New digs for the girls

We are going to be adding seven new hives to the apiary this year. I hope they like blue!

Pictures of our winter killed hive

Queen cell from different angles. This hive swarmed last summer before we bought it from a neighbor.

There were several frames of beautiful capped honey in this hive. They starve to death while attempting to chew through the caps.

Bee butts. This is a pretty good indication that they starved.

I am pretty sure this was caused by an infestation of varroa mites that we din't catch until it was too late in the year to do anything about it. I lost two hives to varroa this year and have one more struggling. They were eating a few days ago when I checked on them, but they don't seem to have the numbers that the Utah hive does. I hope it makes it.

Another one bites the dust.

It was warm enough yesterday to go out and check the hives for the first time in about two months. Our nuc is doing great, and that is the one we were worried about. They still aren't out of the woods, but they are eating the sugar we put in the hive for them. They don't seem too interested in the pollen patties, but as long as they are eating something they should be ok. The Utah hive is still strong and more aggressive than the others. I bet we will have to split that hive this year to keep them from swarming. They were eating the sugar in their hive too, but were also trying to get into the other hives to see what they could rob. Going to have to watch that situation. Nevada hive #1 is strong and doing well. More gentle than the Utah hive, but I don't think I would want to work them without gloves and veil. Nevada hive #2 is dead :( The bees were laying dead on top of the sugar so I know they didn't starve. I think the mites got them. These were the bees we bought last fall and by the time we noticed the mites, it was too late in the season to do much about it. So now we have two big hives and a nuc that are still doing well. Let's hope it stays that way.

Hubby has been busy

We are expanding the apiary! Going for an even 10 hives this year. The nuc is over wintering well and the hives that were struggling in the fall are still alive so I am optimistic. We also got snow this year so hopefully this means we will actually have plants that bloom for them. Last year was so dry and hot that we had NO honey stores and have been feeding the bees all winter. We are also trying out some new equipment this year so I will let everyone know how that works out for us. We are also switching up the breed of bees we are raising. Until July of last year we only had Italian bees. They had some issues with the climate. They also got very tempermental. Then we ordered our Carniolan/Caucasian queen and put her into a nuc with some nurse bees and brood we took from our strongest hive. Those bees can be worked without gloves and they have not stung any of us. They are thriving this winter even though they were robbed late in the fall and went into winter with low numbers and hardly any honey stores. I am really liking these bees. They are almost solid black so it's easy to spot them in the yard. Lots of changes to come, hopefully one of them will actually involve a honey harvest this fall!

and then there were four

We lost a hive early this winter due to exessive robbing. We lost our Georgia hive that had always been so strong, the one that we had just requeened, the one that had spent the summer kicking our Utah hives tails. I don't know why they were suddenly weak enough that they would allow themselves to be robbed so badly. Our nuc took a pretty serious hit as well, but they are still hanging in there. We bought some pollen patties to feed all of them through the winter so hopefully we don't lose anymore. I am thinking of naming my hives with native animals. I can paint a siliouette of each animal on the hive. That is one way to help my husband remember. Right now we just call them the Utah hive, the two nevada hives, and the california hive. It gets confusing. Hubby wants to paint a different color on the landing board of each hive, but I am not so convinced. Thoughts?

Bees can be @$$h0le$

 We have one hive, our Utah hive that we bought as a nuc early this spring, that is robbing all of our hives blind. This is the hive that we brought back from the ranch because our first hive was robbing THEM. Once we brought them home, they build up nice and strong.
   We brought all the hives home for the winter about three weeks ago and everything seemed fine. Then Hubby decided to get them set up for winter and moved all our big hives in a row up against the fence so they would be protected from the wind. Both of our purchased Nevada hives were broodless and that was worrisome. One was totally broodless and had week old brood but nothing younger.
   I did some research and decided to feed them and see if the queen starts laying or if they might be queenless. We mixed up a five gallon bucket of syrup for them and started feeding them with a gallon ziploc bag on top of the frames.
   One bag for some reason made a big mess. Not sure if the holes were too big or the bees just didn't want the syrup. Either way, syrup leaked out the front of the hive and puddled on the ground. Enter robber bees. They went nuts. We put entrance reducers on all of the hives so they could defend better, but there are still a pile of dead bees in front of the other three hives. Not what we wanted going into winter with already weak hives.
   They even started going after the nuc in the front yard today. I rubbed menthol across the entrance and that seemed to help a lot. Going to do that to the other four hives tomorrow and hope it helps.
   Oh yeah, and we still have to deal with the varroa issue. *sigh*

Bee drama or HOLY PSYCHO BEES, BATMAN!

