Today I Made

[Ben Framed]

Les I have never had a mouse problem in my hives either.

[cao]

I haven't had any problems with mice, but my cousin has found a mouse living in one of his hives during the first spring inspection.  I think the reason he has had mice is that he lets the weeds grow up around his hives and he has them setting on railroad ties.  There is plenty of hiding areas around his hives.  Mine are on taller stands and I spray the weeds under the hives.

[Terri Yaki]

Les, I don't know what your winters are like there but in my area, mice look for warmer places to nest when it gets colder. I don't know what kind of damage they do once they're in there but they are not the least bit hygienic and they will stink the place up, at best. At that, I don't know what the threshold is for when they come in but I'm thinking around the freezing temp. Cao, you and I have similar climates but I suspect that yours is a little colder than mine so maybe I'm being overly concerned about mice. They taught us about protecting against them in class so that's where I'm getting my thoughts from. It looks like a lot of beeks have their hives out in fields where mice roam freely. My neighbor has more weeds and harboring places for mice than I do and he told me that he didn't have a problem. So I'm thinking that I'll just put up the plastic guards that I can make easily and if I see that Tom and Jerry have been visiting, I'll up my game. I have enough steel laying around that I could make something but the vinyl is easier to work with.

[Michael Bush]

I think the colder the climate the bigger the mouse problem.  Mice are a scourge here.

[Lesgold]

I was watching a clip yesterday morning of an Aussie guy who has varroa in his hives. He was trimming out drone brood from split frames that he had in his hives. I have a few split frames set up for the same purpose but when I saw the simplicity of his design, I thought I?d better make a few. A standard deep frames is split by inserting a horizontal bar that is rotated through 45 degrees to give a sharpe edge as a guide for the bees to draw drone comb. Although the bees will build comb without this guide, it tends to guarantee that the comb will be built in exactly the right position. I ripped up some timber to 16mm square section and then docked bars to a length that would just fit inside a standard frame. Two simple jigs were then made to hold the rail in the desired position. A crown staple and some glue finished the job. The top section was then wired and foundation trimmed and positioned in place. The jigs made the job a simple task and saved a considerable amount of time during the assembly process. Will place one in each hive so they can be drawn out. When varroa hits, the drone brood will be removed every two weeks during hive inspections.

[Lesgold]

With the family coming down for a stay, I decided to get my grandson to help me with a project that has been in the back of my mind festering away for a couple of years. I?ve always wanted to have a go at rearing some queens using a cell punch method but haven?t been able to find the gear that was needed. A decision was made to make my own using what I could lay my hands on or purchase easily over the net. A piece of 10mm stainless tube with a wall thickness of .2mm was ordered online and was pleasantly surprised that it arrived in only 3 days. The tube was cut into lengths of about 32mm using the angle grinder and then one end of each piece was sharpened using the lathe and a file. A cordless drill and file could be used to achieve the same result. Some 10mm plastic tube was then cut in lengths of about 14mm to make caps for one end. Some dowel was then machined on the lathe to a size that would fit into the plastic tube and short lengths of about 6mm were then parted off. These dowels were then positioned and glued in place with super glue.

[Terri Yaki]

On the frames...I moved a newly made queen on a medium frame into a deep nuc. The bees quickly filled the empty space with comb. I wasn't trying to do that and didn't add any starter strips for them. Is there a reason you can't just do that?

[Lesgold]

Terri, starter strips are just a bit of a guide for the bees. They are not essential  as long as there are other drawn frames on either side of the empty frame. The bees will fill the space parallel to the frames that are already in place. If you were to fill a box with empty frames, you could end up with cross comb and a real mess.

[Lesgold]

The cell punches were finished yesterday. The glued caps sit nicely on the tube and will hold the cell pinch in place on a frame bar.When the punch was tested on some drawn comb, I found that the cell that was punched out could fall through if giggled or moved. This could be problematic during the construction phase of the queen cell. The solution was to dip the blunt end into molten wax a couple of times. This reduced the internal diameter of the punch and would hold the queen cell in place.

