My newbee progress so far...

[Intheswamp]

Well, I'm still planning on the two established colonies from my mentor early this spring.  But, I'm also seriously intending to set several swarm traps out close to some feral colonies that I've located...maybe get some survivor genes in my yard.  I've also got a couple of feral colonies that I may do a trap out on.  I'm interested in increasing my yard but most importantly building some strong colonies from the original two and then overwintering them successfully through 2012/2013. 

I've pretty well decided on the yard location.  It's at the #5 location where the "x" is located.  It is situated between two terraces.  The exact area has a slight rise between them...it should be good high ground during times that rainwater is catching behind the lower terrace.  The location should give good early morning sun and while still having full sunshine a touch after 5pm at the first of November.  Hopefully this will be a good, full-sun area to minimize SHB problems...hopefully. 

The possible issues I see is that it does lay on a northward sloping hillside (terraced field) and is probably 8-10 feet lower than the top of the hill.  It is not at the bottom of the hill, though.  The spot is located at least 100' from "usual" human traffic areas and about 150 feet from the grandchildren's swing set area.  My concern would be whether after inspections or honey harvesting or any other invasive/disturbing (robbing/skunks/etc) things to the bees, will the distances be far enough away from the traffic areas to give the bees room to settle back down?  Or, will they be angry and flying far enough from hives to cause a problem in the human traffic areas?

There is an abundance of privet hedge, goldenrod, tarweed, etc., to the south of the property so I anticipate the bees traveling often from north to south a good bit (which might mean their beelines could be through a traffic area?).  I'm not sure what they'll be working to the north being as their is a pine forest and then a large lake and creek bottom which empties into a small (about dry right now) "river"...but naturally there is no issues with any beelines going in that direction.




In preparation so far...

I've put together sixteen 8-frame mediums and four 8-frame deeps (for traps, feeding covers, transitioning from 10-frame deeps, etc.,).  I've gotten approximately 110 medium frames assembled and 24 of those wired.  This is in addition to the two 2-story 5-frame medium nucs and 20 frames inside of them that I built earlier.  I've pretty well gotten my supplies....veil, smoker, hive tools, etc, in house.

My library grows.

There's a lot of goldenrod across the road from my house that has gone to seed.  Yesterday and the day before I harvested a good bit and shook it along the edges of the hayfield behind my house.  If you look at the aerial picture I started shaking goldenrod about where the "3" is located, on northward and then eastward to the furtherest point along the edge of the woods shown in the picture.  I know this won't be a killer of a forage source...but it'll be a little help and be close by for the ladies.  Hopefully it will germinate this coming summer.  I'm seeing a small amount of miniture white aster scattered around about...I'm wondering whether to try to harvest some seeds and scatter them along the edge of the woods, too,...maybe even transplant a few plants.  Not much tarweed right aournd the house, but there are loads of it to the south of me (fallow fields)...plenty of seeds there is they would be good to scatter.  I've read that both aster and tarweed honey can be prone to fast crystallization.  Thoughts anyone?

Anyhow, just an update on Intheswamp's status. :)
Ed

[mikecva]

I would not be worried about the bees after an inspection or harvesting as long as you are calm and take your time and follow normal procedures. We have had BBQs at the same time as inspections (@ about 35' away) with no problems. My daughter has even cut the grass on her riding lawnmower while I was performing an inspection. In short it looks good, are your hive fronts facing the morning sun?  -Mike

[Intheswamp]

Hey Mike.  Thanks for the feedback on the distance.  Going a little bit further...what about something catastrophic like a wind storm toppling the hive boxes?  100-150 feet far enough separation given the bees have a bit of time to gravitate back to the toppled boxes?

I've been planning on having the entrances facing south, maybe nudged a bit to the east.  The physical line of hive stands would more or less run east to west to follow the lay of the land.  Would running my row of hive stands east to west but turning the hives so that the entrances face more east of southeast work ok?  I know the morning sun coming more into the entrance will be good but I've been concerned that angling them too much and having one bee hive interfere with another one's beeline.  Also, concerned about the beekeeper possibly getting in the way as the row of bee hives grow.  By angling the entrances it seems that returning bees would pass by a portion of the sidewall of the neighboring hive.  Does that make any sense?  Or am I making to much out of something simple?  :?

Thanks,
Ed

[BlueBee]

Brother Adam found less drifting from hive to hive by grouping his hives in sets of 4 with entrances facing E, W, N, & S.

As for wind, I assume you'll have some spare 5 gallon buckets around?

Ed you may be one of the most prepared beekeepers ever!  Kudos to you for all the research you have done prior to getting your bees.

[mikecva]

Sorry, I sometimes do not write what I think. By the front facing the sun, it makes no difference if the front is squared off or at an angle (so long as it sees some morning sun, as the sooner the sun warms the entrance the sooner the bees seam to emerge.) I actually have some hives facing south west as their flight path lately is in that direction and they are the last to leave home but they all do just as well.

