrate them. They will keep them in buildings, insulate the hives, feed like crazy... Bet if some see the local strains can survive they propagate more honey production......

GregV

OK, let us do an exercise... Someone gives me $1B and asks to introduce tiger species into wild areas of North America (NA) so that we "save tigers" before they go extinct.(I know - crazy and irresponsible idea, but this exactly what happened with humans bringing honey bees into North Amer...

GregV

Here you go. The thing is called "swarm prevention pocket". But this is really a multi-function thing. A medium super can be modified into this without much work, I would imagine. Numbers on pic1: 1)hive wall 2)frames 3)bee space under frames (small enough to prevent comb building) 4)plywo...

GregV

I tested this myself, Greg, i have some hives with a medium under. One build comb in every available space under the frames and has worker brood there. This is a mess. Difficult to pull the frames. There is a way to make is so that bees do not consider the extra space under the frames for comb buil...

GregV

The screen maybe OK - does not hurt (though unnecessary in this case). What I do notice is this - there is not sufficient free space under the frames (combs). Given enough free space under the frames (2-3 inches/5-10cms), these bees would likely hang in there and ventilate the hive. About this amoun...

GregV

Obviously if they can't survive, they can't adapt. I feel like that doesn't need saying.. Then agreed. However, Alaska and Siberia are just most obvious cases (cold long winters are very radical selection factor).... Actually, this kept bothering me and so I thought more on the subject. I retract m...

GregV

Control is important for germans ;) The Germans better drop this "control" thing. :) You only can control a thing or a process that you understand really, really, really well. No one should claim they understand Nature very well (and bees as a part of it). PS: to be more correct - this &q...

GregV

BTW, I googled and found a good blog of some Alaskan beek:
http://alaskahoneybee.com/dev/alaska-wi ... /about-me/

For sure they do keep bees in both Alaska and Siberia and doing well at that.

GregV

Solomon wrote:Obviously if they can't survive, they can't adapt. I feel like that doesn't need saying..

Then agreed.
However, Alaska and Siberia are just most obvious cases (cold long winters are very radical selection factor)....[/quote]

GregV

Not only are they likely to adapt, but they will.... I would think this statement needs to be qualified. What if you moved from Arkansas to Alaska. Would your bees still adapt then? I think chances would be very high that all of them would just perish during the the very first winter. So, some qual...

GregV

I do not have a top entrance, only a bottom one. But do you ventilate through the top? That still might be a part of the picture... We mess with them too much to our liking. Basically, for a classic distribution of the comb usage, the nest should be something like Tom Seeley depicts in his book (pi...

GregV

Alternative free download:
http://småbruk.se/publication/view/cons ... eekeeping/

GregV

I honestly don't care to think of these multitude of these things because I am busy planting potatoes. Kind of late in the season! I am very, very late on everything this year. What should have been planted in April, got planted in June (like beets and carrots even). Blaming it on the bees and the ...

GregV

Free PDF.
Great Read and is scientific at that.
I have been re-reading few places.
No idea of any relevant legalese.
http://småbruk.se/publication/view/nets ... -honeybee/

GregV

Caught another swarm. Late evening. Dark. Pouring rain. But this is a whooper all right (I am afraid, 40 liter nuc is too small for them). Some bees spilled all over the tarp; I brushed them into a cardboard box; the box is turning into a soggy mash. 20170612_214533.jpg Oh well, as of this AM, all b...

GregV

This is one reason I avoid getting into vertical, multi-body hives - this move up/move down management of the bees is just too strange and busy as for me. Why they are going up? Why they going down? Why different hives do it differently? Should you have top or bottom or both entrances? When you do t...

GregV

The queen is laying heavy in the second brood box, but the bottom box has very little worker brood. Mostly drones and honey. Let me guess - you have a top entrance only (in the second, upper box)? If this theory is correct, this is pretty typical with top-only entrances (see MB's writings, for exam...

GregV

I looked again.
I am pretty sure you can distinguish Varroa from Braula by their outlines and behavior.
Braula runs around; Varroa sits tight.
On the third picture down you can see how a bee is trying to scratch Varroa away (pretty sure that is Varroa).

: BraulaAndVarrowOnTheSameBee.jpg (221.63 KiB) Viewed 82 times

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