Beekeeping Tidbits

A bee hive consists basically of a queen bee whose job it is, is to lay eggs, which she can do by the thousands. Most of the bees are worker bees. Their jobs vary by the age of the bee.

Why do bees swarm? When a beehive is too full, worker bees start to produce queen cells which look like a peanut has been jammed into the honeycomb of the hive. The queen bee larvae (as well as the queen) are fed a substance called royal jelly. This is produced by the workers and you can think of it as steroids for bees. Larvae that are fed this become queens.

But back to the swarm! When the bee hive is going great the population increases until there just isn't room. When the new queen larvae begin to emerge many of the workers and the queen leave the hive to find a new place to live.

They fly away and land and form these big balls of bees. What is happening is the queen is in the middle and scout bees are out looking for a new place to live. Once they find it, all of the bees and the queen set up shop there and start a new hive. The old bee hive is no longer over crowded, and the new queen takes over.

Three B's
Queen Bee
The queen bee's only job is laying eggs and can lay up to three thousand eggs in a single day. A queen looks a little different than the other bees. She has a longer and more slender body. Also the thorax which is the part between the head and the abdomen is shiny black and doesn't have the fuzzy look. A queen bee can live for 2 to 5 years.

Drones
The drones are the male bees aka gigolo's. These are the bees whose job it is to mate with the queen bee. About 2% of a colony will be drones. They have large stocky bodies (from lifting weights at the gym) and big eyes and no stingers. Like all good gigalos they don't do any work other than mating with the queen.

But it isn't all it is cracked up to be. During the cold winter months if food runs low and it often does the worker bees get pissed, have lots of secret meetings and eventually shove the drones out of the hive to die.

Worker Bees
And the last caste is the worker bee. These bees as the name implies do all the work of collecting nectar and making honey. Workers comprise about 98% of the hives bees. These are all females, go figure!

Worker bees perform a number of duties which include feeding and caring for the queen and the larvae, building the comb, cleaning the beehive, regulating the temperature of the hive, guarding the hive, gathering pollen, and making honey.

Honey Production
The worker bees put the honey into a hexagon cell made out of wax.
With their wings, the worker bees inside the hive fan the honey to remove most of the water.
They cap the honey in the cell for storage until the winter.
You as a beekeeper cut off the wax cappings. Today these combs are then put into an extractor which is a large pot.
It has a mechanism to spin the comb and sling the honey onto the walls of the extractor where it drains to the bottom and can be collected.
Filter this and store your honey.

An extractor isn't necessary, it just makes the job easier.

Don't throw the combs away after extracting the honey. The bees wax can be used to make virtually smokeless candles.

Smoke!
Smoke is a useful tool for the beekeeper. When bees detect smoke they fear their hive will be destroyed. So they stop worrying about protecting it and start eating the honey so they can get at that energy and not have it wasted. Sort of like cooking all your meats when the freezer breaks.

This distracts them and they just aren't as worried about defending what is about to go up in smoke. That is why smoke is used by beekeepers when tending their hives.

Factoids
Different types of honey come from different flowers because the nectar that the honeybees collect varies from one plant to another.

When to harvest! Harvest your honey when the beehive is filled with cured and capped honey.

Don't harvest nectar. If what you think is honey is uncapped it should not drip. If it will drip off of the comb it is nectar and not ready to be collected. Once a cell is capped by the bees you know it is good to go honey.

Harvest a frame when 80% or more of the cells have been capped.

Only harvest honey during the warm months.

It is best for the bees if you harvest more heavily in the first half of the warm months. The bees need honey to survive the winter. Take all their honey and you won't have any bees next spring.

Honey is hygroscopic meaning that it sucks up moisture out of the air so keep all containers of honey covered with a lid.

After the honey is extracted filter it through a fine sieve to get any debris, bee parts, wax etc out.

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OLE TIMER TIPS