^^Two phrases I never imagined myself saying^^

We picked up our two new hives last week and took them out to the ranch with the other hive we have out there. (I REALLY need to come up with names for these hives, it's getting confusing) We left them alone for a couple of days to settle in and then went out to check on them. We opened the hive and realized they were doing quite poorly. Brood patterns were really bad and they were just overall weak hives with little honey stored. We checked the original hive and went home. We ordered new queens for all three ranch hives because two of those queens were two and a half years old and none of the three were doing well.
   The queens arrived on the 13th and we happily went out to install our new girls. The purchased hives were pretty easy to deal with. We found the queens, picked them out of the hive and I stepped on them. The queens were all pipping at each other and that was really cool. I had heard that on youtube, but never in person. Amazing.
   We got to the original hive and realized something was different. We could NOT find the queen. We searched and searched and still never saw her. We saw some queen cells though and that was worrisome. I did not dare leave the new queen in case the hive went on the war path and killed her. I went back home and did some research. The queen cells we saw were emergency cells. Uh oh. That means we lost our queen at some point. I looked up the age of the larvae we had seen in the cells and determined that the hive had been queenless for about a week. Pretty much since the last time we were there. Uh oh. We must have either squished her by accident, or lost her somehow when we left the new hives. Good thing we already had a queen to install. I went out the next day and put her in her new home. The bees were surprisingly mellow. This had always been a fairly aggressive hive but I didn't even light my smoker.
   Fast forward three days and we go out to check the queens and turn them loose into the hive. We also got our new beesuits and were quite excited to try them out. I put mine on and then taped the one spot where a bee could get through, right on the neck. Hubby told me I was paranoid and a pansy. I told him I didn't care, I would rather not get stung, thank you very much. We started with the queenless hive and HOLY PSYCHO BEES, BATMAN!!! These bees went into attack mode right from the moment we walked up to the hive. They would not give you a friendly headbutt warning, they went straight for the jugular. Luckily the neck on MY suit was taped up. But my non paranoid, non pansy husband ended up with half a dozen bees inside his suit. One went up his nose while another sunk her stinger right into his adams apple.
   He sucked it up long enough to release the queen and we watched her disappear down into the hive like she was supposed to. We battled the workers long enough to make sure they didn't attack the attendant bees that came with the queen. There was a lot of butt wiggling and threats, but no one seemed overly pissed at them, just at us. We put the inner and outer covers back on the hive and retreated. They chased us quite a ways down the road and we finally got away from the determined little critters. We smoked our suits to mask the sting pheromones and braved the kamikaze insects one more time to fasten the straps around the hive. Whew, that was pretty intense.
   Now on to the new hives. These girls wanted new queens! They had almost eaten all of the candy in the queen cage and eagerly accepted the queens into the colony. They escorted her right down into the hive and never really even flew out of the hives. They were gentle enough that we could have removed our gloves and touched them. What a relief after dealing with those other attack bees!
   We are going to wait a week and then go back out and check on the hives to make sure the queens are ok and laying eggs. If that crazy hive has killed their queen, they are toast. I am tired of dealing with them and their attitudes. I will split them up and distribute the frames between the hives I bought to boost them and will start over with a new package of bees next year.

major score

   Hubby and I went to check our hives this evening. Our medium hive, the one we moved back home is really packed with bees and honey. Doing great. Our Nuc in the front yard is also doing very well and will need a new box very soon. The big hive in the canyon....not so much. While not struggling, it is not growing either. It has enough honey stores to get through the winter, but none for harvest.
   On the way home we were discussing where to go from here. How many hives we wanted for next year, where we wanted to get them, ect. We had only been home about a half hour when a beekeeper neighbor called to say he was getting out of the bee business. He wanted to know if I wanted to buy his two established hives and his extractor for $300. We will be picking them up next week :-)

Hive inspection

   I moved my bees out to a farm/ranch nearby in a small valley that is much cooler and greener than my house. My neighbors were actually upset and several have asked us where the bees are. They missed them.
   The weather has been so dry, I was worried about them starving here. Now I am worried about them starving out there as well. My small hive isn't doing well at all. There seem to be a lot more bees than when we got them, but the brood pattern is very spotty and they have absolutely NO pollen or honey stored in the hive at all. I think it might be time to requeen them and bring them home so I can feed them.
   I know there is food available, they are on the edge of three alfalfa/clover fields that are in bloom. The big hive has honey and pollen stored. Not as much as I had hoped, but they still have some. I might not get any honey again this year. *sigh* So far the bees have only been an expense and I am getting frustrated. I am not about to give up on them, I just wish they would start to give back a little.
 This darn heat is really messing with everything this summer. I have not been able to plant much of a garden and much of what I did plant never came up. We are going to be out of town quite a bit this summer and it just wasn't worth replanting.
   Hope everyone else is having a better summer than we are.