I suggest you keep yourself in mind when setting up your yard because the more comfortable you are the calmer your bees will be. Others have said never stand in front of your hive but I do it for short times while inspecting/cleaning the hives. I do not have sage advice for you (maybe better beeks do) but if you respect and work with your bees, you should have no real problems.  -Mike

[Intheswamp]

Brother Adam found less drifting from hive to hive by grouping his hives in sets of 4 with entrances facing E, W, N, & S.

As for wind, I assume you'll have some spare 5 gallon buckets around?

Ed you may be one of the most prepared beekeepers ever!  Kudos to you for all the research you have done prior to getting your bees.

Hmm, I think I want to keep the hives all more or less facing the same direction.  Maybe it's just the newbeeness in me...dunno.   For now, I'm planning on placing two hives side-by-side...skipping a spot in the row....have a couple of cement blocks in the empty spot to set hive boxes on during inspection...two more hives after the empty spot....repeat.      I figure this will help a bit in regards to drifting.  I might get my 4.5 year old granddaughter to paint some flowers on the front of the lower brood boxes for me . :)

Currently, I'm trying to contact a person in New York regarding the 5-gallon buckets...seems there's an engineer up there that has designed some hurricane-proof buckets....bird, you listening.    jk  :-D

BlueBee, I don't know if I'm getting more prepared or more confused.  :roll:  Sometimes I feel like a cat chasing it's own tail.  I'm trying, though!  :)

Ed

[Intheswamp]

Sorry, I sometimes do not write what I think. By the front facing the sun, it makes no difference if the front is squared off or at an angle (so long as it sees some morning sun, as the sooner the sun warms the entrance the sooner the bees seam to emerge.) I actually have some hives facing south west as their flight path lately is in that direction and they are the last to leave home but they all do just as well.

I suggest you keep yourself in mind when setting up your yard because the more comfortable you are the calmer your bees will be. Others have said never stand in front of your hive but I do it for short times while inspecting/cleaning the hives. I do not have sage advice for you (maybe better beeks do) but if you respect and work with your bees, you should have no real problems.  -Mike

Hmm, warming the entrance.  I've seen both pros and cons mentioned on the utility of landing boards.  A landing board could possibly help warm the front entrance up some...sun hitting it and by conduction and some convection warm the entrance up a bit...also give the bees a "porch" to walk out on to sun for a moment to "wake'em up" before taking off.  Naturally the entire wall of the entrance side would be warming, too.

I really would like to have the hive entrances facing at least southeast, maybe east of southeast.  Our prevailing winds (and storms) mostly come from the southwest.  Angling more eastward would turn the entrances away from those winds and storms and also let them catch the early morning sun.  In thinking about it, I need to go check the horizon line from a ground view perspective...being down the slope a bit it may delay the sunshine striking them dead on after sunrise.


In regards to standing in front of a beehive...  My mentor and I went and checked out a feral hive in the wall of a barn.  It was actually trapped between a lean-to shed on the back of the barn and a walk-in cooler inside the barn...rather hard to get to for a cut out.  Anyhow, this was about a month ago and the bees were bringing in pollen and some nectar.  After finding their entrance I was standing in the field (fence was right behind the barn) probably 30-40 feet away from them.  I didn't realize I was in their beeline...they let me know!  I had a couple of them buzzing me pretty good and another one stinging my shirtsleeve. I really can't say they were aggressive, though, because I was inside the barn stuffing plastic bags (we used what we had on hand) into the long crevice that they were using to enter the barn (actually a 92 year old lady had turned the barn into a big storage shed and wanted the bees out).  I got a few stings on my hands before I put some gloves on, but I don't blame them 'cause I was basically pushing plastic bag in over their heads...and had no smoke with me.  I think my mentor enjoyed it since he was down on the ground at the door of the barn and I was on top of the cooler all the way at the back of the barn (had to crawl over piles of junk to get to the bees!).  :-D  We contacted them since and we really haven't gotten a good answer as to whether the bees are still getting inside the barn.

But, anyhow, I hope to stay out of their beeline as much as possible.  Also, if I turn the hives more to the southeast then that would aim the hives to the side of any regularly frequented areas around the house.  That doesn't means the bees will follow that route but it should at least encourage to shift their flight path a little to the east of the house.

One concern I do have is that a very large portion of what I see as good forage for the ladies is across the highway.  I'm hoping that I don't have too many casualties from vehicles splattering them.  There is privet hedge and yaupon holly and other bushes/trees lining the fence row beside the highway so hopefully this will get them up and over most of the traffic.

I'm going to sight the hives basically in the middle of the area between two terraces.  This will keep the hives the longest distance away from the backside of one terrace and the frontside of the other...thus keeping the hives on the driest piece of ground.  The area I have also has a slight rise to it rather than the normal slight depression see between most terraces.  There will be plenty of room behind the hives to drive a vehicle and still plenty of room to mow the grass in front.  There is a slight slope to the area which will help rain to drain off but the slope isn't so great that if I stumble I'll roll downhill. :)

Well, I'll quit running my mouth now. :)  Thanks for letting me bend ya'll's ears...
Ed