The up's and down's of beekeeping

Earlier in the week I was quite elated with all the new bees that had unexpectedly showed up or were rescued.  It was a lot of work but seemed worthwhile.

I spent a day and a half building, caulking and painting new equipment for the bees.  However when I went to install the new hardware, I was greatly disappointed to find the rescued hive I brought into the apiary had vanished !!!!   Completely absconded.   There was a queen and they were mild mannered beautiful bees so it was a sad moment.

Why?   Well first off, it was stressful for the bees to have their home (a tree) crash down and then when I arrived, a chainsaw was used to get to the hive and the bees.  This made a big mess of sawdust that covered all the brood and a great deal of sawdust was vacuumed into the temporary base which was the bee vac base.  And the brood was pretty covered in dirt and dust.  But that was really the only way to get these bees out of the tree.  A trap out wasn't in the cards because the county needed the hive removed before the weekend as it was close to where people walk.

Also .... the nucs with the new swarms were different.  Only one Nuc had some bees remaining and it didn't look like the swarm that was there the other day.  Who knows what happened there.  Oh well, easy come, easy go.  I don't even try to figure it out any more.  They do what they're going to do.

And one of my other hives was queenless and not doing so well so I borrowed some brood from a stronger hive to build it up.  So many queens seem to unexpectedly disappear.

Today I'll put some bee swarm traps out at The Florida Bee Farm and try to re-capture some of these bees.  Maybe we'll get some of them back.

Blueberries and bees, bees, bees

Tomato plants are almost all gone now and in a way I'm kind of relieved because I spent a couple hours a day working on them.  It was pleasant working on them but a lot of work.  Now the blueberries are just going crazy and we're getting a lot of berries.  My wife and I were out close to sunset picking blueberries and got several quarts of them.  And boy are they delicious.  We're also getting a lot of various peppers and papayas. 

Papayas, blueberries, tomatoes and peppers for today

delicious blueberries

The Honeybee and pollinator garden is also blooming like crazy and the sunflowers are making their debut.  It's so wonderful sitting out there and watching all the butterflies and bees zipping around among the flowers. 

Sunflowers starting to bloom

I had a phone call yesterday asking if I could remove a hive from a fallen tree in one of our local parks.  For some strange reason I said yes even though I don't have enough hive parts available.  That and the fact I had a dozen other things going on.

The guy from the county said he thought the tree was hollow and would be easy to cut into.  But that was not to be.  It was a massive tree and where the bees lived it was slightly hollow but mostly solid wood.  The guy from the county offered to help but said he couldn't because he didn't have a bee suit.  So I said "I have a spare you can borrow" and suited him up so he could run the chain saw while I vacuumed the bees into the bee vac.  It turned out to be a good amount of work but the good news is I got the queen which is always a concern.

The big dilemma I was facing however was the fact that I didn't have any more bases for my hives.  So I decided to set up the new hive using the bottom of the bee vac contraption I built.  The entrance (temporarily) would be the hose hole for the vac until I could build, source or buy another base.  So problem solved for the moment.

But the big surprise of the day happened when I arrived back at The Florida Bee Farm and was greeted with two new swarms that had taken up residence in two empty Nucs that were sitting on a bench.  Bees everywhere !!  When I woke up this morning I had no desire to get any more bees as the apiary was pretty full.   Now I have three more hives counting the squatter bees in my nucs.  Time to build more bee stuff !!!