New bees!

We got a new hive last weekend. We drove to Utah with our empty super, all set up and looking tiny in the back of the truck. On the freeway, we passed a big rig hauling hives covered in screens. I can only imagine what he thought when he looked down at our little hive with one deep super, lol. We did some shopping (I love Costco!) and then went to dinner with Hubby's mom. Weird enough, we ran into relatives at the restaurant! We got to our table and turned around and my mother in law was gone, we walked back the way we came and she was talking to her sister in law and Hubby's cousin. We all changed tables so we could sit together and had a very nice time. Once it was later in the evening, (you want all the bees to be home when you pick them up) we traveled to the apiary. The guy we were buying the bees from opened the nuc and showed us the queen and brood pattern before putting his five frames into our super. We loaded them up and headed home. On the way we stopped to pick up a dozen fertilized blue laced red wyandotte eggs to hatch. So fun pics to come!

Bee mayhem

My bees got lost yesterday. Since the "big move", seriously 30 ft away, about half of the bees got lost. The last few days have been cool and stormy so there hasn't been much activity. But yesterday was warm and sunny. I was at a friends house and when I came home, there were thousands of bees flying around in the air where the hive used to be. I immediately geared up and grabbed the new empty hive. I placed it on the edge of the cloud of bees and they went right in to rest. Most of them eventually found their way back to the active hive, but a few hundred were too weak. I shook most of them back into the active hive, but still lost quite a few. The ground is littered with tiny striped carcasses this morning. There are still  a few that are crawling around trying to get the strength to fly, but I doubt they will make it. Weird how you get attached to a bug and will sit outside dribbling sugar water on them each individually to try and bring them around. I placed a branch in front of the entrance to the active hive so they have to orientate themselves when they leave. Hopefully this will help them find their way back home today.

What a bee-utiful day!

Yeah, I know. That was a lame little pun, I couldn't help myself. For the last couple of weeks, Hubby has been building new beehives for me. We ordered a nuc that we will have to pick up sometime in May. I am also going to split my hive this spring.  The first hive was completed today.

Pretty nice, huh? Here is the old and new hives next to each other. The bees kept flying into the new hive to see if there was anything good in there. I hope they give it up soon so that they don't rob the new bees when I install them in the hive. I think I am going to have to do some research on the subject.

We also opened the existing hive today. This was the first time I ever had help (hubby got his own veil today, hooo hooo!) and I never felt comfortable taking it all apart without an extra set of hands, so this was a first for me. We had some funky architecture going on with some frames. This one was just weird. Loads of brood though, so I know the queen is doing a good job. Look at the little white spots near the bottom, those are larva. Gross little white worm looking things. Those will soon be busy little bees. I also saw a few drones, I still kind of like those guys. I feel bad for them, they are so gentle and sweet.

The queen is in this picture, can you see her?

How about now? She's almost in the middle of the pic 

Anyway, all seems to be well in the hive and I am looking forward to fall when I can have my first harvest!

Just random rambling

Yesterday was the nicest, warmest day we have had so far this year. We had a nice dinner with a friend and her family and then loaded up all of the kids and guns (for some reason the "kids and guns" combo always makes me smile) and went out to the desert for some fun. Hubby set up the AR and the .22 while my friend and I set up some targets for our handguns. Next thing you know, bullets are flying an everyone is having a blast! I need some serious practice with my gun before I am anywhere close to being ready to take my concealed carry test. Oh well, at least the practice is fun.

I got to shoot my friends Ruger 9mm and her husbands XDM Springfield .45 (holy smokes! That thing is LOUD). My gun kicks worse than either of theirs, lol. We all got to shoot the AR and my friend's husband has decided he really wants on of those!

We forgot hearing protection and now have a slight problem. Hubby has some painful ringing in his ears. I used some essential oils, and it worked......for a few minutes. He is still having problems with it today at work. If he is still not better by friday, I will get him an appointment with the audiologist.

