Sunshine and Smoke

Hey, the sun is finally out and luckily on bee checkup day. We opened up both hives and found we have no queen in either hive. I feel deeply sad about this. We decided that we should take the chance and combine both hives so the small one has a chance and the large one could use the extra workers. We don't think the small hive is sick, just weak. The large hive got very pissed off about the new bees trying to get into their hive, so in this case I used smoke, which did calm them down a bit. It calmed me down a bit too. (Update: We are getting a virgin queen this weekend from Bob Fisher.)

I was really beginning to get SAD out of season with this lack of sunshine, so now I'd better go soak up as much vitamin D as possible. I hope the sun stays for awhile. Enjoy!

Part 2 of the Calm Beekeeper's Swarm

I received a call at about 3:30 pm that Colleen's swarm had relocated. This time they were low enough to capture with the help of our local mentor Cal. You can see from this photo the scale of the swarm--it is a bit smaller than a basket ball net and somewhat diminished from what it was yesterday. They were in the front yard of a neighbor's house, having traveled north. We've usually seen them travel south, so this was a new situation for us.

The trick was to clip the small branches first so that the bees would be all together in one large clump that C could rehive.

It was awkward getting near the branch because there were hedges all around it. Cal talked C though it all in a soft, gentle voice. You could say he is a beekeeper whisperer and well as a bee whisperer! The trick was using the small handsaw to cut in a backwards motion to gradually cut through the thick branch.


Neighbors stopped to watch and ask questions. An arborist explained to the neighbor that having one final big cut at the end of the branch would be the kindest thing to do to the tree at this point. It's good to have a tree doctor on the scene! You can see that C gave her bee suit to Cal to wear, so she did get a few stings and it seemed that once the bees got the scent of the stings she was a marked woman! Cal doesn't even usually wear gloves, but since this was a bit tricky to get to, the bees did start to get defensive.

This is the branch after the swarm has been cut down. It took a while for the remaining bees to catch the scent of the new hive.

Here's the branch inside two dadant boxes. Once the bees felt secure in the box they started fanning the scent to bring the rest of the bees home.

Once Cal and C got the branch into the hive, they put in as many frames as they could and put a cover on the box, leaving a back entrance for the bees to find their way into the hive. It took about two hours to get them to this point and another two to get them all settled in for the night before we moved them into C's back yard. C and Cal did a great job and having the swarm in such a public place was a good educational opportunity for the neighbors. It was a beautiful swarm.

The Calm Beekeeper's Swarm

It's a muggy, heady day. There are all sorts of sweet blossoms out there. I cut some phacelia from the city hall school garden and put in a vase on our dinner table. I hadn't realized it was so fragrant. The roses are starting to bloom, the mock orange with its intense jasmine perfume and the sweet purple rocket. I gave our small hive a peek just to see if they were getting crowded, but they still have room. Our neighbor's hive decided they needed a more spacious condo. When I returned her phone call she sounded incredibly calm and had the situation under control. When I arrive to take a look she offers me a cup of tea. The bees had swarmed right in front of her (funny how they do that) and landed in a cedar tree in the neighbor's yard to the south, 30 feet in the air. So now what do you do? You phone Cal, the swarm man, get an extra hive box, fill it with a few frames sprinkled with sugar water and put it on the roof of a shed directly under the cedar tree and you wait.

This is a huge swarm. It looks like a warm knitted sweater hanging from the tree. The calm beekeeper went to tell the neighbor he had a swarm in his yard and when I heard laughter I knew everything was going to be okay. C came back smiling holding a nice looking raspberry bush he'd given her. Another neighbor came over to take a look and offered to help as he has had experience with bees in South Africa. J came bearing a gift of sugar water and C sprinkled it on the outside of the hive and closed up the box about 3/4 of the way because in our experience the bees prefer a dark space to move into.



It was a strange day for a swarm being very wet and cool this morning, but the bees saw a window of opportunity and they were right. It's been a dry, sunny evening, even though at one point we did hear a rumble of thunder. C thinks she will leave the box there over night and collect it in the morning. Now that I see from the photos it's a dadant I hope it's big enough for all those bees.



On the way home I see bumble bees scrummaging like mad over the California lilac. I've got to get some of that in my back yard. It must be one of the best bumble bee plants that grows in Vancouver.

Honey Tasting

Yesterday, in honor of the International Day of the Honey Bee, J and I hosted a honey tasting, including some comb from our two block diet hive. J and her daughter made some cute bee balloons to lead the neighbors to the event, which was graciously sponsored by a small grant from the Little Mountain Neighborhood House Small Neighborhood Grants program.

J has an awesome bee garden. This is a variety of monarda, aka bee balm. J has a monarda with red blossoms which the bumble bees like and I have a wild variety in my garden with mauve blossoms.

These are the nectars which will inevitably form the floral bouquet which will find its way into our honey. The bees have obviously done a great job pollinating this cherry tree. The raccoons will be happy!

Clover honey is one of the most common of the monofloral honeys in Canada.

Jerusalem artichokes are a great fall food source for bees, but be advised that they can be a very invasive plant.

Lavenders are excellent bee plants and you can really taste the floral oils in the honey made by lavender fields.

In fact all the plants in the mint family are wonderful for bees.

We laid the honeys out from left to right, with the lighter honeys first, just like you would in a wine tasting. I put out some sheets where people could write their tasting notes, with guides such as: viscosity, mouthfeel, aroma, color, and taste.

This linden honey was a favorite of a few people, including me. One person said it tasted like Indian sweets and rose water. I thought it had a bit of lemon peel in the finish.

