I did three bee programs at two elementary schools. The poorest school's students paid closer attention than the Yuppie class school kids. Wonder what can be made from that... Anyway, I took a jar of live bees as I had no demonstration hive. It was a big hit as every kid could hold it, if he/she wanted, and get a very close look at bees.
The odd thing was that I had several when I went to the far away school and I left them in the jar in the garage overnight. The next day i remembered them and they were not happy with me. I took them out and placed them on a stand close to their hive. The angry buzzing they made as I took off the lid let me know that I shouldn't tarry and spend much time explaining.
So i did a few bees when I went to the very close elementary school. I caught the bees just before i left and took them back immediately after returning home. All but one bee had died. I don't even have a theory as to why unless some third grader put a hex on them.
I enjoyed showing and talking to the kids and may do it some more.
Today I had enough sugar to mix up 2.5 gallons of sugar-water feed. It should be cooled off by now so I better had go feed before they all die.
Monday, November 15, 2010
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Feeding & feeding and feeding
Dang bees are hungry. I have to give one hive a quart of sugar-water a day and the other hive gets a gallon or more a week. I need another gallon feeder so I wouldn't have to keep running out everyday fixing the west hive's jar.
I got two gallons and a couple of quarts this harvest. It was a heckuva lot of work for that amount but every recipient has appreciated it. Hopefully, next year will be better. I want to add at least one hive and if I do it early enough, they may be able to produce.
Next thing is hive beetle control. I must do something about that by next week as the next few weeks may be awfully busy.
The Jones hive is doing well I think. Jilleroo is taking care of them. We are in a partnership that we both enjoy. OK, I know I enjoy it and she seems to. Now if she just could get super educated about bees it would help. Being way younger she still has a brain (and a very good one) so she can remember the important stuff.
Friday I am to do two programs at an elementary school in Tulsa about bees. I'll take a complete hive equipment without bees and carry a jar full of bees. I had a demonstration hive borrowed but that fell through. The hive parts were falling apart and it wasn't safe to take into an elementary school. So-- I'll wing it.
I'll get it all together and then plan on time. 2nd grade and a fifth grade. Probably 30 min at most.
I'll let you know.
I got two gallons and a couple of quarts this harvest. It was a heckuva lot of work for that amount but every recipient has appreciated it. Hopefully, next year will be better. I want to add at least one hive and if I do it early enough, they may be able to produce.
Next thing is hive beetle control. I must do something about that by next week as the next few weeks may be awfully busy.
The Jones hive is doing well I think. Jilleroo is taking care of them. We are in a partnership that we both enjoy. OK, I know I enjoy it and she seems to. Now if she just could get super educated about bees it would help. Being way younger she still has a brain (and a very good one) so she can remember the important stuff.
Friday I am to do two programs at an elementary school in Tulsa about bees. I'll take a complete hive equipment without bees and carry a jar full of bees. I had a demonstration hive borrowed but that fell through. The hive parts were falling apart and it wasn't safe to take into an elementary school. So-- I'll wing it.
I'll get it all together and then plan on time. 2nd grade and a fifth grade. Probably 30 min at most.
I'll let you know.
Friday, October 22, 2010
How sweet it is!
Finally the big day arrived. I had given up on helping someone so I could learn how to extract and decided to do it myself. I reckoned that it was not rocket science but whatever it was, I would make several mistakes anyway. So I looked on the Internet and watched a video or three and started getting everything ready.
Naturally, whenever I either get ready or start to do things, there are untold interruptions. I dealt with those and got my jars ready to boil. That only took about three times longer than it would a normal person. I boiled jars until they all screamed in surrender. I boiled jars until they all screamed in surrender.
I had taken the supers off the two hives and had checked them earlier. I sat them on flat boards with plywood covering the top so whatever bees were buzzing around couldn't get in. I had covered and placed newspapers on & under before placing the wood on/under them.
After boiling the jars I went back out and discovered one of the super boxes was not flat and bees were coming and going just like normal. Now having bees in your extracting area fighting you for the honey is not my idea of a grand ol' time so i fixed that and went back in the house. I tried to get everything in the garage setup so I would be ready when the bees were cleared from the frames in the supers.
I took my leaf blower and blew out bees from the pink hive super frames. It worked fairly well altho the bees could hold on even in a 200 MPH wind. But... I did get most of them gone.
