I live in South Carolina. I’m actually trying the same thing kinda. I am trying to make 2 nucs to overwinter. I requeened two hives with vsh/poline queens and started the nucs with the old queens. I actually installed 4 queens in total, two of my 20+ hives were queenless. The biggest challenge here right now is robbing. We are in a serious dearth. As the year goes on your probability of getting back a mated queen decreases rapidly as drones begin to decline. I was very fortunate to get one back in October last year. Here in SC the odds are about 30% chance you’ll successfully get one back. She’s been one of the best queens I’ve ever had with brood production. I like your trial and error approach. Here for the most part we combine weak colonies in august and split in spring. I’m learning why… I’ll probably lose those two nucs to robbing(even with robbing screens) and if not I’ll have to feed all winter in some capacity. Going to be interesting to see how you fare in Michigan. Wise choice to leave your strong colonies alone to keep them strong.
I’m a little behind on the timeline this year with my bees. Just tryna make the most of this year the best that I can so that I’m set up good next year. I also see why most don’t split in august haha 😂 getting a little antsy since yes there aren’t as many drones in the hives as of this week. So fingers crossed! 🤞🏼 thanks for being here ☺️♥️
@@beefitbeekeeping check out Bob Binnie’s “Feeding for success” two part series on his RUclips channel. Very interesting and informative. Biggest thing is getting those nucs built up for winter. I know those northern winters since I’m originally from Ohio lol. Main reason why I moved south! Also, great job on those nucs! You should do a video on how you built them. Every beekeeper should have nucs on hand. I’m hoping the golden rod starts here soon. Not much of a nectar “flow” but anything would help at this point. Feed feed feed!
Great information and explanation keep doing what you’re doing, it’s the best way to learn. I’ve done a few videos of my mistakes and what I’ve done as well. We’re all learning even us older bee keepers like me. Thanks again for sharing TrickyTrev 🇦🇺👍🐝🍯
Thank YOU for being here! ☺️ yes we are always a student. The day we stop learning is the day we stop growing and no one wants to stay stagnant 🤷🏼♀️♥️
Yes! Here ya go! dengarden.com/.amp/gardening/6-easy-steps-to-make-a-nuc-box Only thing I changed was I made the bottom board shorter. My next round of nucs I am going to make the sides and front/back of the 2nd box that goes on on top around 1/2 and inch shorter bc there is too much of a gap between the frames in the bottom and the frames on the top that I know they are going to build crazy burr comb because of it
The Nucs are beautiful well crafted. In life you never know how much is enough until you know how much is to much, lessons learned are worth the loss it sometimes take to learn them. Keep beeing awesome!!
I always learn so much watching your videos. Like you, I’m not afraid to try new methods or ideas and don’t worry about set-backs. As long as it helps the hive I feel like my efforts were worth it.
Exactly! Plus what’s the worse that could happen okay some nucs fail to get a mated queen or fail to build up fast enough. Alright just combine them with another hive 🤷🏼♀️ gotta try to know ☺️
That's exactly what I did... Dove headfirst into queen rearing after learning from videos, out of 60 attempted grafts only 2 succeeded, and I shared my (almost) complete failure, the goal is helping other through my mistakes, I'm only in my third year and hopefully other beginners can learn. I learn a lot from those mistakes though! I also diversified, tried two types of splits: flyback and walk away. So I ended with 15 hives total: 3 from last year, 2 reared queens and the other tens were a mix of flybacks and walk aways. Two of those are in a double nuc, same as Mike Palmer uses as brood factories, The hope is to user them to boost my colonies next summer.
I had never even heard of a fly back. Thanks for introducing me to that! Mistakes are the only way to truly learn! Happy to have ya! Thanks for watching ♥️
@@beefitbeekeeping Flaybacks are pretty interesting and effective: take 2 frames from a mature hive (preferably a 2 brood chambered one). Take 2 frames, one of which the queen is laying on and a food one and place her in the original spot with 8 undrawn frames All the foragers will return to a near empty hive (hence flyback) and go on overdrive to make room for the queen. The rest goes to a different spot and you will end up with a ton of cells. Make as many split as you can/ want with the cells. if you wish to know more, look up Gus Mitchell- Cranes Nest Honey, I learned this from him.
If you put a couple of nucs where the old hives were that you split all of the frames into your new nucs then the foragers would have come back and went into the nucs. It is how Roger Patterson makes up his nucs.
Yes that would have been wise. Unfortunately tho the day I split was right before the fall flow hit so robbing was BAD. They were getting robbed out as I was splitting so I had to get them out of there asap
My Amish beekeeper friend over winters 4 frame Nucs. His 4 frame Nucs are a 10 frame box with a 2 frame feeder/divider with 4 frames on each side. He over winters these as a single. Where did you get your Nuc plans? I'm thinking about building Nucs for the 2024 season Nuc sales can be a lucrative investment. I also have an Amish queen breeder local to me. I'll have to have him teach me how to graph queens.
Emily, check around and see if you have a woodmill in your area, you'll get full dimension lumber at a much better price, many of them will provide a planing service also. Last year, I purchased 2000 board feet of pine planed on one side for a dollar a foot. Beats the hell out of the box store prices.
