Beekeeping

Anyone have any good information on beginning beekeeping? I've been looking at a couple of suppliers local to me, but have not decided on a particular setup. Any helpful hints or preferred distributors would be appreciated.

 

buy a veil and cowhide leather gloves that extend up to half your upper arm, look for ones that have elastic bands. Still possible for bees to sting through jeans and maybe even two layers. you can use pine needles or clean (no ink or printing) corrugated cardboard that is shredded/ripped for smoker fuel or roll the cardboard into tubes and light the bottoms (see attached) burns for long time. Do NOT breathe hard when working on the bees, they dont like our breath on them and will immediately fly for your head. Also consider joining Beesource.com forum.


EDIT: CHECK LOCAL LAWS your state might not prohibit apiaries, but cities my prohibit or stipulate that you register or mark your hive bodies or supers with all your contact info (name/address/phone number)
Always carry liquid antihistamine (benadryll) pills are good for extended use but immediate relief is best attained with liquid antihistamine (been stung in the twice face both times on left side near the eye while not working w/ bees)

 

buy yourself a plexiglass/acyrlic sheet maybe 1/8 or 1/4 thick for an observation window if you want to look into the hive without actually opening it up. thinner the sheet the more prone to warping that is why you see those 3 wooden shims in middle the sheet was flexing downwards and bees couldnt get between the top of the frames. I now switched to thicker sheets and i used the old 1/8 thick to make plexiglass shims to place between the rim of the hive body and glass so it provides ventilation during summer. be sure to learn about how to overwinter your hive in NC, looks like you get quite a bit of snow. Make beekeeper friends in the locale through beesource and ask them what they do during each season because overwintering a hive in different locations call for different measures. for example here in socal i dont really have to do anything to protect the bees during winter (40F lowest), but where you are at you might have to do extra work.

 

so glad someone is becoming a beekeeper the last beekeeping thread died 3 years ago... i just became a member recently too so i was dissappointed

 

But.... but.... but..... bees are so scary though.....

 

there is a certain serenity that you attain while working with tens of thousands of bees flying around you.

 

Id imagine so, i couldnt imagine the sound of thousands of bees flying around me. I get startled when i hear one like 20ft away lol

 

Yea i know what you mean i panic the fuck out (wait can i use that word on the forum?) when a bee flies into my room or tacoma.
the hum/buzz of thousands of bees is surreal, sometimes i can't tell if im hearing it in my head or in real life. same thing with the crawling feeling you get when you aren't doing anything, except ive really had a stowaway bee hiding in my shirt 4 different times.

 

This is all I know about bees.....

 

And I thought this would be forever buried in pages of Toyota. Thanks for the responses guys. We do have a plethora of apiaries around us, both everyday beekeepers and a few large commercial operations. Thanks for the site info andjenliang, I'll be checking that out in a few minutes.
The GF has been wanting to get into it since she was little partly because her dad was really into bees. We've got plenty of space for it and I think it would be beneficial to our upcoming small orchard and garden as well. Brushy Mountain Bee Farm isn't too far from us and I am torn between their 8 and 10 frame kits. Might try to make a decision this week and suprise her with it. Any opinions?

 

Guess I can show the HIVE I saved and relocated.

 

Bees are an awesome asset to a garden, you can also get into vector friendly landscape plants which would also attract butterflies and hummingbirds too.

 

You are so nice relocating them to your house..

 

I have planted a few bee friendly plants recently. It's amazing how quickly they come around too.

 

I ♥ Brushy Mtn they have awesome shipping time and price FREE shipping $100+ and if you buy a kit it would definitely be more than $100. I would say if you are the type of guy who knows how to woodwork definitely buy your own lumber and make a hive body and if your GF is artistic let her at with colorful latex/acrylic paint. I have seen some beeks with beautiful hives that have pink flowery swirls because their wife or gf wanted to paint something. You would still have to to buy the frames because those are harder to make from scratch. Anyways those kits are worth it if because they come with everything you need. Im kinda cheap and also love diy so i never bought a kit.

okay as for 10 or 8 frame it is really just a preference thing regarding weight of hive and manipulation of parts. So if your gf is gonna work on the hive and shes kinda a small gal 8 frame would ideal. I do 10 frame and a single hive body is almost 75lbs really hard to manipulate w.o upsetting bees.

I was also worried about spacing/ventilation because it is always hot in socal and if the bees feel crowded in summer/spring they will swarm away. Compared to NC (i looked at past year's worth of forecast) 8 frame would be smaller and easier to keep warm during overwintering because they would be clustered tightly together and during summer you could just add on more supers or you could split them and get another hive.
Also bees are sold separately from the kit, i've seen some reviews where people thought the bees came with the have ahahah. expect to pay about 100 dollars for a 3lbs package of bees with a queen. The black box picture by skygear looks exactly like the amount of bees you would get in a 3lbs package.

I am so jealous that your GF wants to work with bees, my gf wants nothing to do with honey bees.

@skygear your rescued hive looks really purty im so jealous, no EHB swarms encountered just yet only AHB. I stopped by a Beverages and More store and i was wondering why there was no one parking near a bush with over turned shopping cart. I opened my door and there was a AHB swarm no more than 10 feet from me hanging on the shopping. I laughed at my good fortune thank goodness AHB swarms are not as aggressive as normal

 

good to hear so many tacoma owners care about gardening kinda eco friendly stuff.

I purposely plant flowers that honey bees dont like to pollinate but humming birds and bumble bees can only and love to pollinate. stuff like fox gloves, mexican sage bush, red hot lips sage, and stuff like that. I have so many fruit trees at my house and i figured hey why not get a bee hive

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1GadTfGFvU

 

^ HAHAHAH he deserves it for his many terrible films and pointless films.

 

:lol: Uh, I relocated them FROM a neighbors house to a nice "box"

The colony is doing great and I did the whole thing without getting stung, and without bee "gear" on. No hood, just a pair of gloves and some cardboard.

They were very dosile when I was ripping apart the whole front of the house where they were. No smoke either. Just a set of steel balls

 

I figured