Lo! and BEHOLD! lightning started flashing and it was getting one towards dark. The two supers from the ..old hive were still full of bees. I was less successful on getting rid of them than the pink hive. So- I decided to wait.
I arranged a place to put the frames until I could start the extraction. Then it started raining and I knew that if I chased the bees out in the rain they would probably die. I had to wait until the next morning so I made a space between the hives so the bees could escape and go home.
That must have worked as the next morning there were almost no bees in any of the supers. I brushed them away with the bee brush very early the next morning while they were still yawning.
Then I made an unnecessary trip for jar lids, as it turned out, and had everything ready. There are some people, or maybe at least one person, in the world who is more messy than me. That is possible but not entirely true.
I cut the tops off and honey ran all over everything - or so it seemed. I had to scrape the knife constantly to get off the wax & honey. I kept the knife in hot water while not using it so it would cut through the wax better.
The pink hive frames were not as full as the old (west) hive's frames so cutting them was a major pain. I worked until quite late and gave up for the evening. I started again early the next morning getting the hives outside checked to make sure they were in the proper configuration and everything was fine. Then I started again.
I cut the "caps" off both sides of the frames of honey, doing two frames and then placed them in the extractor. It is a large, galvanized cylinder that has a wire basket inside. A handle is placed on the top cross bar on the gears. You spin the basket with the frames in it so as to force out the honey. After about the tenth frame it becomes a little harder as it is hard to get started. After about two minutes of spinning it starts to become easier as the honey is thrown out. Then you turn the frames around with the other side out and start spinning again. This takes time. Lots of it. Next year I will have a much better idea of what to do and possibly what not to do.
Wednesday morning I started to fill containers. I had much more honey than I thought I would which is a YAHOOO thing. I won't have enough to sell this year but it looks promising for next year. If all three hives produce we should have a little left over for selling.
No, I think I will split one hive and buy another. That would be two hives producing honey and three hives to grow. Then the next year there would be five hives to produce honey.
Unless I decide to split another hive.
How sweet it is!
Naturally, whenever I either get ready or start to do things, there are untold interruptions. I dealt with those and got my jars ready to boil. That only took about three times longer than it would a normal person. I boiled jars until they all screamed in surrender. I boiled jars until they all screamed in surrender.
I had taken the supers off the two hives and had checked them earlier. I sat them on flat boards with plywood covering the top so whatever bees were buzzing around couldn't get in. I had covered and placed newspapers on & under before placing the wood on/under them.
After boiling the jars I went back out and discovered one of the super boxes was not flat and bees were coming and going just like normal. Now having bees in your extracting area fighting you for the honey is not my idea of a grand ol' time so i fixed that and went back in the house. I tried to get everything in the garage setup so I would be ready when the bees were cleared from the frames in the supers.
I took my leaf blower and blew out bees from the pink hive super frames. It worked fairly well altho the bees could hold on even in a 200 MPH wind. But... I did get most of them gone.
Lo! and BEHOLD! lightning started flashing and it was getting one towards dark. The two supers from the ..old hive were still full of bees. I was less successful on getting rid of them than the pink hive. So- I decided to wait.
I arranged a place to put the frames until I could start the extraction. Then it started raining and I knew that if I chased the bees out in the rain they would probably die. I had to wait until the next morning so I made a space between the hives so the bees could escape and go home.
That must have worked as the next morning there were almost no bees in any of the supers. I brushed them away with the bee brush very early the next morning while they were still yawning.
Then I made an unnecessary trip for jar lids, as it turned out, and had everything ready. There are some people, or maybe at least one person, in the world who is more messy than me. That is possible but not entirely true.
I cut the tops off and honey ran all over everything - or so it seemed. I had to scrape the knife constantly to get off the wax & honey. I kept the knife in hot water while not using it so it would cut through the wax better.
The pink hive frames were not as full as the old (west) hive's frames so cutting them was a major pain. I worked until quite late and gave up for the evening. I started again early the next morning getting the hives outside checked to make sure they were in the proper configuration and everything was fine. Then I started again.
