Easter Mess up

-Posted by Isaac

Happy Easter, bees.

Yes, that’s actually a field in Ohio. Right down the road, in fact. Every now and then you’ll see a thing of beauty. The farmers haven’t been in to spray. It’s either too wet or they’re just too busy, and the purple deadnettle takes over. I hope the bees enjoy it. It won’t last long.

Let me tell you about my mess up. I discovered it yesterday, Easter Sunday. I was skipping the extended family stuff, mainly because Jayne and the kids spent Easter in Holmes County, but also for the simple reason that I’m feeling overwhelmed with bee work, and yesterday was a warm dry day. Had to work… but now I wish I hadn’t…

I discovered I killed about 50 nucs. Still sick about it this morning. But I’m getting a grip on what happened, and what the repercussions will be.

I won’t get into the details. But let me say it can be boiled down to— 1. My own stupidity. 2. The weather 3. The rush to fulfill wholesale nuc orders.

Those three, in combination with apple pollination.

Moved bees into the orchards this week.

And as it turns out, all my foragers (those that were supposed to be keeping the nucs warm) went into the apples.

Instead of taking pictures of goats, maybe if I was a little more vigilant about checking…

…I would have discovered my little disaster in time.

We’ve got 350 to wholesale! Got to move, got to move! I assumed all was well, and forged ahead. Maizy even helped for a while.

That beautiful frame of brood she’s holding— now dead.

What an idiot I am. I’m just glad I was able to call Jayne last night. I didn’t sleep much, but what little I got was due to her soothing everything-will-be-alright talk.

And she’s right, everything will be alright. We’ve got plenty of bees, and plenty of time to recover. Another hard lesson learned.

Most of the night was spent batting around the nuc sales problems. Here’s what I’ve come to (for next year):

1. Nothing goes out before May.

2. No more wholesaling. (Which ought to make a few of you happy. You know who you are.) I’m tired of the stress. Maybe some sort of nuc honor system?… so I still don’t have to deal with you…

3. I come first. The early nucs will be moved into dead-out holes in April… instead of the post-sale stuff in late May.

It’s another day. Looking like we’ll see some sun. I’m going back out in an hour, going to shake this sick feeling in my stomach. Hopefully I’ll make it through five or six yards, come home hungry and tired and be able to kiss and hug my beautiful family.

And really, take a step back. What are these problems? They’re trivial. Sri Lanka dealt with church bombings for their Easter Sunday.

Today is going to be a better day.

American Dream

-Posted by Isaac

What a fantastic week!

For humans and insects alike.

Mostly dry, sixty five degrees, even sunny at times. The world has come alive!

The pollen flow has gone from a trickle to a tidal wave.

Red from the deadnettle, yellow from the willows.

The bees are building, the race is on!

We are well into the splitting process…

… the nuc population of Honeyrun Farm is increasing by the hour,

and by the day.

I’m rushing around from one thing to the next.

But I am thankful for my lovely wife who helps me keep my bearings. She sees to it that I don’t lose track of the more important things in life— like good music. A few days ago we shot down to Nelsonville to watch my favorite drunken poet.

I’ve been in love with Hayes Carll for a few years now. Jayne knew this and made good on a belated birthday present— front row seats, Stuart’s Opera House on a Tuesday night. What a perfect evening, falling into a perfect week.

This song has been kicking around in my head for days.

I love it. Even though I don’t totally understand it. It just makes me feel good, almost patriotic. I listen to it, draw metaphors from the beautiful lyrics, and just look around. Is this it? The American dream? I guess so. I guess it suits me. Bees and trees and flowers and kids and music. The brimming excitement of spring growth.

I’ll leave it at that. I’ve got a phone full of pictures from this week and I’ll go ahead and share my version.

Then play it again. Listen to this Texas poet and think about your own American dream.