This is my 3rd year beekeeping. Really only the last 2 I’ve been serious about it though. Everything I’ve learned so far is from trial and error, watching videos and reading articles, learning everything I can about how and why a bee thinks, acts, and does things the way they do, I’ve picked up some tips from other beekeepers. Picking up things all over the place to help me figure out my own beekeeping style. 😊 happy to have ya!!
Newsflash pallets last forever the hard to get lit but once or let they stay cooking for hours I did one at 10 in the morning and at 4 o’clock I said it to burn out and it was still cooking by the Pallets
usualy not need weaking the colony, just take young brood frame (1 day old eggs) and give back free frames for young eggs, and fill up from other hive bees, and some days later check and destroy unwanted queen cells, every day can take fresh frames from reproducable hive, and colony will stay strong
My 2 frame nuc’s take about a month to start building brood after the queen is mated. Sometimes it’s slower. No more splits for me the bee’s aren’t getting pollen so much and I don’t want to feed pollen and sugar. I will end up feeling both at small amounts.
We are hitting the golden rod flow right here right now. Bringing in multiple bees with pollen every second. Crazy how much location makes a difference!
Not sure exactly what you mean by storm…but to answer your other question. The queen will not mate with drone in the hive unless you force her. Even then it’s hard to get her to do it bc it’s considered inbreeding. She would prefer to leave the hive to mate with other drones of other genetics
I just found your channel and i love it! I am a 3yr backyard beekeeper and I’ve had so many losses. I tried to be treatment free but i always ended up loosing the bees before the next season. Also from many other mistakes. But i love that you are showing your wins and losses. I am treating this coming winter with apivar strips. When i think of them as what they are( livestock) it comes clear to me to treat, as you would treat any other farm animal. I really do want to go treatment free but the struggle is real with hive Beetles and wax moth on weak hives. Anyway love your channel keep up the good work! By the way i only have 3 hives.
Taking care of mites starts in August. Late fall and winter are too late. I only dust my bees with powder sugar for mite knock back. Weekly in August and September works best for me to catch them while the winter bees are being made to keep them virus free. 8 years so far. Yes we get losses no matter what we do with or without chemicals but totally treatment free is very hard unless you are the only beekeeper on an island with hives on both sides of that island for drones to mate with your queens.
Genetics are everything when it comes to being able to be treatment free sustainably. That and these nucs. Going into winter with more bees than you want in the spring saves your wallet and allows you to take more risks in that realm. That is my plan. Thanks for being here happy to have ya!! ♥️
Just let them run their course. Figured there was a reason they were killing her. It was a Queen they had made theirselves otherwise I would have taken her.
Great info. Like the trial and error method. This is my first year, haven't tried any splits yet, thinking split in the spring if all goes well this winter. 🙂
The obstacle to overcome in trying to develop queens in August, is, where have all the drones gone? The answer is they perished while mating in late April, May, and June during prime time. Hence, my hunch is with extremely limited drones, the success of queen mating becomes daunting late in the season and a risk factor.
Depends on where you are. There are drones being made in colonies all spring and summer. I have combs with drone cells on 1/4 - 1/3 of a few combs in every hive in August and September while the weather is still warm. In the north that may be an issue but we can get at least 2-3 more rounds of queens mated this time of year. Plenty of drones and capped drone cells still in the hives
If you sit outside your hive watch and listen, what is the rate of drone entry? In the Central Region on April 15th, the rate is every second to 3 seconds. The goal is for the queen to mate numerous times, depending who you talk to 10-40 times, IF there are enough drones. For discussion purposes let's choose 15. So if I want to requeen just 20 hives, that is 300 adult drones. Here, I can't see 10 flying in and out at any rate. There would be a work around if you deliberately took a queen from a hive and tried to induce laying workers to lay drone cells, but to me, as mentioned at the end, seems to be going backwards and taking from Peter to pay Paul or for me, taking from Paul to pay Peter. I hope this helps.
@@paulh.7598 The queen's don't mate with brother drones unless there are no other hives within 5 miles. I have several hives. Plenty drones and drone cells in each one. Bigger colonies will make and keep plenty drones as long as they have plenty resources or are being fed. It'll be October before my area will see them getting kicked out. Hives are still making queen cells and drones are plentiful. These are things queen breeders pay attention to.
@@sherryortiz227 Sounds like geographical location and climate are very different, but let's not miss the point. It is not optimal to be splitting hives and raising queens in late August to October. Let's start a survey, most reasonable bee keepers I know would much rather split hives and raise queens in the Spring, not late summer. More pollen, more nectar, more rain, and the sequencing of different flowers is just beginning not tapering off, so populations can be built up much faster in the Spring without sacrificing other hives just before going into late fall/winter.
One thing you might find helpfull is to read some of the studies done by Randy Oliver. He has a site called scientific beekeeping. there is a rather lengthy post on there about basic beekeeping. I learned a lot from it.