I cut the "caps" off both sides of the frames of honey, doing two frames and then placed them in the extractor. It is a large, galvanized cylinder that has a wire basket inside. A handle is placed on the top cross bar on the gears. You spin the basket with the frames in it so as to force out the honey. After about the tenth frame it becomes a little harder as it is hard to get started. After about two minutes of spinning it starts to become easier as the honey is thrown out. Then you turn the frames around with the other side out and start spinning again. This takes time. Lots of it. Next year I will have a much better idea of what to do and possibly what not to do.
Wednesday morning I started to fill containers. I had much more honey than I thought I would which is a YAHOOO thing. I won't have enough to sell this year but it looks promising for next year. If all three hives produce we should have a little left over for selling.
No, I think I will split one hive and buy another. That would be two hives producing honey and three hives to grow. Then the next year there would be five hives to produce honey.
Unless I decide to split another hive.
How sweet it is!
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
A tragic Aussie bee story
I just returned from Australia and had two encounters with Aussie bees.
My brother has a nectarine tree in his back yard (garden as the Brits & Aussie call them) that was in full bloom. I noticed a bee one morning and began to look much closer. The tree was covered with small bees, similar to what I am used to but seemed to be a little different. Even tho I pleaded they would not hold still long enough for me to get a really good picture for I D purposes.
Later I found out that someone on the next street over was selling honey so I suspect that is where the bees were coming from. We were leaving the next day so i did not get to go ask and look and all those things I was dying to do. Oh well.....
Then- we went up to Coonabarabran which is in north central New South Wales -- Oh, we were originally in Broken Hill which is the furthest west you can go in NSW, almost in the center of the country and it is semi-arid except for this year. (More on that later)
Whilst driving one day well out of the town we came across a row of bee hives that stretched on the raised shoulder for ?? 50 + yards or metres. They had obviously been off loaded on the shoulder in a hurried manner as the stacks were not arranged and some hives were cracked and the whole scene spoke of disorder. There was a fork lift still sitting there and a semi-truck under a tree facing well away from the highway.
I went across to them to get close pictures and see what I could see as this looked tragic to me.
The bees were quite angry and didn't want to be bothered. You could hear their buzzing from across the road but I went anyway.
I didn't get a picture of an individual as very few landed on the boxes but I did get the "swam" in the air. The bees took exception to having their picture made and chased me back across the road. That distance would have been over 100' which surprised me that they would go that far. Then they attacked the car and tried to get at the people they could see through the windows. It was an Alfred Hitchcock moment. My sis-in-law left as quickly as she could get the car in gear after I slammed the door.
The next day we went back to see what happened. The truck and all the hive bodies were there but the fork lift was gone. The ground outside the hive bodies was covered in dead bees. Then I remembered seeing a police car going in that direction the day before as we were going back into town.
My guess is that someone declared the bees a hazard and sprayed them. The worst part of that is that my brother/sis-in-law own 70+ acres outside of town well away from everything and would have welcomed keeping the hives there. There was just no way to communicate that.
There is a weekly newspaper in that town and they took my story. It was supposed to have been in last week's edition and emailed to me.
I haven't received it yet.
Thought you might find this interesting as Aussie bees were being imported here not too long ago. I am going to write the paper to see if I can get any information, but they were not overwhelmed with curiosity. Sometimes Aussies are like that; very British and very set in "we've never done it that way before."
Oh well........................
My brother has a nectarine tree in his back yard (garden as the Brits & Aussie call them) that was in full bloom. I noticed a bee one morning and began to look much closer. The tree was covered with small bees, similar to what I am used to but seemed to be a little different. Even tho I pleaded they would not hold still long enough for me to get a really good picture for I D purposes.
Later I found out that someone on the next street over was selling honey so I suspect that is where the bees were coming from. We were leaving the next day so i did not get to go ask and look and all those things I was dying to do. Oh well.....
Then- we went up to Coonabarabran which is in north central New South Wales -- Oh, we were originally in Broken Hill which is the furthest west you can go in NSW, almost in the center of the country and it is semi-arid except for this year. (More on that later)
Whilst driving one day well out of the town we came across a row of bee hives that stretched on the raised shoulder for ?? 50 + yards or metres. They had obviously been off loaded on the shoulder in a hurried manner as the stacks were not arranged and some hives were cracked and the whole scene spoke of disorder. There was a fork lift still sitting there and a semi-truck under a tree facing well away from the highway.
I went across to them to get close pictures and see what I could see as this looked tragic to me.
The bees were quite angry and didn't want to be bothered. You could hear their buzzing from across the road but I went anyway.