I lit the fire, poured out the bottle

Asked the moonlight what it might have seen

If we danced, I can't remember

I fell down into the American Dream

Been too long in the Devil's workshop

So I'm driving the backbone to change the scenery

Here come the horses through purgatory

They fell down into the American Dream

Summer time sunshine, shine on me

Show me where I'm going

I'll find an old friend in El Dorado

Like Harry Dean Stanton on a drive-in screen

A tumbleweed blowing through Paris, Texas

He fell down into the American Dream

Sun-bleached dresses wavin' from a clothesline

Come Saturday evening, they'll have a place to be

I'll pick some flowers to take to her Mama

I fell down into the American Dream

Summer time sunshine, shine on me

Won't you show me where I'm goin'?

Leaving San Francisco for New Orleans

I can hear that rooster crowin'

Spit and polish the ancient story

Love and glory, gold and greed

Nothing changes, even if it wants to

We go down into the American Dream

Package Bees- Addendum

-Posted by Isaac

Can’t we all just get along?

Following Brian’s comments on that last post, I began thinking about a scenario that often happens with package bees. It occurred to me that this oft repeated scenario is beneficial to both the package folks and anti-package beekeepers. And so often we help each other while pointing fingers and dismissing the other party.

Give me a minute to take you through this:

-Package Bees (Pro-package beekeeper installs a package.)

-Honey (Package builds quickly into a hive and produces a box of honey off the wonderful spring flow.)

-$$$ (Pro-package beekeeper rushes around extracting and selling the wonderful honey.)

-Swarm (Because of the rush, the hive isn’t resupered in time. Bees swarm from lack of room.)

-Bee Removal (Swarm annoyingly ends up in a garage wall. Anti-package beekeeper gets a call.)

-$$$ (Charges for the removal, and places bees in the backyard apiary.)

-Overwinter (Takes the “wild” hive through the winter.)

-Queens (This anti-package master beekeeper breeds the progeny of the hardy overwintered stock.)

-$$$ (Sells locally adapted queens from wild and hardy overwintered stock.)

See how easy that was? This happens all the time. We really can get along. To the benefit of each party.

Now how about you try it? I’ve taken care of the hard part—beekeeping.

I can think a number of other issues tearing this country apart— guns, drugs, immigration, abortion, racism, sexism, taxation, healthcare, income inequality, etc… you name it. Get to work! I want solutions! Compromise! Nuance!

Granted, none of these are quite as complex as the beekeeping problem. That’s why it took me a few days to figure it out. But you can do it!

The package bee conundrum

-Posted by Isaac

It was a big week on the bee farm. We got our package bees installed.

For the last three years on the last week of March, I’ve had the good fortune of driving down to Georgia in the tough little Ranger and coming back loaded with bees.

Bought 120 this year— about all that would fit! I look at it as good fortune because it’s really hard to get packages this early unless you’ve been in the business for years and years. And I’m still a relative newbie. It’s an enjoyable quick trip, 12 hours down, sleep, 12 hours back, and if the weather is suitable we’re giving those bees a home the very next morning.

For us, buying packages has been a real shot in the arm. It’s helped in so many ways. But I hesitate in even posting about it because, as you may know, the bee world is divided on this. Some, maybe even the majority of beekeepers are quick to cuss and spit when the subject of packages comes up.

So it’s a conundrum. Should I tell you about it? Will it make you hate us?

We obviously fall in the ‘packages are awesome!’ camp.

Because it’s such an fun little adventure, I think I’ll go ahead and show you the process. But I won’t turn my back on you ‘packages suck!’ people. I’m going to try to acknowledge many of your thoughts and misgivings. How about I make a list? The good and the bad of package bees…

While you go over the two lists and figure out where you stand on this divisive issue, I’ll simply caption the photos with explanations of what we’re doing. You know,… for those of you interested, but undecided. Pick a side, you spineless lily-livered centrists.

Prepping the hives. A little protein, a little syrup.

Package Bees- The good:

-A fun trip to the south

-Quick and easy way to fill dead-outs

-You’re starting with a clean slate (No varroa)

Each package comes with a newly bred queen. She goes in first. (Having pulled the cork from the candy plug.)

