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Leave them bee!

As we approach December of 2012, I wanted to remind folks that if temperatures are lower than about 75 degrees outside, then try not to open up your hives at ALL.

The only exception that I can think of at the moment would be to add fondant for feeding – and then it needs to […]

November Swarm

Late swarms sometimes happen.

I received a call Friday morning about a swarm that occurred – most likely from another beekeeper who was out of town for the day. A neighbor contacted him about a swarm that had been found in her yard – behind his home. They found them while their tree-trimmers were working […]

Winter Feeding

The bees need to be able to maintain their warmth throughout the winter to survive. That means that they need to have a ready supply of carbohydrates available to them – without my having to open their brood boxes, and allowing their heat to escape from the hive. These “candies” are placed directly above the […]

Winding down the season

It’s starting to cool off – and the beekeeping season is starting to wind down.

That does NOT imply, though, that we are done with the hive or honeybee work for the year. What’s there still to do, you may be asking yourself?

There’s lots! How about:

Feeding for strong brood through the winter Manage […]

A few leftover bees…

Hah! I received a call today from a gentleman that was referred to me by another beekeeper. He said that he had a lot of bees on the outside eve of his house – and that he’d had bees removed from a wall of his home about 3 weeks ago. I thought to myself – […]

West Nile Virus – Aerial Spraying

As if insult was not bad enough when they started spraying for West Nile Virus infected mosquitoes. Now Dallas County plans to move forward with aerial spraying of Dallas. That’s definitely adding injury to insult! (Yes – I know it’s backwards – but it’s how it is)

WNV is reported to give the same symptoms […]

Score at an estate sale

Shannon and I visited a Tyler area estate sale last weekend. I’d gone through the house – as well as the tool shed, and didn’t really see anything that caught my eye.. until we were leaving – I glanced down at a brown box.. that simply said “bee box” on it.

Of course, my interest […]

Hives bumped up / LocalHarvest

It was time to bump up 2 of my 5-frame nuc hives to 10-frame boxes. I waited until the rain had subsided to a slow drizzle, and fired up the smoker.. and moved 2 nucs to 10-frame deep hives with screened bottom boards.

I believe that this will give the bees something to do besides […]

Hot in Texas

One of my 7 hives is bearding outside the 5-frame nuc. Temperatures here in North Texas are in the mid-to high 90’s right now (1st week of June 2012). I do believe that it’s time to move these ladies to a 10-frame box along with a screened bottom board. That should do wonders for helping […]

Swarm Capture

I received a message from a friend today about a swarm that had taken up a temporary home in a tree in her back yard. I loaded up the extension ladder, and high-tailed it to her home before it got too late in the evening, and evaluated what we had going on… It looked to […]