My mouth is almost healed to the point where it feels normal. Last night though I had a shard of bone make it's way down and out through my almost healed gums. Argh. I hope that doesn't happen again. I have lots of the bone graft coming out, but those are small sand like grains, not at all painful. This piece last night though was SHARP!

Hubby has decided to build a few more beehives. We want to buy more bees this year as well as split my hive. He has built everything except the foundation. He has decided to jump right into this rather than sit back and watch me do it. He ordered a veil for himself and everything. Now I need to find a bee repellent for my son to wear outside. I have a bunch of essential oils I am going to try. I know lemongrass attracts them, but I think I can find one to repel them as well. Hopefully I can figure it out because I have several ideas of where I can use that. I can use it to keep them out of the chicken feed, I can use it to keep us from getting stung, and I can use it to clear the bees out of a super I am collecting honey from. I will let you know as soon as I figure that one out, lol.

Holy Honeycomb Batman

I opened my hive yesterday since it was such a nice day. I wanted to see how my bees were doing for honey stores. Apparently, they had a very abundant season last summer as they had loads of honey left. I will still feed them because there aren't really any flowers blooming yet, besides my few crocuses. One frame looked like whichever bee was in charge was high when she designed the layout. Instead of building flat along the frame, they build all sorts of little tunnels and mazes SIDEWAYS. It was all built out away from the frame and looked almost like rungs on a ladder. I cut it all off to encourage them to build it like they are supposed to. They had quite a mess going on. My kids have been picking at the comb ever since. I have to admit, fresh honey tastes soooo much better than what you pick up at the store!

Spring has sprung?

We had a snowstorm blow through three days ago and dropped four inches of snow. Today I took this picture. Mother Nature is off her rocker.

Spring fever

I am so totally over winter. Not that we have had much of a winter or anything, I am just ready for spring. Spring usually comes late to the desert, sometimes as late as June. At that point it usually just skips spring all together and snows one day and hits the 90's the next.

Yesterday was a mild day and the bees were out in force. I actually watched one of them bury herself in the chicken feed. She wandered around for a while in it and then just wiggled her way right down into it. Weird little bug. There is something in the feed that really attracts the bees. Every day that it is warm enough for them to be out, they are all over the scratch. The chickens don't seem to like that much and steer clear. I fed them yesterday and am watching close to make sure they don't starve. So far so good.

I have plans to split my hive this spring and am working (nagging) on Hubby to get me another hive built. So far he seems very hesitant. I think he is intimidated by building it. Not sure why, he built a nice big shed for the dogs complete with loft, windows and dog doors. He also built our nice chicken coop. A beehive should be a walk in the park.

I have also been looking through seed catalogs and planning this years garden. We learned a lot last year and are going to make a few changes this year just so things run smoother. We are going to plant the potatoes and onions first (like soon) and the lettuce and radishes last. I got over excited and planted all of the instant gratification plants first last year and had too short of a growing season for the plants with a longer maturity time.

I also put in an order for chicks already. I am going to get two more Black Australorps, and six light Brahmas. I had really wanted some blue laced red wyandottes but I had to order a minimum of 10 and they were over $4 a chick. *sigh* So no pretty hens for me this year. My hens have already started laying for the season and are keeping us stocked nicely.

HURRY UP SPRING!!

Bees, game and dog drama

This time of year we are usually in the negative temps. Since Christmas we have had temps in the 50's. I have a litter of bottle fed pups here that have been able to be outside during the day (hallelujah!) and my bees have been out and about. I have been feeding them because there is nothing for them to eat and I worry that they haven't stored enough honey to last the whole winter. The few times I have cracked the lid and taken a peak, it appears they have filled both supers with honeycomb. Hopefully they had time to fill it with honey as well. THIS fall I am looking forward to a nice honey harvest. I am also going to need to step it up and build another hive because I plan on splitting my hive this spring. I can either order a queen for around $20 or I can put in a frame of day old eggs and hope the workers can raise their own queen. I think I would like to try letting them raise their own and if that doesn't work, I can still order a new queen. I am having some hangups with the bees because they have become so aggressive. I am more than just a little scared when I crack that hive open. I make sure the kids are in the house and there is no one in the area who is not protected. My heart thumps and my hands shake (not good when handling thousands of bees). As much as I enjoy my new hobby, is it worth being that scared of them as well? Something to think about I guess.