These are the darker honeys, with buckwheat near the end and finally a honey with propolis which has a funky piney medicinal taste people either love or hate. Buckwheat honey has an earthy, rich molasses, malty flavor. When I was at UBC farm this week someone had brought a tea cake made with whiskey, coffee, and buckwheat honey that was absolutely gorgeous. I've got to get that recipe!

I also gave away some of my friend L's great handmade paper embedded with seeds. She describes this guerilla gardening project on her website.

It was a drizzly day, so unfortunately we couldn't open up the hive, but I showed a few local beekeepers what our set-up looked like. There were a few bees huddling inside the entrance peeling out at the rain, and a few brave foragers who were making foraging trips. One of the boys who came by was writing a paper for school on colony collapse disorder, so he was very keen to take photos the next time we do a hive check.

Some people really preferred the lighter honeys such as the fireweed and acacia. In doing research for the tasting I read that there are over 3000 monofloral honeys in the world, with 300 in North America. Once again I was inspired by the mystery and magic of honey. Our honey was a big favorite, with its fresh, complex floral bouquet of white blossoms.

J looked lovely in her leopard spot boots! Thanks to every one who came out to have a taste. Hopefully next year the sun will shine.

Bombus Queens in Azaleas

The azaleas in our neighborhood are blooming in bright lipstick colors and today I saw two giant bumble bee queens in our fuschia azalea bush. The weather is windy and unsettled with constant temperature fluctuations. I have a few volunteer sunflowers growing in my vegetable garden and one of them is already about six inches tall. The mason bees are sunning themselves and pollinating our strawberry blossoms.

Currently we are trying to settled our honey bees down because they have been trying to swarm. (Long story.) The trick is to monitor their health without spooking them again. This week we need to give our original hive a good checking over to see if we still have a queen and to give them a dusting of icing sugar for mite control.

I am very excited that we are having a meeting of beekeepers in the neighborhood very soon. It will be great to share stories. If you are an aspiring beekeeper under the age of thirty, check out the Environmental Youth Alliance's urban apiculture program.

Early Swarm

On Sunday (April 11) J and I were just about to do a hive check. I'd just finished lunch and my partner said, "Honey, look out the window, something's happening with the bees." Sure enough, the yard was full of a cloud of bees getting into swarming mode. Thank goodness we were home. I got into my beekeeping suit, my heart thumping away as the adrenaline started to pump into my body. A neighbor across the way started yelling at me to do something. I followed the bees into another neighbor's yard two doors down from mine, but then wouldn't you know it, the bees chose to land in a tree in the irate neighbor's yard. I grabbed a banker's box and a pair of scissors and knocked on his door. I heard vicious barking. My adrenaline went up a notch. I apologized he told me he was allergic to bees. I assured him they were not in stinging mode and I would get them down as soon as possible.

Fortunately his neighbors were helpful and friendly. Fortunately they had a ladder that would reach up to the garage roof I needed to climb up on to get to the bees. Fortunately the adrenaline rush meant that in spite of my fear of heights I got up on that roof and started scooping bees into the box. The Nasanov reflex kicked in immediately and the other bees followed the scented trail. All along the edge of the box, bees had their butts in the air fanning their wings. It was a beautiful sunny day and my hands were shaking. All I could do was wait. I might as well enjoy this, I thought. So I took a deep breath and tried to calm my body in by breathing in the scent of the spruce tree and rest my eyes on the intensely blue sky. There were a hell of a lot of bees. The majority of the hive had swarmed.

Of course all the while I was kicking myself for not opening the hive sooner and adding more space. The weather had been so crappy that it didn't give me much of a window to open the hive. It was almost as if a giant batch of bees matured at the same time--a real surge in the population. As the box began to fill I realized I would need help getting it down from the roof and also I needed I bigger box! I shouted over to P to get J and a big box with a lid. We ended up using a large Rubbermaid tub. I put the cardboard box into that tub, then I used J's secateurs to cut off the spruce branch the bees had landed in. Sometimes the smell of the queen's pheramones rubs off on the branch so I wanted to keep it in the hive just in case.

Luckily we had a couple of extra hive boxes, a bottom and a lid so we could house the swarm. Once they'd settled down we put in a layer of frames. It actually took them a couple of days to settle down. Yesterday we flipped the boxes so the frames are now at the bottom and today I removed the pine branch and put in a pollen patty and a jar of sugar water to boost their wax production. They're all settled at the bottom of the hive now, busy building comb.

In the photos above you can see there is a hole in the front of the brown box. I find it fascinating that that is by far the favorite of the three entrances available to the bees.

Yesterday we did a check of the original hive and knocked off the queen cells. I'll go into more detail about that in another post. For now, enjoy the lovely bumble bee I found resting inside one of my sunny yellow tulips!

First Day of the Beekeeping Year

Happy New Year! This year the beginning of the beekeeper's calendar coincided with the Chinese Lunar New Year and Valentine's Day. Furthermore, it was a sunny 15 Degrees Celsius in Vancouver. Time to clean up the back porch to get ready to grow seedlings!

We opened up the hive and found some mold had formed on the top, so we scraped it off and took out one frame all together and replaced it with another. We put on a pollen patty I had just defrosted and a jar of sugar water. The bees were very curious--landing on us and flying into the house as soon as I opened the door. I had to perform three rescue missions. You can see where they landed on J's beekeeping suit below. There were young bees practicing their orientation flights in front of their hives and others bringing in bright yellow crocus pollen and white/light yellow pollen from cherry blossoms.

Behold, the happy beekeeper!