[Lesgold]

My gramdson drilled out a cell bar and the cell punches were placed in the frame. Should be able to make a few queens when a starter hive is established.

[Terri Yaki]

Your grandson has a great teacher. Congratulations.

[Lesgold]

At the end of last month, I placed one of the split frames into a hive on the edge of the brood box to see if the top section of the frame would be drawn and filled with nectar while the bottom section would be drone comb. Although there is no flow on, the bees did their job well. The drone comb is fully laid out. Looks like this type of frame will work well to help control varroa numbers when it arrives.

[Lesgold]

After making a few frames using the laser cutter, I was just about to cut trenches in the top bars for foundation or starter strips when I had a thought. Do I need starter strips at all? The reality is that they are not really essential and the bees will draw comb on the top bar anyway. A starter strip does have an advantage as it acts as a guide to ensure that comb is constructed in just the right location. I decided to have a play with one frame and experiment. I put two saw cuts into one top bar which resulted in basically a recessed starter strip.  A bit of wax was painted on the strip to encourage some interest from the girls and it will be paced into a hive tomorrow. What do you think the result will be? I?m pretty confident at this stage. I will post what happens over the next week or so.  If this works, it could be a bit of a time saver.

[BeeMaster2]

For foundation less it will probably work really well. I add a waxed strip of wood to the slot in the top bars and the bees will build nice straight comb.
Jim Altmiller

[Lesgold]

That?s what I currently do in the brood box during build up. I think this may work but time will tell.

[Lesgold]

Back into making some foundation today. Thought I?d show you guys the process that I use. With a flow coming up in less than a month, I?ll need to make sure that I?m ready to go. I use a double gas burner to heat the wax which sits in an old beer keg that has been cut in half vertically. The wax sits in a water bath so that it doesn?t get too hot. Preheating the water and the melting of the wax takes about 20 minutes. During that time, all the other gear is set up. I use a couple of wooden paddles to make flat wax sheets. They sit in a tub of warm water during the warm up process. For standard wax foundation, the paddles are dipped twice into the molten wax. If I want to make really thin foundation for comb honey, the paddle is dipped once. If I?m making the comb honey foundation, cappings wax is used. For regular foundation, the darker, recycled wax is also used.

[Lesgold]

After the wax on the paddles solidifies, a knife is run around the perimeter of the paddle to remove the surplus that sets on the sides. The paddle is then inserted into the water bath where the sheet normally falls off when the paddle is pulled up and out of the bath. These sheets stay in the warm water until I?m ready to use the embosser. If you allow the sheets to cool, they will be brittle and will break up as they are forced through the rollers. Once the sheets are embossed, the wax is much more flexible and can be handled as per any normal foundation sheet. The embossed sheets are placed into a clean water bath to dissolve the dishwashing detergent that has been added to the embossing rollers. Finally, sheets are trimmed to size with a pizza cutter or knife and allowed to dry.

[Lesgold]

After completing a bit of beekeeping work, the day turned nasty so I decided to make a few more sheets of foundation. From just under 3kg of wax, 42 sheets were formed. Not a bad way to finish off a windy, overcast day.

[Lesgold]

With Christmas fast approaching, it was time to get in front with some of the honey gift items. Quite a few wooden lids are being turned for honey jars at the moment. With my dads birthday also coming up in a couple of weeks, I thought that one of the decorative honey jars might make a good gift as he loves his honey. 48 years ago my parents sold their farm and took a new direction in life. Many years later I was able to get hold of some timber that came off the property. One piece that I did keep was a 100 year old fence post that was cut on the farm in the early 1920?s. It is a timber that lasts really well in the ground and doesn?t deteriorate much at all over time. A lid was turned so that some of the natural weathering and surface cracking was left on the top of the lid. This allowed an array of beautiful colours and cracking to still be evident on the surface. All  imperfections were strengthened with super glue.

[max2]

Fantastic idea and lovely timber.
In our area they used to use White Beech as fence posts and Red Ceder ( Toona australis)
I have found very old fence posts around the ridges here.