We have been eating deer and elk meat almost every day. We got a crazy amount of meat from that elk. I was really surprised as how many roasts and how many pounds of burger we were able to process. That is one chore I am glad to be done with though. My house smelled like blood for weeks. I couldn't seem to get it out of my hands and clothes and sink. I guess it is because as soon as we got one animal butchered, we would harvest another one. Hubby grew up hunting but has not been able to go since we had kids. It had been over ten years since he had been able to hunt big game. He is hooked again and is really hoping he will be able to draw out again. I am enjoying being able to walk past the meat counter at the grocery store!

I am up to my eyeballs in dogs. I have the four that are our family pets, four orphaned pups that need homes and one eight month old lab that is going to her new home soon (thank goodness). The lab, Magpie, is not allowing my hound to eat so he looks really bad. I had to bring him inside and feed him special food which also means I have to feed him pumpkin and special medication because he gets the runs every time he has to live as a house dog. He is also the same dog who is allergic to all grains and can't have dog food that contains ANY grain at all. I am so tired of cleaning up poo, it isn't even funny. The puppies make a horrible mess in their crate every night and because they are in the crate, the hound has to be locked in a bathroom. This morning I had to clean diarrhea off the floors, walls and door. I WANT MY LIFE BACK!! Once the lab and the pups are all in their new homes, I think I am done with the fostering. I will still work with the rescue, but I just can't handle the stress of other dogs right now.

That is what is going on in the life of Gracie. The short version anyway. There is actually tons more, but this is a blog not a novel, lol.

That's a lot of bees!

Truck hauling 25 million bees overturns in Utah yesterday. Later reports say that 2/3 of the haul was recovered and the bees are being kept at local beekeepers houses. How's that for houseguests!? I am really glad I was not that truck driver!

absentee blogger

Yes, that is me. I am sorry. I have been crazy busy the last few...umm...months...? My boys started school and I stupidly thought this would give me soooo much free time. Yeah, that didn't happen. I am up by 6 to get my middle schooler (gasp) off to school. As soon as he walks out the door, I have to wake the younger two and listen to them fight as they get ready. I really hate mornings. By the time they are out the door I am exhausted.

I have also been canning. and canning and canning. We had an early freeze this year so I spent an hour and a half outside in a snowstorm picking tomatoes and the rest of the garden produce. Luckily a friend came to help or it would have taken me all day. We picked 16 pumpkins, four watermelons, two cantaloupes and 430 tomatoes. Yes, you read that right. I have 430 tomatoes in various stages of ripeness on my kitchen table. Salsa anyone? I have already done two batches of salsa but neither of them really came out. One was too sweet (it also called for several of my cucumbers), the second called for over a cup of vinegar and that is all you can taste. Sooooo.......this next batch will use the second recipe but cut the vinegar wayyyyyy down.

I canned my peas and carrots together because I didn't have enough of either to bother canning. I got a batch of green beans done and two quarts of tomatoes.

I did end up being a judge for the fair and there was a judges category (whoot) so I entered. I won three blue ribbons! We were up all night judging the hundreds of jars and had to come early the next day to award the ribbons.

The chickens are all molting and the yard looks like a fowl massacre with feathers EVERYWHERE. I wish they didn't do that right before the weather turns freezing cold. Mr Chicken and my chicks are completely clueless as to how to use the cat door we installed on the coop. My older hens are used to it and go in and out several times a day. It is too cold to leave the big door open and it is driving me crazy to have to let them out every morning and catch them every night to put them back in the coop. I hope they figure this out sooner rather than later.

I already gave you the update on the bees. Kind of. I have just gotten scared enough of them that I don't really go out there unless the smoker is fired up and I am in full beekeeper gear. That is just such a pain in the butt that I usually don't get around to it. Plus, my little photographers are not willing to get that close either. It doesn't help that my oldest son is allergic to bee stings.

So there are all of my excuses. I am going to try harder to keep up with this but if I disappear for a while again, I am sorry.

The death of the drones.

It has been getting very cold lately and the workers threw all of the drones out to die. It's kind of sad seeing them all over the ground outside the hive. I haven't seen drones in a long time so I thought maybe they were all gone. I have also had a lot of problems with yellow jackets and have no idea how to solve that one. I could spray them, but then I run the risk of killing the bees. The yellow jackets are EATING my bees. So, it is kind of a lose/lose situation. Here's hoping I can get it all figured out. I have started feeding the bees again as the snow killed off pretty much everything that was blooming.