According to the homeowner, bees have lived there for much of the last 30 years. Not the same colony, obviously and it’s not been continuous. They’re planning renovations to the house and they wanted the bees safely relocated so the contractor could do his thing safely.

We actually started the job two weeks ago. We arrived bright and early and pulled the old cedar siding down and located the entrance. Big problem: the bees were located behind the second floor rim-joist. Neither of us were comfortable with just blinding cutting in. We’re not big on risking demolishing our customer’s home. So we covered it up to do some research.

This Sunday we rolled in armed with the tools we needed and the knowledge that cutting the joist shouldn’t be a problem. Just to be safe, we pounded hardwood wedges in beneath the joist outside of the area were cutting to prevent it from possibly sagging. It wound up being no problem at all.

Things we learned:

• Cutting the rim joist, obviously.
• We really should take the bee vacuum with us even if we don’t plan to use it. It came in very handy.
• It’s time to find some better hose for the vac. The sump pump hose we have works well, but the ribbing on the inside makes a painful squealing whistle noise when the vacuum is running.
• We both seem to have really built up our immunity to bee venom. I got six stings and Greg got 5. None of mine swelled much more than a mosquito bite.

So, on with the show: removing a hive from a wall in 3:30. There were enough bees and brood to make two hives from this one.

Click here to view the embedded video.

On a day like today (beautifully sunny, warm, light breeze), when the blooming is still going strong and the foragers still have plenty of places to collect pollen and nectar, it can get busy at the hive entrance. Very busy.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lvj1PH4cJK4

Fast forward two years and we’ve gone from two guys who had never looked inside a bee hive to two guys trying to take over the world with a new way of doing things.

We made our first hive split on May 2 this year. It’s almost unheard of to have enough drones out and flying that early to be able to raise new queens, but the early spring was on our side. The queen that they raised in that first split matches the timelines perfectly and the brood pattern is perfect. I’m going to try my hand at breeding queens and will be basing the line upon her.

So, from a low of three hives at the beginning of May, we’re back up to 8 and counting. With a great queen and a bit of luck, I’ll be able to make some nucs up soon and really kick into high gear. 

Click here to view the embedded video.

I got a call early this evening form the manager of a local truck stop. They had a swarm on the canopy over the gas pumps. Apparently, the came from a hive on the back of a truck that was there earlier. I’ve never heard of a migratory hive swarming in transport, but I guess it happens.

The problem: he sheepishly admitted that his first reaction was to call a pest control company. They came out this afternoon and sprayed the bees. He was calling me because the bees were back.

So, I grabbed some dinner, loaded the car and off I went. Only to find that the pesticide did it’s job very well: there were only about 1,000 bees left in the cluster. There were also more tan 20 feet off the ground and not a long enough ladder in sight. If the swarm was still viable, I could have left a bait hive, but they were decimated.

I’ll be having words with the killers in the morning. Cordial words. It’s good PR for a company that kills insects for a living to step back occasionally and say “No, you should call a beekeeper.” Hopefully, they’ll see it that way.

First, the scheduled bit: I headed over to Simcoe to check on a split that Greg made on Monday and to split the other hive. All is well. One hive is still defensive and grumpy, but I made the split tonight with zero problems. I wasn’t wearing gloves and could very well have done it without the veil and suit. They’re amazing, these bees and true to their Buckfast lineage: good honey producers, frugal with their winter stores and wonderfully calm.

They were also preparing to swarm. There were at least a dozen queen cups in varying stages of preparation, so it would seem that I timed the visit nicely.

I was on my way home when I got a call for a swarm. They were actually about 5 minutes from home, so it all worked out nicely. A decent sized colony of Italians arrived in a tree this afternoon and the gentleman that called was quite pleased that we could come right out.

Three young ladies have a story to tell at school tomorrow. One of then has show and tell, too.

So, if all goes well, we’ve gone from three hives to eight in less than three weeks. Not a bad way to spend May.

One thing that some folks may not understand is that we’re being very picky about locations. Our focus is healthy bees, so we have to be sure that there’s enough and a variety of forage around to sustain them. Vast fields of one crop, monoculture, is terrible for bee health. You wouldn’t dream of eating your favourite food for every meal day in and day out and the bees are no different.

We also have to be sure that there’s enough room for them:

I think this one will do.

Just as the heavy use of antibiotics contributed to the rise of drug-resistant supergerms, American farmers’ near-ubiquitous use of the weedkiller Roundup has led to the rapid growth of tenacious new superweeds.

…

Now, Roundup-resistant weeds like horseweed and giant ragweed are forcing farmers to go back to more expensive techniques that they had long ago abandoned.

Mr. Anderson, the farmer, is wrestling with a particularly tenacious species of glyphosate-resistant pest called Palmer amaranth, or pigweed, whose resistant form began seriously infesting farms in western Tennessee only last year.

Pigweed can grow three inches a day and reach seven feet or more, choking out crops; it is so sturdy that it can damage harvesting equipment. In an attempt to kill the pest before it becomes that big, Mr. Anderson and his neighbors are plowing their fields and mixing herbicides into the soil.

The full article.