I have always saved the queens I've seen getting balled and put them in the curler cages to save them. Bees from other colonies or mixed during nuc make ups will get killed. I have found the queen to be good layers but just needed to be introduced properly. I don't graft but I do cut out cells and cage them all to emerge in a hive before moving the cage to where I want it. With a marshmallow stuffed in the end of the curler cage it takes them a couple days to get her out and they survive to get mated. This year being I've had Covid twice and did hospice care for my mom before getting sick the first time I've not been caging and therefore lost alot of queens. I currently have 2 combs of several queen cells made in one of my packed top bar hives prepping to swarm so I caged their queen who was still laying and shook out 2 nucs worth of bees to go with those cells for mating nucs when they emerge. I've been doing 2 frame mating nucs by making a divider/follower from election signs for each nuc and having front and back entrances to save space. I use reflectix on them as inner covers to keep the queens separate til they start laying good. It's easier than having 2 frame boxes sitting unused most of the year. I can divide until they grow or stack my 5 frame boxes to add a feeder jar or when they fill up. But I always cage the new queens if they didn't emerge in that colony.
Just screenshotted this so that I remember the way you split up for 2 frame mating nucs thanks! This queen was made by this hive on their own and emerged in this hive which is why I didn’t take her and cage her otherwise I would have. It was a walk away split I had done. Thanks for being here and watching ♥️
I have one question how long do you treat for mites with a small colony single brood box and I love your videos I do a lot myself by experimenting I take advice from everybody
Depends where you are. If your in August (Autumn) Hives are soon to build up their Winter Bee population... Who will need to survive for the eg x5 Months of pending Winter... here in Scotland that Nov until March. So we need good healthy FREE of Varroa Mites !!! So do several different Treatments !!! If you do different types, Mites won't get resistant to one Product and BAM ! They should be wiped out to Zero numbers, or a very low % worth !🤞 Check out RUclips for Randy Oliver : Scientific Beekeeper, talks, slides, footage... he really knows his stuff... He does at least x4 minimum treatments per Hive. Eg Oxalic Acid (O/A) Apiguard (Thymol) Formic Acid (Formic Pro) and another product for V.M eradication etc etc. You can also do Splits, and Cage a Queen (Brood Breaks) as V.M treatment as extra methods (done in Summer mainly !) Hope this helps. 😎 🐝🐝🐝🐝🐝🐝🐝🐝🐝 Happy Beekeeping 2022. 🐝🐝🐝🐝🐝🐝🐝🐝🐝
@@ME_MeAndMyBees I’m sorry I live in Pennsylvania and thank you for the information I will look up the other person to watch tons of videos thank you good luck
I’m one of those who treats very minimally. I treat once per year with Formic usually in July or August. Planning to go treatment free next year once I bring in better genetics. Always follow the instructions on how long to leave a treatment on. It’s dependent on what exactly you are using. Everyone has a different method with mites just gotta figure out which one works best for ya! Formic kills all mites on the bee and under capping without leaving residues but it is very harsh on the bees. It will burn some of your brood and set your Queen back a couple weeks. OA has to be done in multiple rounds. I’ve been told Apiguard followed by a brood break works wonders. Apivar also effective but will leave residues. Gotta have honey supers off for all of them except Formic.
@@beefitbeekeeping That’s exactly what I was thinking of doing was breaking the brw cycle they say that helps a lot I don’t want don’t like chemical treatment either I thank you for your information and I will continue watching your videos thank you
Set your nuc's up so that you can slide them together, that way when your temp drops they can be slid together share heat. I have also seen were the keeper set 2 nucs side by side and a super on top so that they shared the super. You can also take and put them over the top of your strong colonies so they can pull heat off the biggen. You are going to have to watch real close for late fall swarms. Bees love to grow up, while slightly crowded like ya said so stacked nucs can be incredible bee factories. I actually watch a few keepers that the majority of their operations are nuc based. It's just easier to get bucked off that bee and watch them fly off as a swarm in the smaller boxes. Nucs are a great tool, I love all the different ways beekeeping tools can be used.
I will be stacking them all together so that they share heat. And in the spring I will be making use of those double nuc deep boxes. Wanted to do them this winter but need to buy the material to build them. That double nuc box is a sneaky way to get a killer honey harvest off of “one hive” that is if you put another deep with a divider on top so they can have 8 frames of brood instead of 4. Will be trying that out next year too. Not a fan of putting weak colonies over strong colonies with a screen board in between just bc humid air raises so the weak colony would be getting all of that moisture. But some keeps have day success with it!! Thanks for watching and your tips ☺️♥️
Nice try! I think you should try a packed full hive of bees to draw out your grafts. There didn't appear to be nearly enough population. And heavy resources. 🙂👍
It takes 10+ days (10 during the warm summer, and possibly a couple of extra days if it is cooler/cold or she is delayed on her mating flight day due to rain) for the queen to mature after emerging before she takes her mating flight.. You need to check back in about 2 weeks, not 1 week. If you are not good at seeing eggs, you need to wait 4-5 more days so that the larvae are present.
If want someone to watch and get some ideas with do's, donts and trying all different ways, you should check out 'Black Mountain Honey'. He has some nasty bees as well, definitely worse than your's but keeps them around till trails and experiments are over.