I didn't get a picture of an individual as very few landed on the boxes but I did get the "swam" in the air. The bees took exception to having their picture made and chased me back across the road. That distance would have been over 100' which surprised me that they would go that far. Then they attacked the car and tried to get at the people they could see through the windows. It was an Alfred Hitchcock moment. My sis-in-law left as quickly as she could get the car in gear after I slammed the door.
The next day we went back to see what happened. The truck and all the hive bodies were there but the fork lift was gone. The ground outside the hive bodies was covered in dead bees. Then I remembered seeing a police car going in that direction the day before as we were going back into town.
My guess is that someone declared the bees a hazard and sprayed them. The worst part of that is that my brother/sis-in-law own 70+ acres outside of town well away from everything and would have welcomed keeping the hives there. There was just no way to communicate that.
There is a weekly newspaper in that town and they took my story. It was supposed to have been in last week's edition and emailed to me.
I haven't received it yet.
Thought you might find this interesting as Aussie bees were being imported here not too long ago. I am going to write the paper to see if I can get any information, but they were not overwhelmed with curiosity. Sometimes Aussies are like that; very British and very set in "we've never done it that way before."
Oh well........................
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
Aussie bees - Srept 8 2010 Broken Hill (NSW) Australia
Yesterday started out as a lovely day. with the sky blue as an Oklahoma spring and the sun trying its best to keep its promise. We sat on the veranda and had a cuppa whilst reading, talking and enjoying the beautiful garden. Then, as I was looking at the various colours of the flowers, etc., I saw a honeybee. No mistaking it for any other insect, it was a honeybee.
There was a small, pink-flowering tree just a few steps away and she was attracted to that. I went to the tree to check it out and found there were multitudes of bees but they were of an unfamiliar type. I got my camera and tried to get a shot or two so I could either post a picture or show someone and have them identify what kind of bee it is.
Trying to take a good shot of a bee in action is harder even than trying to get grandkids to stand still and quit acting silly.I probably shot ten times and don't think any of the shots are good enough. However, Herself got at least one with her teeny camera so the whole exercise may not have been in vain.
Next weekend we are going to my brother&sis-in-law's country place where they are building a home. They have several acres out of the town of Coonabarabran and most of it is cleared. There is also water available.
Right! Sounds just perfect place to start several bee colonies. I hope to be able to talk seriously w/ sis-in-law about this after we get there. She has a lot on her plate so I'll have to wait my turn. I think it is doable even at Aussie prices. Bee keeping here seems to be a very high dollar operation and the honey sells for about the same as in the U S.
I think I need to check that a little further also.
This was live from Broken Hill, New South Wales, Australia
There was a small, pink-flowering tree just a few steps away and she was attracted to that. I went to the tree to check it out and found there were multitudes of bees but they were of an unfamiliar type. I got my camera and tried to get a shot or two so I could either post a picture or show someone and have them identify what kind of bee it is.
Trying to take a good shot of a bee in action is harder even than trying to get grandkids to stand still and quit acting silly.I probably shot ten times and don't think any of the shots are good enough. However, Herself got at least one with her teeny camera so the whole exercise may not have been in vain.
Next weekend we are going to my brother&sis-in-law's country place where they are building a home. They have several acres out of the town of Coonabarabran and most of it is cleared. There is also water available.
Right! Sounds just perfect place to start several bee colonies. I hope to be able to talk seriously w/ sis-in-law about this after we get there. She has a lot on her plate so I'll have to wait my turn. I think it is doable even at Aussie prices. Bee keeping here seems to be a very high dollar operation and the honey sells for about the same as in the U S.
I think I need to check that a little further also.
This was live from Broken Hill, New South Wales, Australia
Aussie bees - Srept 8 2010 Broken Hill (NSW) Australia
Yesterday started out as a lovely day. with the sky blue as an Oklahoma spring and the sun trying its best to keep its promise. We sat on the veranda and had a cuppa whilst reading, talking and enjoying the beautiful garden. Then, as I was looking at the various colours of the flowers, etc., I saw a honeybee. No mistaking it for any other insect, it was a honeybee.
There was a small, pink-flowering tree just a few steps away and she was attracted to that. I went to the tree to check it out and found there were multitudes of bees but they were of an unfamiliar type. I got my camera and tried to get a shot or two so I could either post a picture or show someone and have them identify what kind of bee it is.
