Ultimate comb guide

So I had this wonderful idea. Perhaps the biggest challenge in top bar beekeeping is getting the girls to build straight comb. If we could give them a no brainer guide to build on, maybe cross combing would be a thing of the past. I've tried many types of comb guides. Waxed kerfs, Non waxed kerfs, Waxed wooden guides half inch tall. The bees don't seem to care what the guide is, they build comb how and where they want.

I had a friend engrave these boards for me with a partial comb pattern.
I was sure that the bees would find this to be perfect.

I installed 3 packages in the last 2 weeks all with these new engraved bars. I rubbed beeswax on the engraving just to make sure.
In all three hives, they completely ignored the pattern and built wherever they wanted to.

Beeswax rubbed on the pattern.

Cross comb

I did make the pattern with 4.9mm cells. I will try again with 5.1mm cells and see if that makes a difference. The bees that I tested this on were all package bees. No doubt raised on large cell foundation.

I think regardless of what kind of comb guide I use, I'll need to be vigilant with my early inspections to ensure they are building straight comb.

Peach Tree Swarm

I got a call tonight about a swarm of bees in town. I got the call just as the sun went down. I checked them out and decided to catch them tonight (tomorrow's schedule wouldn't allow it). They were on a peach tree about 4 feet off the ground. I know of 1 swarm a year within a block of this swarm for the last 3 years. One of them I caught out of an apple tree. It can bee seen here. The other was dead before I got to it. Sprayed by wasp killer by an ignorant neighbor. Large swarms all three.

I took sheet and a large basket. The bees were huddled pretty tight. I placed the sheet on the ground under the swarm. I held the basket directly under the swarm and shook the tree. Those girls were hanging on tight. I was amazed at how tight they were hanging on. I got most of them but there were still a bunch that would not shake off the tree. I scooped up some small clusters from the sheet with my hand and put them in the basket. It was dark so none of them were flying. I took a sting to my right pinky finger. Ouch. Didn't swell much though. We brushed as many bees from the tree as we could.

I drove the basket home and shook it into my rustic cedar TBH. I will place it at the cabin in the mountains in the next week or so. I'm curious how much and how good the honey will be with all the wild flowers up there.

Small video of swarm capture here:
http://youtu.be/oKMPvbSR1ow

package inspections

I checked on the hive at Brent's place today as well as the queen breeder in the back yard.
I've been meaning to get to them for the last 4 or 5 days but haven't had a chance.
The packages were installed 8 days ago.

Brent's hive first.
This one had 2 boxes on the bottom with natural drawn out comb in the top box, extending down into the bottom box. I had hooked the queen cage onto the bottom of one of the combs. It held the queen cage ok. I didn't think about it being able to hold 3 lbs of bees clustered around the queen cage. It had broken the comb and was laying on the bottom of the hive. There was a cluster of bees on it (size of a baseball).
The queen was still in the cage. They had almost eaten through the candy plug but not quite. I released her into the hive.
I then put a box of foundation (some drawn out) above the 2 brood boxes, then queen excluder, then 3 deep boxes with wax coated plastic foundation, the inner cover and the telescoping lid with an opening at the front. This all sits on a screened bottom board. The idea is to manage this hive after the manner of Oscar Perone. The bottom 2 boxes are brood nest and are never touched. The next box is stores for the bees and is also never touched. The three upper boxes can be harvested in the fall and put back on empty. The hive stays 6 boxes tall year round. Not sure how that will work, but I'm gonna find out.
I left the queen excluder on the entrance as she was just released. I'll remove it in a few days.
The bees had filled quite a bit of the comb with nectar and I could see them bringing in pollen also.
Several drones were under the screened bottom board trying to get to the queen.

Queen breeder.
Crooked comb in both sides. worse on the right.
5 bars attached together on the left - 7 on the right.
I was able to cut a bit of it back and put in dividers. Hoping that they'll start straight on the other side of the divider. I was tempted to tear the whole thing out and have them start over. I still might. I won't be able to move brood combs into the queen chamber if they are all stuck together.

3 hives with the laser engraved comb guides. All three with crooked comb. I wonder if I had made the engraved hexagon shapes 5.1 mm instead of 4.9 if it would have made a difference. I may get more engraved and try it.

Pollen can be seen on this rock below the entrance holes. The queen excluder that I've placed there is knocking the pollen off of the bees as they climb through. I will remove the queen excluder (includer in this case) as soon as I see that she is laying eggs.

I had heard from a friend in Wellington that hived bees the same day and his were building crooked also. He had put in wax coated wooden comb guides 1/2 inch deep. Hmmm.

Jared TBH inspection

Inspected Jared's hive today. They had released the queen so we removed the queen cage.
They had built several combs. Crooked too. So much for my laser engraved comb guides! Well I sure liked them, even if the bees didn't

We left 2 bars with cross comb alone and put in a divider and an empty bar on the other side of the divider.

We'll have to see what they do.

HIving packages

Hived 4 packages today.

1 package in Mom's back yard in Springville. This will be Jared's first hive. He did great with the install.
We put them in one of our new cedar TBH.