Yes I have seen a couple of his videos. His bees seem very aggressive 😅 the more I’m learning about the breeding the more I realize in the beginning it is wise to only select for one trait not multiple. Too hard to do them all at once. I see why he keeps the aggressiveness. Can weed that out later
Awwww I felt so bad for those queens😔but hey thats nature and they've been doing it for millions of years I'm sure and it's all instinct and about survival there's nothing vindictive about it unlike how us humans operate🙄But those other queens really r Beautiful and those dark bees are Gorge too🖤🐝🖤I Loved ur intro my friend u summed U up perfectly, Always 100% honest and real and I love that we get to go on this journey with u and experience Everything the good and the bad, Perfectly Imperfect Emily the bee keeper I dig it and I am Always here for it! I like these series videos it keeps it suspenseful😱OH my century ride went really well too we shaved an Hour off our palm springs century👍Had my Favorite Keeper in my head on those hills too true story! Well Amazing job on those builds my friend they look Fantastic well done! Thanks for another Greag video and I Hope ur doing well and the fur babies r thriving and I will see U in the next one☺️#emilyisthebeesknees💛 #beefithoney🍯 #myfavoritekeeper☺️
You shaved an hour off?!?!?!?!??!!!!!!! That’s INSANE!!! Good job! I know that is NOT an easy feat. Super impressive! Was just wondering how that ride went today true story! 😉 thanks for watching and being here! ♥️
@@beefitbeekeeping Ur the Best Emily thats a true story I Appreciate U and ur support more than u know my Amazing friend☺️👣🐝💛It was Definitely not easy but not missing a week of training Definitely helped👏We have a 75mile ride event next month then doing Palm Spring century again in Feb we just signed up for that so we'll see how century #3 goes!😁🚴♂️☁️🌵Nowhere else I'd rather be than right Here supporting my Hard working friend, a pleasure and an Honor😊👑🐝🍯💛#emilyisthebeesknees #beefitbeekeeping #beefithoney #myfavoritekeeper
i would have done things diferently: take from strong hive and give to the small hive. and in spring give that back to make strong colonies. if you go on winter with small nucs you are exposing them to diseases. I make nucs only in may and june but next year i am planing to use snealgrove to make nucs in late april , in that way i can control hives from swarming and also help later the stronger hives with gathering bees
@@sherryortiz227 indeed i wintered also on nucs without problem. the probability to get disease is low but once you get it it can spread easily to others family. once you have many hives you cant risk anything. the situation it depends on weather and location
you say you are th eonly chanel that shows theri mistakes???? and u have to make mistakes to learn??? im learning to avoid makign mistakes as much as possible. but vino farm lost alomost all of his bees but didnt' say it was his mistake canadian beekeeper blog lost his hives but didnt say it was his mistake so now that I tink about it I think you are right!!!!! they make em but dont admit it. mike palmer doesnt admit any mistake either. keep it up!!!! please reach out to beekeeping with natalie the most famous girl beekeeper. Natalie is a master grafter!!!!
I will definitely look her up! Admittedly making mistakes I think it’s one of the strongest things someone can do. Definitely earns my respect bc I know how easy it is to just blame it on someone or something else. Thanks for being here ♥️
Micheal Palmer also said 3 to 4 high nuks are as close to what bees would be in nature in a hollow tree. you should consider using double screen boards to overwinter weak nuks over stronger colonies so they came share heat.
My main concern with this though is wet kills bees not cold. And the moist air from the bees breathe will go up through the screen and the top hive will be getting all of that moisture. I do plan on stacking them all together so every wall is touching so they can share heat
I'd do a mylar double bubble inner cover on the top box and drill a 3/8" hole about a 1/4" below inside frame rest in front side of the top box so you have that slight chimney effect going so there's little moisture effect, plus if your going into winter with light stores up top, you can add a thin shim and do the mountain sugar feeding thing which is adding a sheet of news paper on the top bars leaving some room around the edges then lightly spritz the paper then pour 1/2" of sugar spritz that layer add another layer then spritz it on top, this sugar will also catch any condensation and the bees eat it from the bottom side as needed.
![Quando Rondo - Life Goes On [Official Music Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/eIf3fhMXAow/mqdefault.jpg)
I live in South Carolina. I’m actually trying the same thing kinda. I am trying to make 2 nucs to overwinter. I requeened two hives with vsh/poline queens and started the nucs with the old queens. I actually installed 4 queens in total, two of my 20+ hives were queenless. The biggest challenge here right now is robbing. We are in a serious dearth. As the year goes on your probability of getting back a mated queen decreases rapidly as drones begin to decline. I was very fortunate to get one back in October last year. Here in SC the odds are about 30% chance you’ll successfully get one back. She’s been one of the best queens I’ve ever had with brood production. I like your trial and error approach. Here for the most part we combine weak colonies in august and split in spring. I’m learning why… I’ll probably lose those two nucs to robbing(even with robbing screens) and if not I’ll have to feed all winter in some capacity. Going to be interesting to see how you fare in Michigan. Wise choice to leave your strong colonies alone to keep them strong.