-New young queens

-Added and mixed genetics

-Many early drones for your own breeding endeavors

Take the can of syrup out and shake the bees in. (About three pounds) A spacer helps…

-The bees are on the upswing and ready to go, filled with southern enthusiasm.

-It’s spring! You haven’t had to deal with frozen toes and mud as you take them through the winter.

-They’re fast! A March package on drawn comb can actually make honey in May.

…the spacer helps keep them in as they go down

Package Bees- The bad:

-It’s too easy. You should have to earn your beekeeping stripes.

-You really don’t know what you’re getting into.

-We’re creating 4-H projects, not enough disciplined lifetime apiarists. Bee-havers, not beekeepers.

One after another… 120 seems almost endless.

-These are “weak” southern bees with inferior genetics.

-We’re polluting our strong, hardy overwintered Ohio stock.

-Who knows what kind of diseases those packages hold?

A warm body attracts a few passengers on a cool morning.

-You and your packages are the reason the bees are going “extinct.”

-You and your ilk are knowingly unleashing a plague.

-You are solely responsible for a host of ills, including but not limited to: rampant ecological destruction, the insect apocalypse, climate change, the Spanish flu, both world wars, the 2008 recession, and Donald Trump.

-Oh yeah, I almost forgot—original sin. Your fault!

Done in four or five hours. Another hour to clean up the mess.

So where do you fall on the package bee spectrum? Are they bad or good? The curse of the beekeeping industry? Or the savior?

Maybe you’re just still indifferent. It is what it is, right? Say what you will, many a lifelong beekeeper (including this one) got their start with a package.

Maybe having a 4-H project isn’t such a bad thing.

Onward past the Ides

-Posted by Isaac

Some days are diamonds.

We’ve had a few of those haven’t we?

Thinking about the miserable March of 2018, I certainly can’t complain about this year.

On warm days, we’re out. On cold days we’re out.

On the rainy days, we find things to do inside.

In between all this shifty March weather, we get wind.

It’s been pretty intense this year, as some of us have seen close up. The hay barn just outside Darbyville lost its roof.

And Mt. Sterling’s iconic restaurant took a beating.

I remember the last hurricane force winds that ripped through town a few years ago. A big chunk of roof was taken off the same building. I listened the next day as the news was so relevant it made the afternoon talk on AM 610. The late great John Corby commented, “If Ben and Joy’s ever gets taken out, I’ll tell ya, that whole town might as well hang it up.”

Well, keep smiling John, wherever you are. I’m happy to say Mt. Sterling is standing solid, Ben and Joy’s is still kicking, proudly serving up green marshmallow fluff in the eternal lunch buffet. Climate change has thus far proven no match for the Angel Room.

The night of the nastiest winds took a couple lids off our hives here at home. I went out with a flashlight and placed them back, but it made me think… I’d better make it around to check on everybody. The next day, sunup to sundown, I visited almost everybody. About 500 hives. Even though I only found three more lids blown off, it was worth the trip. It gave me a chance check on the girls one final time before we start our April splitting.

If a hive is marked with the brick on edge, it’s big enough to make a split. (To make a nuc or two.) Much to my delight, about 90% are splittable.

And even better, I’d say at least 50% look like this:

A hive like this will make a nuc or two in April and go on to produce a box or two of spring honey in May. (Fingers crossed.) It’s awesome! A complete turnaround from the way things looked last March.

But for now, the weather’s still cold and the many many mouths require ever more calories to make that final push into spring. We burned through our third pallet of winter patties this week.

It won’t be long though. On the good days, the girls are making it out and actually finding what mother nature is serving up. Bill Huhman, our county bee inspector got a closeup of one of his girls loaded with what we think is maple pollen.

The willows will soon follow. Then the deadnettle, the chickweed, the dandelions, and… everything else. Just a few more days!

For now, we cheat. On the nice days our girls here at home have themselves a gluttonous picnic.

Collecting, cleaning, and selling pollen has its benefits— buckets of dust. A winter’s worth of pollen dust provides the bees with hours of snacking and gives us some good cheap entertainment to boot.