The bees in both hives were happy and active. I didn’t open the hive to check on the top feeder, but I did notice that both hives had workers returning with baskets full of yellow pollen. I don’t know what they found in March 16th. The forsythia have not come close to blooming and the only flowers that I know of would be Snowdrops, Crocuses and some early Daffodils. I don’t think that these would be all that plentiful, though. The only thing I can think of would be Skunk Cabbage and perhaps there is a tree that is blooming early from all the rain and warm weather. I think that perhaps the large silver maple is starting to bloom, at least the buds that I saw are large and ready to go. I think at the top of the trees there may be some blooms.

That the bees are returning with lots of pollen this early in the season is a wonderful sign. Tomorrow I will give them more syrup.

One thing, though, is that there is bound to be more bad, cold and wet weather. Spring is like that.

This is a wonderful surprise. I thought that the Martha hive was doomed, and now she is active and growing. I will be getting my next two hives, soon and I hope that this year I will get a good crop of honey.

One thing, though, my brother wants to raise bees, too. After I started, he began to read up on it. He wants me to split a hive for him this summer so he can get started. I was going to split the hive, but I was going to sell it and make back some of my investment. I may be able to make more than one split. We’ll see. I think it would be better if he bought a package up near where he lives.

I am stuck in the usual Spring wood backlog. I ordered new supers and deeps, enough to make my fifth hive if I split. Everything is back-ordered. I have enough to handle the two packages that I ordered, but I want to be prepared.

As I understand it, the bee packages are made at large apiaries  from vacuuming out bee hives, taking a bunch of bees from each hive, but leaving the queen and the half the bees behind. The early Spring in Georgia means that the hives have been building up for a month or more before the hives are vacuumed. If there is bad weather, the brood will be late and everyone will have to wait in order to get enough bees.

Queen breeders provide the queens, and the schedule of starting the queens and mating them has to be coordinated with the making of the Bee Packages.

The bees are added to a shoebox sized mesh box with a can of sugar syrup and the queen cage. It takes about 16 to 20 hours to get from Georgia to the NY area, depending on conditions and traffic. I understand last year the 3AM shipment didn’t arrive until 10AM. If the truck loads at Georgia 6AM and all goes well, the bees will arrive as scheduled. If there is a line and the truck isn’t loaded right away then all bets are off.

I am bringing a pillow with me when I go to pick up the bees.

This whole feeding in March thing is questionable. I fed Martha just because I felt the hive was in jeopardy. Then I fed Connie as well. I wonder if it is a good idea to feed the hives in the late Winter – early Spring?

It has consistently been above 50 degrees F in the daytime here. The bees are waking up and cleaning out the hive. The outlook shows that the temperature will rise above 50 for the next 10 days. Feeding sugar water when the temperature is cold is not good because the bees have trouble evaporating the water to make honey and will be stressed. The humidity has been low and the temperature in the hive is perhaps warm enough so this may not be a problem.

Italian bees will start building up in the early spring if you feed them, and this is my goal. I want the weaker Martha hive to be ready for the spring nectar flow and I want the stronger Connie hive to be productive. I have in the back of my mind to split the Connie hive.

The buds pop here at the end of March. The pussy willows are already popping, and I see skunk cabbage sprouting up. These are early sources of nectar. The bees will be flying about, if it is warm enough, in two or three weeks. I am hoping that that is when the brood emerges so they can take advantage of the early flow.

A good backyard Beekeeper has a few good hives. A bad beekeeper has as many as he can get. I want to have eventually five or six hives and be able to sell a split hive once or twice a year.

I will have two hives from last year, and I think they will produce as much as 100 pounds of honey that I can sell for 4 or 5 dollars a pound. This will go a good ways towards paying for all the wood I’ve bought.

I will have two packages in April. If they do well, they may give me some honey in late summer, but I doubt it.

I might have a split off of Connie that might, or might not have enough honey to harvest in the late summer.

I will be able to sell one of the hives next year, if they all survive the winter. With the wood and the hive I should get maybe $300. This would be about $150 worth of wood and frames and $100 worth of bees, but together in an established hive it would be worth more.

I ordered frames and wood so I would have a small extra hive ready for a split or a swarm capture this spring. There is always hope.

If you want to see what is happening on BeeSource there is a link to
view latest posts that automagically shows postings in real time. I have this bookmarked and I watch it when I have nothing else to do.

This is way too much information – it is like trying to drink from a fire hose.

The good news is that when I opened up Martha, there were lots of very active bees. I thought that she would be dead. She only had the one hive body of honey to make it through the winter and I thought that it was mostly empty from being robbed.

I took this video:

Bee Hive March 6, 2010 from Keith Graham on Vimeo.

As you can see there is lots of buzzing around and it might be the other hive robbing what is left, but I tend to think it is mostly Martha waking up from her long winter sleep.

Both hives have about a quart and a half of sugar water (about 3 pounds of sugar each). I will mix up some more and feed them during the week if I have time. The top feeders hold a gallon or more each.

I took a video of Connie, the healthy hive. (For some reason I called her Ethel in the video. Ethel is the hive that died last fall.)

Bee Hive on March 6, 2010 from Keith Graham on Vimeo.

The first weather related bee delay has been announced.

My bee packages are now due to arrive in West Nyack on April 2nd, 2010.

AZApiaries.com » Package Bee & Nuc Delivery Dates.

The video here is a little new age whifty for my tastes, and in my conversations with Ron he comes across more reasoned and thoughtful than he seems here.

I will be using my store bought hives again this year and I hope the weather is better and the bees thrive. I want to spend some time and perhaps, with experience, I can go Ron one better with an interesting hive design. I like the sculptural and architectural aspects of his hives and I think I might find a practical, but interesting approach to the same problem.

I opened Martha and quickly set the pollen patty over the frames near where they were clustered. There was a visible mass of bees just below the top of the frames and they were moving. As I put the top back on, one slow moving girl came out of the hive to challenge me. I hope she made it back in as I quickly as I left.

By the way, yesterday, February 14, was my Aunt Connie’s 92nd birthday. Happy birthday Aunt Connie. (My granddfather was reading a book when she was born in which the heroine was named Consuela. He liked the name, but he pronounced it Con-Sue-Ella.)

If you want bees, order NOW because the truck is almost full.

Bees on January 18, 2010 from Keith Graham on Vimeo.