I’m a little behind on the timeline this year with my bees. Just tryna make the most of this year the best that I can so that I’m set up good next year. I also see why most don’t split in august haha 😂 getting a little antsy since yes there aren’t as many drones in the hives as of this week. So fingers crossed! 🤞🏼 thanks for being here ☺️♥️
@@beefitbeekeeping check out Bob Binnie’s “Feeding for success” two part series on his RUclips channel. Very interesting and informative. Biggest thing is getting those nucs built up for winter. I know those northern winters since I’m originally from Ohio lol. Main reason why I moved south! Also, great job on those nucs! You should do a video on how you built them. Every beekeeper should have nucs on hand. I’m hoping the golden rod starts here soon. Not much of a nectar “flow” but anything would help at this point. Feed feed feed!
You got a serious pump on keep up the good work 👍🏾💪🏾
Great information and explanation keep doing what you’re doing, it’s the best way to learn. I’ve done a few videos of my mistakes and what I’ve done as well. We’re all learning even us older bee keepers like me. Thanks again for sharing TrickyTrev 🇦🇺👍🐝🍯
Thank YOU for being here! ☺️ yes we are always a student. The day we stop learning is the day we stop growing and no one wants to stay stagnant 🤷🏼♀️♥️
Good stuff Emily. It’s been fun watching your journey!
Thank you Bruce ☺️
Do you have a link for the plans you used to build the nucs? You did an amazing job on them!
Yes! Here ya go!
dengarden.com/.amp/gardening/6-easy-steps-to-make-a-nuc-box
Only thing I changed was I made the bottom board shorter. My next round of nucs I am going to make the sides and front/back of the 2nd box that goes on on top around 1/2 and inch shorter bc there is too much of a gap between the frames in the bottom and the frames on the top that I know they are going to build crazy burr comb because of it
And thank you ♥️☺️
@@beefitbeekeeping Your welcome. I enjoy your videos and advice being a Michigan Keeper as well.
The Nucs are beautiful well crafted. In life you never know how much is enough until you know how much is to much, lessons learned are worth the loss it sometimes take to learn them. Keep beeing awesome!!
Exactly!! Thank you ☺️♥️
I always learn so much watching your videos. Like you, I’m not afraid to try new methods or ideas and don’t worry about set-backs. As long as it helps the hive I feel like my efforts were worth it.
Exactly! Plus what’s the worse that could happen okay some nucs fail to get a mated queen or fail to build up fast enough. Alright just combine them with another hive 🤷🏼♀️ gotta try to know ☺️
cool stuff! thanks for sharing.
Thank YOU for watching ♥️
That's exactly what I did... Dove headfirst into queen rearing after learning from videos, out of 60 attempted grafts only 2 succeeded, and I shared my (almost) complete failure, the goal is helping other through my mistakes, I'm only in my third year and hopefully other beginners can learn. I learn a lot from those mistakes though!
I also diversified, tried two types of splits: flyback and walk away. So I ended with 15 hives total: 3 from last year, 2 reared queens and the other tens were a mix of flybacks and walk aways.
Two of those are in a double nuc, same as Mike Palmer uses as brood factories, The hope is to user them to boost my colonies next summer.
I had never even heard of a fly back. Thanks for introducing me to that! Mistakes are the only way to truly learn! Happy to have ya! Thanks for watching ♥️
@@beefitbeekeeping Flaybacks are pretty interesting and effective: take 2 frames from a mature hive (preferably a 2 brood chambered one).
Take 2 frames, one of which the queen is laying on and a food one and place her in the original spot with 8 undrawn frames All the foragers will return to a near empty hive (hence flyback) and go on overdrive to make room for the queen.
The rest goes to a different spot and you will end up with a ton of cells. Make as many split as you can/ want with the cells.
if you wish to know more, look up Gus Mitchell- Cranes Nest Honey, I learned this from him.
Love that attitude and try to do that on my own channel, I show the good the bad and the ugly of beekeeping. It’s how we learn.
It is how we learn! And watching others mistakes helps us too. Keep on doing that it helps ♥️☺️
If you put a couple of nucs where the old hives were that you split all of the frames into your new nucs then the foragers would have come back and went into the nucs. It is how Roger Patterson makes up his nucs.
Yes that would have been wise. Unfortunately tho the day I split was right before the fall flow hit so robbing was BAD. They were getting robbed out as I was splitting so I had to get them out of there asap
My Amish beekeeper friend over winters 4 frame Nucs. His 4 frame Nucs are a 10 frame box with a 2 frame feeder/divider with 4 frames on each side. He over winters these as a single.
Where did you get your Nuc plans? I'm thinking about building Nucs for the 2024 season Nuc sales can be a lucrative investment. I also have an Amish queen breeder local to me. I'll have to have him teach me how to graph queens.
Emily, check around and see if you have a woodmill in your area, you'll get full dimension lumber at a much better price, many of them will provide a planing service also. Last year, I purchased 2000 board feet of pine planed on one side for a dollar a foot. Beats the hell out of the box store prices.