Trying to take a good shot of a bee in action is harder even than trying to get grandkids to stand still and quit acting silly.I probably shot ten times and don't think any of the shots are good enough. However, Herself got at least one with her teeny camera so the whole exercise may not have been in vain.
Next weekend we are going to my brother&sis-in-law's country place where they are building a home. They have several acres out of the town of Coonabarabran and most of it is cleared. There is also water available.
Right! Sounds just perfect place to start several bee colonies. I hope to be able to talk seriously w/ sis-in-law about this after we get there. She has a lot on her plate so I'll have to wait my turn. I think it is doable even at Aussie prices. Bee keeping here seems to be a very high dollar operation and the honey sells for about the same as in the U S.
I think I need to check that a little further also.
This was live from Broken Hill, New South Wales, Australia
There was a small, pink-flowering tree just a few steps away and she was attracted to that. I went to the tree to check it out and found there were multitudes of bees but they were of an unfamiliar type. I got my camera and tried to get a shot or two so I could either post a picture or show someone and have them identify what kind of bee it is.
Trying to take a good shot of a bee in action is harder even than trying to get grandkids to stand still and quit acting silly.I probably shot ten times and don't think any of the shots are good enough. However, Herself got at least one with her teeny camera so the whole exercise may not have been in vain.
Next weekend we are going to my brother&sis-in-law's country place where they are building a home. They have several acres out of the town of Coonabarabran and most of it is cleared. There is also water available.
Right! Sounds just perfect place to start several bee colonies. I hope to be able to talk seriously w/ sis-in-law about this after we get there. She has a lot on her plate so I'll have to wait my turn. I think it is doable even at Aussie prices. Bee keeping here seems to be a very high dollar operation and the honey sells for about the same as in the U S.
I think I need to check that a little further also.
This was live from Broken Hill, New South Wales, Australia
Thursday, August 19, 2010
TAADAA-IT IS MISS SUZY!!
Wellsir, sometimes things work out. I was in salvation Army doing my book job and ready to leave. Dadgumned people kept buying books and making big holes I had to keep refilling the places where those books had been. Hmmp, it would sure be a lot easier if people left everything in order and.... nevermind. I don't do the children's books as a lady does them plus the religious stuff. So-- as I was getting ready to finish and I looked over and saw "Miss Suzy."
Now for you uninitiated, Miss Suzy is the story of a squirrel who is very neat and sings as she does housework and cooks acorn cakes. I have been reading this story to various small audiences for more than 40 years. This book not only caught my attention but it grabbed me by the mental throat. A few years ago I did an all out search for it and a friend found it at a garage sale.
I now have a new small audience that needs to hear this story. In fact, I may have more audiences later on and I really believe that their childhood cannot get started without knowing about Suzy Squirrel and how she and some toy soldiers chased out the bad squirrels.
I was wrong on the cost of the book. When I was looking for it before I thought the price was about $50.00, but something has changed. I believe that people who owned the book decided to sell it so the price has come down.
It is now available for $12.89 up to $40.00. Being a used book at Salvation Army and yesterday being a half price day, I didn't have to pay that.
This book is new(looking), clean and unmarked. That makes me wonder what kind of child had the book if they didn't even fold a page or mark it with a crayon.
Yesterday was a hugely successful day.
Now for you uninitiated, Miss Suzy is the story of a squirrel who is very neat and sings as she does housework and cooks acorn cakes. I have been reading this story to various small audiences for more than 40 years. This book not only caught my attention but it grabbed me by the mental throat. A few years ago I did an all out search for it and a friend found it at a garage sale.
I now have a new small audience that needs to hear this story. In fact, I may have more audiences later on and I really believe that their childhood cannot get started without knowing about Suzy Squirrel and how she and some toy soldiers chased out the bad squirrels.
I was wrong on the cost of the book. When I was looking for it before I thought the price was about $50.00, but something has changed. I believe that people who owned the book decided to sell it so the price has come down.
It is now available for $12.89 up to $40.00. Being a used book at Salvation Army and yesterday being a half price day, I didn't have to pay that.
This book is new(looking), clean and unmarked. That makes me wonder what kind of child had the book if they didn't even fold a page or mark it with a crayon.
Yesterday was a hugely successful day.
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