Half the hives arrived

 Last Friday we picked up one of the nuc hives and a package from Apis Hive Company.  We decided to wait until the following day to install them since we didn't have much time.  I was so excited I couldn't sleep that night.  The package of bees looked great.  Abby was sure excited to try out the new veil.

 

 

The nuc also looked really good.  I was shocked at how full it was.  You could tell it had been well established before we received it.  I think I would probably stick with the nucs if they are not much more money. At a minimum it is 4 weeks ahead of the package and really seemed to be a good way to go.  I have attached a clip of us installing the nuc.  I will try to post one of us installing the package. 

Why do I wait until the last minute?

Looks like we are going to be adding one more hive to our fold (total of 5).  We decided to try and find one more package of bees since we already have the hive boxes.  I realized I waited about a week too long to think of that one.  I have found someone in Logan, but that is a 2 hour drive each way.  Still looking around for someone closer, so we will see how it goes.  We will have tried the 3 main ways of buying bees: packages, nucs, and an existing hive.  Next year hopefully we can do our own splits to increase our apiary.  The next couple of weekends should be fun! I hear hiving a package of bees can be a fun experience.  I will take pictures and video and post them.

Nature's Hive

Welcome to Nature's Hive

We bought some raw honey in 2009 and loved every single drop. Last year I decided to look into getting more. I started reading more about raw honey and then about how fun it is to keep bees. I called my wife and she knows we're in trouble when I start the conversation with, you know I have been thinking. I told her I wanted to start keeping bees. She wasn't as opposed as I had prepared myself for. This was in March of last year and nobody had bees for sale, they had all sold out. I called my Dad and told him about my crazy idea and he loved it. He said he would buy the first hive if I would do the work. Well, we found one for sale and paid a little more than we should have for it, but we at least had a mentor. They have struggled as we were without a queen for a couple of months. By then they were getting a late start on the nectar flows. We fell in love with this new hobby. My parents love sitting in lawn chairs and watching their hive. My girls have become big fans until they get too close. My sweet wife puts up with my crazy ideas, but loves the idea of all the benefits from the bees. Nobody was stung last year except my Dad. He likes to get a little too close as he prunes the trees or weeds the flower bed. The amazing thing is not one grandchild was stung and we are talking a lot of grand-kids. In fact a lot of our concerns with bees went away as we saw they were so gentle and really didn't bother anyone. We did see an increase of honey bees in the yard, but they were either flying or on the flowers. I realized the wasps and hornets really do give the honey bee a bad name. We harvested just over 2 gallons of honey last year, which was a little disappointing. The one thing we were not disappointed in was the flavor. Some things we learned:

• Bees take their time and grow it good and slow (reminds me of the song by Lady Antebellum "American Honey")
• Try to avoid not having a queen (the hive just doesn't work with out a queen)
• Find a mentor
• There is always something to learn about and from the bees

We will try to post pictures and video to document what we have learned and what the bees are up to.

Hope you enjoy!

Nature's Hive

It's Beginning to Feel a lot like Christmas

No it isn't because we woke up to snow the other morning, although that would be fitting if it were December. Santa gave me three nuc hives for Christmas and we are getting closer to the delivery date. The anticipation of getting the bees feels just like Christmas. I waited a little too long to order the wooden ware for the hives, but Western Bee Supply was great to work with and got me the order. Not only did they have great prices (best I could find for a hobbyist), but were great to work with and I was really impressed with their quality. If I get a chance, I will post a video on how to assemble a frame and foundation. I still have about thirty to put together.

I decided to make a request to Santa to get the nucs from two different vendors. They both seemed really good and the price was similar, but I wanted to see which one works out better. I bought one from Apis Hive in Grand Junction, CO which has a Carniolan Queen and two from Harvest Lane in Grantsville, UT which will be a mix between Carniolan and Italian that they like to call the Utah Bee. Our current Queen is an Italian, so we should have a pretty good sample of Bees.

The original pick up date was April 9th with Harvest Lane, but because of the bad weather in CA they wont be ready until the 30th. Apis Hive will also be available for pick up on the 30th. Should be a fun day. If things go well this year we hope to have a little extra honey to sell. An average hive usually gets an excess about 40-50 lbs, which would be 4-5 gallons of honey. You never know what to expect from the hives, but hopefully we get a good crop from last year's hive and get at least a little off of the three nuc hives. I have checked the hive once already and the girls made it through the winter. We started feeding them just to make sure we don't lose them. They have made it this far, I would hate to have a cold spring (like it has been) and loose them.

I learned there are a few ways to buy bees. One is a package of bees and these can even be shipped through the mail. This mimics a swarm of bees in a cage. You will have about 10K bees and a mated queen. You also can buy a nuc or nucleus of bees. These are usually for local pick up only as they are more difficult to ship. From what I have found, a standard nuc contains 4-5 frames of bees. Three frames with brood in all different stages and one frame of honey and another empty frame for expansion. Most nucs will have the queen in the box for 3-4 weeks to allow her to start laying eggs. This makes it so that the queen is already accepted and you shouldn't see a drop of of bee population since new bees will hatch as old bees die off. The final way is to buy an existing hive. This tends to be much more expensive, but you should get more honey the first year. We chose to try the nucs as it wasn't that much more than a package of bees and we hope to get more honey as the queen is already established. We will see how it goes.

Nature's Hive