Anyone keeping bees?

This is my second summer keeping bees. I have two hives going and it has been a lot of fun. I was wondering if there were any another bee keepers around?

Not me, but my granddad was a farmer and bee keeper.

Watched an interesting documentary about bees and bee keeping the other night.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2263058/

I once heard that if bees vanished, so would we.

They are amazing little creatures. The honey side of things haven't been very productive but I just love watching them. Being new, every time I open the hive something else is going on.

B&B Honey group buy?

I wish. My first year I got about 3lbs and this year I got about 6lbs. I have given 2lbs away to members here and 1lb as a PIF.
Hopefully next year will be productive.

For about 10 years or so. Got my son started when he was in kindergarten. Just a hobbyist but would like to work up to a sideline business when life slows down a bit.

It has always interested me, but I am not sure how to get started or how much $$ I will need to invest.

Nope. My father did... he was stung many times over the years but he developed an allergy over time and one sting nearly killed him.

tinashubby said:

It has always interested me, but I am not sure how to get started or how much $$ I will need to invest.

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It's cheaper than this shaving hobby the hives boxes were given to me from an old timer who was glad to find someone to use them. He also gave me a suit and veil. The nukes of bees are about $125 each.
As I said, I have bought 2 nukes over 2 years and I don't plan on getting any bigger. I might have to split a hive in the spring to keep it from swarming.
I have found the bee keeping community to be very friendly and helpful. If anyone is interested just contact a local bee keeper. Most will let you come along to check on hives and see what it is all about.

Never bought a nuke, collected swarms. Had 24 hives at one time. The mites wiped me about out. Then the strips and meds got to cost so much I got out. Still have my extractor in the barn. Have fun, but if you get a bunch of hives it will not be a one man job. A full super is heavy.

Just finishing my third year with two hives in the backyard. Last year I harvested about 60 lbs. Lost one hive over the winter so I kept the harvesting to a minimum as I split the remaining hive. I may get 35-40 lbs when I was hoping for 80+ lbs.

It's a great useful hobby that can pay pretty well.

30lb would be great . This year one of my hives was new and just building up so no honey there. My hive from last year lost its queen in the middle of July. I just let them requeen themselves but this really stopped everything there for about a month. Add to that that this was a long winter up here in Maine and a crummy summer. I'm already hitting 40-50's at night. So my season is done.

I had a few hives when I was a kid. Caught a swarm once. I've tossed the idea around getting back into it now that I own my own home and somewhat country property but SWMBO is dead set against it. I'm thinking I'm out of luck and not the battle I want to enter.

Terminolgy check for the uninitiated.

What is a nuke?

And what is meant by catching/collecting a swarm? What does that entail?

It really interests me, but it'll be many years down the road before I could actually do it. I don't think my landlord (or neighbors) would approve.

TheVez2 said:

Terminolgy check for the uninitiated.

What is a nuke?

And what is meant by catching/collecting a swarm? What does that entail?

It really interests me, but it'll be many years down the road before I could actually do it. I don't think my landlord (or neighbors) would approve.

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Nuke=nuclear hive. A starter hive with a laying queen and enough workers to sustain the hive.

Swarm=Bees swarm when the hive gets too full. They will raise a new queen and the old queen, along with half the workers, will leave to find a new home. During this flight, the will land on a tree or other nearby structure and send out scouts to find a spot. While they are at this "rest" spot, they are very docile and can be collected easily.

vaplanman said:

Nuke=nuclear hive. A starter hive with a laying queen and enough workers to sustain the hive.

Swarm=Bees swarm when the hive gets too full. They will raise a new queen and the old queen, along with half the workers, will leave to find a new home. During this flight, the will land on a tree or other nearby structure and send out scouts to find a spot. While they are at this "rest" spot, they are very docile and can be collected easily.

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Interesting. Roughly how many bees are in a Nuke?

And how long does the swarm stay in their rest spot before they take off for good? I'm just wondering what the window is for collecting your swarm. Seems like you have to be in the right place at the right time to collect them. How much warning do you have that they are going to do this? Is it obvious?

TheVez2 said:

Interesting. Roughly how many bees are in a Nuke?

And how long does the swarm stay in their rest spot before they take off for good? I'm just wondering what the window is for collecting your swarm. Seems like you have to be in the right place at the right time to collect them. How much warning do you have that they are going to do this? Is it obvious?

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The answers vary.

A nuke hive has 5-10 frames, around 10,000 bees.

Swarms can stay for minutes to a couple days. Once the signs of a swarm are discernable from the outside, it is too late to stop it but if you see the signs, you can watch and catch the swarm as they rest.

There are plenty of resources on the Internet that discuss beekeeping. I would also suggest taking a Beginning Beekeeping course next spring if you're interested. The topic is more involved than can be discussed easily in this forum.