Thank you! I will definitely look into this! With how quickly I’m expanding, definitely in need of wood
Love your down to earth beekeeping. How long have you been beekeeping? Where and how did you learn everything you talk about in your videos?
she jsut started and is teaching as she learns i think a year. we can learn with her
This is my 3rd year beekeeping. Really only the last 2 I’ve been serious about it though. Everything I’ve learned so far is from trial and error, watching videos and reading articles, learning everything I can about how and why a bee thinks, acts, and does things the way they do, I’ve picked up some tips from other beekeepers. Picking up things all over the place to help me figure out my own beekeeping style. 😊 happy to have ya!!
You got it girl.
♥️🥰
Newsflash pallets last forever the hard to get lit but once or let they stay cooking for hours I did one at 10 in the morning and at 4 o’clock I said it to burn out and it was still cooking by the Pallets
Oh my. Good thing tho! Maybe they’ll last longer through the rain and snow
usualy not need weaking the colony, just take young brood frame (1 day old eggs) and give back free frames for young eggs, and fill up from other hive bees, and some days later check and destroy unwanted queen cells, every day can take fresh frames from reproducable hive, and colony will stay strong
My 2 frame nuc’s take about a month to start building brood after the queen is mated. Sometimes it’s slower. No more splits for me the bee’s aren’t getting pollen so much and I don’t want to feed pollen and sugar. I will end up feeling both at small amounts.
We are hitting the golden rod flow right here right now. Bringing in multiple bees with pollen every second. Crazy how much location makes a difference!
@@beefitbeekeeping that rain don’t help any with pollen. Could help the bloom last longer tho. Gl
So the queen does not have to storm to mate? How many drones would be put in a hive to mate?
Not sure exactly what you mean by storm…but to answer your other question. The queen will not mate with drone in the hive unless you force her. Even then it’s hard to get her to do it bc it’s considered inbreeding. She would prefer to leave the hive to mate with other drones of other genetics
So sorry, storm is supposed to be sworm. But, thanks for answering my question. Enjoy your videos, learning a lot from you and others!
I just found your channel and i love it! I am a 3yr backyard beekeeper and I’ve had so many losses. I tried to be treatment free but i always ended up loosing the bees before the next season. Also from many other mistakes. But i love that you are showing your wins and losses. I am treating this coming winter with apivar strips. When i think of them as what they are( livestock) it comes clear to me to treat, as you would treat any other farm animal. I really do want to go treatment free but the struggle is real with hive Beetles and wax moth on weak hives. Anyway love your channel keep up the good work! By the way i only have 3 hives.
Taking care of mites starts in August. Late fall and winter are too late. I only dust my bees with powder sugar for mite knock back. Weekly in August and September works best for me to catch them while the winter bees are being made to keep them virus free. 8 years so far. Yes we get losses no matter what we do with or without chemicals but totally treatment free is very hard unless you are the only beekeeper on an island with hives on both sides of that island for drones to mate with your queens.
Genetics are everything when it comes to being able to be treatment free sustainably. That and these nucs. Going into winter with more bees than you want in the spring saves your wallet and allows you to take more risks in that realm. That is my plan. Thanks for being here happy to have ya!! ♥️
What did you do with the queen they were trying to kill?
Just let them run their course. Figured there was a reason they were killing her. It was a Queen they had made theirselves otherwise I would have taken her.
Great info. Like the trial and error method. This is my first year, haven't tried any splits yet, thinking split in the spring if all goes well this winter. 🙂
That sounds like a great plan!
The obstacle to overcome in trying to develop queens in August, is, where have all the drones gone? The answer is they perished while mating in late April, May, and June during prime time. Hence, my hunch is with extremely limited drones, the success of queen mating becomes daunting late in the season and a risk factor.
Depends on where you are. There are drones being made in colonies all spring and summer. I have combs with drone cells on 1/4 - 1/3 of a few combs in every hive in August and September while the weather is still warm. In the north that may be an issue but we can get at least 2-3 more rounds of queens mated this time of year. Plenty of drones and capped drone cells still in the hives
Even in the north colonies are still producing drones in August.
If you sit outside your hive watch and listen, what is the rate of drone entry? In the Central Region on April 15th, the rate is every second to 3 seconds. The goal is for the queen to mate numerous times, depending who you talk to 10-40 times, IF there are enough drones. For discussion purposes let's choose 15. So if I want to requeen just 20 hives, that is 300 adult drones. Here, I can't see 10 flying in and out at any rate. There would be a work around if you deliberately took a queen from a hive and tried to induce laying workers to lay drone cells, but to me, as mentioned at the end, seems to be going backwards and taking from Peter to pay Paul or for me, taking from Paul to pay Peter. I hope this helps.
@@paulh.7598 The queen's don't mate with brother drones unless there are no other hives within 5 miles. I have several hives. Plenty drones and drone cells in each one. Bigger colonies will make and keep plenty drones as long as they have plenty resources or are being fed. It'll be October before my area will see them getting kicked out. Hives are still making queen cells and drones are plentiful. These are things queen breeders pay attention to.
@@sherryortiz227 Sounds like geographical location and climate are very different, but let's not miss the point. It is not optimal to be splitting hives and raising queens in late August to October. Let's start a survey, most reasonable bee keepers I know would much rather split hives and raise queens in the Spring, not late summer. More pollen, more nectar, more rain, and the sequencing of different flowers is just beginning not tapering off, so populations can be built up much faster in the Spring without sacrificing other hives just before going into late fall/winter.