2 packages in my queen breeder (one in each end)

1 package in the Perone style hive that I've moved to Brent's place.

All went well with the installs.

School presentation, observation hive, rustic hive, and a hive move

I did a presentation in my son's 2nd grade class today. They (including the teacher) were fascinated. They asked lots of questions (many about poop) and seemed to enjoy the presentation very much.
I had several pictures that we put up on the "smart board" (hive types, swarms, queens, gear, life cycle). I need to find more pictures for next time to help answer some of the questions (honey cells, pollen cells, eggs, stinger?, waggle dance, pollen).

I had built an observation hive over the winter out of an old fish tank. I designed the roof to support 2 bars from a top bar hive. I must have measured wrong as I was only able to fit 1 bar (still fascinating to 2nd graders). Now that I've used it I'll need to make some adjustments to it. I'd like to get 2 or 3 bars in there. I need to find a way to secure the lid. As it is, the entire lid can just lift off. Perhaps also a way to light up the comb. It's rather dark in the shadow of the roof.


I knocked together a 44 inch tob bar hive last night out of some old cedar fencing. Two and a half hours total (and that included disassembly of the fence. I still need to put some legs on it and devise some kind of a roof. I have plenty more fence boards. I also want to knock together some more bait hives.

I've heard of 3 swarms so far this year and it's still the middle of April. Crazy warm spring!

The idea for this hive is to put it up at the cabin in mountains. There are so many flowers up there. I've always wanted to see how much honey a hive could make in a season. I've wanted to taste it also. The rustic hive will blend well with the old cabin and out buildings. It should also not draw to much unwanted attention from the neighbors (fellow campers). I'll probably not overwinter it there, though I'm not sure. I put the entrances on the end. I also closed the bottom up and will fill the bottom 2 inches with sawdust/pine shavings. Some recent reading on the biobees.com forum suggests that humidity is better controlled without bottom ventilation. It also suggests that mights can not survive in a humid environment. Worth a try.

I used the rustic TBH hive to temporarily house the colony of bees from the Schampell TBH. I wanted to redo the screen on the bottom and I was moving it to the Patterson farm (4 miles away) tonight so it was a good time to get it done.

The bees had closed of (at least partially) all three entrance holes back at the start of winter with propolis. When I got a close look from the inside they have completely removed all propolis from 2 entrance holes but left the 3rd completely closed off. I figure they know what they want so I left it alone.

After getting the girls back in their box, with a shiny new screened bottom and a fancy hinged bottom board, I let them calm down until evening and with some help from Tim, I moved it to the Patterson farm. His peach trees are barely starting to bloom so the timing is good. I had noticed when moving the bars back and forth from the 2 hives that many of the empty bars I had placed between straight comb bars the other day had already had quite a bit of new comb drawn out. One of these combs fell during the hive move. I was being so careful too! I'll go inspect this hive in a few weeks to make sure they are doing good after the move. I'll remove the fallen comb then. They've been through a lot this week.

Schampell TBH Inspection/harvest

Checked out the inside of the Schampell TBH today.
Last night I noticed that there was a small cluster on the outside of the hive. I wondered if they were out of room. I've been seeing drones also so I wanted to get a look.

The first bar on the south end was a partially drawn out comb with nectar in it (none capped).
The next 10 bars were packed. Mostly capped brood with some eggs and larvae scattered about.
The next bar was solid pollen both sides. This ended up breaking off because the comb guide had detached from the top bar. I tried unsuccessfully to reattach it with aluminum strips and I ended up just removing  (for now)
the next 10 bars were honey - mostly capped. The last 4 were cross combed pretty bad and the last 6 were attached to a mess of comb that had fallen last year and I had left in there.

 I removed the cross combed honey bars as well as another. I removed all the comb from the bottom and sides. This leaves them with 5 bars of honey (mix capped and uncapped). I left several empty bars on the north end, spacing them between full bars to encourage straight comb building. I did the same thing on the south end with the last 2 bars in the nest area.

I did notice many, many drones throughout the hive. I did not see the queen (though I did see eggs). I also did not see any queen cells. I did see a couple of very small cups on the edge of a couple of combs.

I took 2 stings. The first from a bee that crawled up my pant leg. She didn't sting me, however, until I removed my pants to try to free her. Upon loosening my waist, she was able to proceed up and into my shirt and ended up stinging me in my left armpit. Ouch! The other sting was through the shirt on my right bicep. The second one swelled much more than the first.

I did not smoke them (perhaps I should have knowing how invasive I was planning to be. I did spray them with water after they got worked up to try to calm them down. An hour after I closed up the hive, there were still a few that would dive bomb me by the back door.

Also, now 3 hours after the inspection there are quite a lot of bees hanging on the outside of the hive (above the entrance holes). Not sure what they are doing. Many of the bars had bur comb attaching the comb to the side of the hive. This was cut with a serrated knife before removing the comb. With so many bees in the hive, I'm afraid I squished several with the knife each time I cut the bur comb. I hope I didn't injure the queen.

This hive will be moving to the Patterson farm on Wednesday.