One thing you might find helpfull is to read some of the studies done by Randy Oliver. He has a site called scientific beekeeping. there is a rather lengthy post on there about basic beekeeping. I learned a lot from it.
I will check him out thank you very much for the req ☺️
I have always saved the queens I've seen getting balled and put them in the curler cages to save them. Bees from other colonies or mixed during nuc make ups will get killed. I have found the queen to be good layers but just needed to be introduced properly. I don't graft but I do cut out cells and cage them all to emerge in a hive before moving the cage to where I want it. With a marshmallow stuffed in the end of the curler cage it takes them a couple days to get her out and they survive to get mated. This year being I've had Covid twice and did hospice care for my mom before getting sick the first time I've not been caging and therefore lost alot of queens. I currently have 2 combs of several queen cells made in one of my packed top bar hives prepping to swarm so I caged their queen who was still laying and shook out 2 nucs worth of bees to go with those cells for mating nucs when they emerge. I've been doing 2 frame mating nucs by making a divider/follower from election signs for each nuc and having front and back entrances to save space. I use reflectix on them as inner covers to keep the queens separate til they start laying good. It's easier than having 2 frame boxes sitting unused most of the year. I can divide until they grow or stack my 5 frame boxes to add a feeder jar or when they fill up. But I always cage the new queens if they didn't emerge in that colony.
Just screenshotted this so that I remember the way you split up for 2 frame mating nucs thanks! This queen was made by this hive on their own and emerged in this hive which is why I didn’t take her and cage her otherwise I would have. It was a walk away split I had done. Thanks for being here and watching ♥️
I have one question how long do you treat for mites with a small colony single brood box and I love your videos I do a lot myself by experimenting I take advice from everybody
Depends where you are. If your in August (Autumn) Hives are soon to build up their Winter Bee population... Who will need to survive for the eg x5 Months of pending Winter... here in Scotland that Nov until March. So we need good healthy FREE of Varroa Mites !!! So do several different Treatments !!! If you do different types, Mites won't get resistant to one Product and BAM ! They should be wiped out to Zero numbers, or a very low % worth !🤞
Check out RUclips for Randy Oliver : Scientific Beekeeper, talks, slides, footage... he really knows his stuff... He does at least x4 minimum treatments per Hive. Eg Oxalic Acid (O/A) Apiguard (Thymol) Formic Acid (Formic Pro) and another product for V.M eradication etc etc.
You can also do Splits, and Cage a Queen (Brood Breaks) as V.M treatment as extra methods (done in Summer mainly !)
Hope this helps. 😎
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Happy Beekeeping 2022.
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@@ME_MeAndMyBees I’m sorry I live in Pennsylvania and thank you for the information I will look up the other person to watch tons of videos thank you good luck
I’m one of those who treats very minimally. I treat once per year with Formic usually in July or August. Planning to go treatment free next year once I bring in better genetics. Always follow the instructions on how long to leave a treatment on. It’s dependent on what exactly you are using. Everyone has a different method with mites just gotta figure out which one works best for ya! Formic kills all mites on the bee and under capping without leaving residues but it is very harsh on the bees. It will burn some of your brood and set your Queen back a couple weeks. OA has to be done in multiple rounds. I’ve been told Apiguard followed by a brood break works wonders. Apivar also effective but will leave residues. Gotta have honey supers off for all of them except Formic.
@@beefitbeekeeping That’s exactly what I was thinking of doing was breaking the brw cycle they say that helps a lot I don’t want don’t like chemical treatment either I thank you for your information and I will continue watching your videos thank you
Set your nuc's up so that you can slide them together, that way when your temp drops they can be slid together share heat. I have also seen were the keeper set 2 nucs side by side and a super on top so that they shared the super. You can also take and put them over the top of your strong colonies so they can pull heat off the biggen. You are going to have to watch real close for late fall swarms. Bees love to grow up, while slightly crowded like ya said so stacked nucs can be incredible bee factories. I actually watch a few keepers that the majority of their operations are nuc based. It's just easier to get bucked off that bee and watch them fly off as a swarm in the smaller boxes. Nucs are a great tool, I love all the different ways beekeeping tools can be used.
bad for drifting
@@thehiveandthehoneybee9547 I would rather have drift then dead nucs from the cold.
I will be stacking them all together so that they share heat. And in the spring I will be making use of those double nuc deep boxes. Wanted to do them this winter but need to buy the material to build them. That double nuc box is a sneaky way to get a killer honey harvest off of “one hive” that is if you put another deep with a divider on top so they can have 8 frames of brood instead of 4. Will be trying that out next year too. Not a fan of putting weak colonies over strong colonies with a screen board in between just bc humid air raises so the weak colony would be getting all of that moisture. But some keeps have day success with it!! Thanks for watching and your tips ☺️♥️
Got two frame became real big got spit out it for year its how good qween is
Using a well mated queen 3 frames of brood stimulative feeding and protein supplements it's possible.
This is great to know thank ya! I’ve got mated queens on hold if these queens don’t come back so just in case! ☺️🤞🏼
Nice try! I think you should try a packed full hive of bees to draw out your grafts. There didn't appear to be nearly enough population. And heavy resources. 🙂👍
I agree with ya! My next try in the spring will be done that way 😊
It takes 10+ days (10 during the warm summer, and possibly a couple of extra days if it is cooler/cold or she is delayed on her mating flight day due to rain) for the queen to mature after emerging before she takes her mating flight.. You need to check back in about 2 weeks, not 1 week. If you are not good at seeing eggs, you need to wait 4-5 more days so that the larvae are present.
2 weeks correct 👍🏼 ☺️
If want someone to watch and get some ideas with do's, donts and trying all different ways, you should check out 'Black Mountain Honey'. He has some nasty bees as well, definitely worse than your's but keeps them around till trails and experiments are over.
Yes I have seen a couple of his videos. His bees seem very aggressive 😅 the more I’m learning about the breeding the more I realize in the beginning it is wise to only select for one trait not multiple. Too hard to do them all at once. I see why he keeps the aggressiveness. Can weed that out later
Awwww I felt so bad for those queens😔but hey thats nature and they've been doing it for millions of years I'm sure and it's all instinct and about survival there's nothing vindictive about it unlike how us humans operate🙄But those other queens really r Beautiful and those dark bees are Gorge too🖤🐝🖤I Loved ur intro my friend u summed U up perfectly, Always 100% honest and real and I love that we get to go on this journey with u and experience Everything the good and the bad, Perfectly Imperfect Emily the bee keeper I dig it and I am Always here for it! I like these series videos it keeps it suspenseful😱OH my century ride went really well too we shaved an Hour off our palm springs century👍Had my Favorite Keeper in my head on those hills too true story! Well Amazing job on those builds my friend they look Fantastic well done! Thanks for another Greag video and I Hope ur doing well and the fur babies r thriving and I will see U in the next one☺️#emilyisthebeesknees💛 #beefithoney🍯 #myfavoritekeeper☺️
You shaved an hour off?!?!?!?!??!!!!!!! That’s INSANE!!! Good job! I know that is NOT an easy feat. Super impressive! Was just wondering how that ride went today true story! 😉 thanks for watching and being here! ♥️
@@beefitbeekeeping Ur the Best Emily thats a true story I Appreciate U and ur support more than u know my Amazing friend☺️👣🐝💛It was Definitely not easy but not missing a week of training Definitely helped👏We have a 75mile ride event next month then doing Palm Spring century again in Feb we just signed up for that so we'll see how century #3 goes!😁🚴♂️☁️🌵Nowhere else I'd rather be than right Here supporting my Hard working friend, a pleasure and an Honor😊👑🐝🍯💛#emilyisthebeesknees #beefitbeekeeping #beefithoney #myfavoritekeeper
i would have done things diferently: take from strong hive and give to the small hive. and in spring give that back to make strong colonies. if you go on winter with small nucs you are exposing them to diseases. I make nucs only in may and june but next year i am planing to use snealgrove to make nucs in late april , in that way i can control hives from swarming and also help later the stronger hives with gathering bees
I've wintered over nucs over bigger colonies with success.
@@sherryortiz227 indeed i wintered also on nucs without problem. the probability to get disease is low but once you get it it can spread easily to others family. once you have many hives you cant risk anything. the situation it depends on weather and location
Swarm cell or capped queen cell
you say you are th eonly chanel that shows theri mistakes???? and u have to make mistakes to learn??? im learning to avoid makign mistakes as much as possible. but vino farm lost alomost all of his bees but didnt' say it was his mistake canadian beekeeper blog lost his hives but didnt say it was his mistake so now that I tink about it I think you are right!!!!! they make em but dont admit it. mike palmer doesnt admit any mistake either. keep it up!!!! please reach out to beekeeping with natalie the most famous girl beekeeper. Natalie is a master grafter!!!!
I will definitely look her up! Admittedly making mistakes I think it’s one of the strongest things someone can do. Definitely earns my respect bc I know how easy it is to just blame it on someone or something else. Thanks for being here ♥️
@@beefitbeekeeping Thats awesome I hope you do a collaboration with her!!!!! myh onlyh mistake would be no t watching your vids!
Micheal Palmer also said 3 to 4 high nuks are as close to what bees would be in nature in a hollow tree. you should consider using double screen boards to overwinter weak nuks over stronger colonies so they came share heat.
My main concern with this though is wet kills bees not cold. And the moist air from the bees breathe will go up through the screen and the top hive will be getting all of that moisture. I do plan on stacking them all together so every wall is touching so they can share heat
I'd do a mylar double bubble inner cover on the top box and drill a 3/8" hole about a 1/4" below inside frame rest in front side of the top box so you have that slight chimney effect going so there's little moisture effect, plus if your going into winter with light stores up top, you can add a thin shim and do the mountain sugar feeding thing which is adding a sheet of news paper on the top bars leaving some room around the edges then lightly spritz the paper then pour 1/2" of sugar spritz that layer add another layer then spritz it on top, this sugar will also catch any condensation and the bees eat it from the bottom side as needed.