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Caring for bees may seem simple to someone – they are insects. The beekeeper does not have to do anything at all, only to pump out honey at the end of summer. Someone will say that it is easier to deal with animals than an incomprehensible colony with its own laws and biorhythms. But in beekeeping, as in any business, there are pitfalls and secrets.
How to properly care for bees
For beginners, it may seem that caring for bees at home is not difficult: you need to insulate the hive for the winter, remove the insulation in the spring, sit relaxed on the porch with a cup of coffee in the summer, pump out honey in the fall and insulate the hive for the winter. In fact, the beekeeper has enough things to do to take care of the apiary, even if he drinks tea on the veranda in the evening.
For both the beekeeper and the “green” beginner, each cycle of apiary care and honey production begins in early spring. It is better for a beginner in the first year to purchase turnkey hives with ready-made families. Even if it will cost more. Then you will have to manage on your own.
Experienced beekeepers say that such a policy is not beneficial in honey production. Purchased families will be smaller and weaker than the “old”, overgrown colonies. The amount of honey obtained directly depends on the size of the colonies.
Caring for bees in spring
For those who are just starting the first cycle and have bought bee colonies already completely ready, and in new hives, care can begin closer to summer, when the queen flies around. If the second year of beekeeping has begun, bee care in the hives begins as soon as the temperature outside reaches + 8 ° C.
Leaving in the spring begins with transplanting the bees into a clean hive. To do this, the inhabited house is removed from the supports and set aside. In its place put a clean one. The replacement hive does not need to be new, but needs to be cleaned, scraped and disinfected.
After that, a printed honey-pearl frame, prepared in advance, is placed in the hive. After issuing the minimum ration, open the old hive and check the condition of the frames in it. They shake off the bees from the worn ones and put such frames in a portable box. Unworn and containing honey are transferred to a new hive. Filling a new hive starts from the middle.
Bees get upset stomach in winter. At best, it is non-contagious; at worst, it is a viral disease called nosematosis. Due to the possible presence of a virus, frames should be removed during spring care. Beekeepers, confident in the health of their bees, sometimes leave such frames. Coming out of their stupor, the bees themselves will clean them. But it’s better not to risk it.
Next to the honey frame, they put a printed honey-pergo and then a frame with brood. All other frames in the old hive are checked in the same way. Shabby and moldy are thrown away. After all usable frames have been moved to the new home, the total amount of honey is checked. If less than 8 kg, honey unopened frames are added. After that, the bees are transplanted into a clean hive. You don’t have to worry about caring for transplanted families for a month.
Summer bee care
In summer, the bees work on their own, and there is no need to disturb them once again. At this time, they are able to feed themselves if there are enough flowering honey plants in the area. Summer keeping and caring for bees comes down to checking the hives 2 times a month to make sure that the colony does not get sick and collects enough honey.
They try to choose a place for the apiary so that the bees do not have to fly far for a bribe. The shorter the path to honey plants, the more honey the bees will have time to collect in a day. But sometimes flowering is late or there is little nectar in the flowers. Double checks during summer care will help determine if everything is in order with the collection of honey. If it turns out that there are fewer bribes than in previous years, the hives are taken closer to the honey plants.
Supervision of colony formation is to check whether there is too much drone brood and whether there are enough cells for workers. More thorough care in most cases is not required.
swarming
The only case when active intervention of the beekeeper is required during summer care is swarming. Families need to be monitored so that the release of the queen with a new swarm does not go unnoticed. Swarming always occurs on a clear day, as a good queen is sensitive to the weather. Signs of the beginning of swarming:
- bees fly out of the hive and curl around;
- after the appearance of the queen, the swarm adjoins it.
The beekeeper should not miss this moment, because otherwise the swarm will fly away on its own to look for a new home.
What to do if the bees start swarming:
- With the help of a scoop and a swarm, collect the bees. It is advisable to immediately find and catch the queen, then the bees will enter the swarm without coercion.
- The bees who do not want to go to the swarm are driven in its direction with the help of smoke.
- The collected swarm is taken to a dark room and left for an hour, after which they listen to see if the swarm has calmed down. The continued restlessness of the bees means that either there is no queen in the swarm, or there are several queens.
- If there are several queens, the swarm is shaken out, females are found and only one queen is left for the new colony. The rest are placed in cages.
- In the absence of a queen, a swarm is given someone else’s.
Alien female planted in the evening. Dry land and combs with brood are placed in the hive. Usually the swarm remains to live in a new place, forming an ordinary colony. The beekeeper usually has no other care in the summer if the air temperature is in acceptable values.
Sometimes summer is not cold, but very hot. In this case, the bribes also decrease, since the flowers fade early. It may be too hot for the bees themselves at this time in the hive.
What to do if the bees are hot
A sign that the hive is overheated is clusters of bees near the notch. This situation usually occurs when the air temperature outside is higher than it should be in the hive, and the fan bees are not doing their job.
The heat inside the house is dangerous, first of all, for the brood. He can die from overheating. Apiaries are often located in the middle of an open space under the sun’s rays. This situation is good in the morning, when the bees warm up and fly away for a bribe earlier than usual. Not bad is the quick warming up of the hive in early spring, when the queens are selected for flight. The rest of the time it is more harmful than helpful.
With a large enough colony, the bees themselves can raise the temperature in their house to the level they need. Care in this case, they do not need. But during the hot summer, a large family suffers, and here protective measures must be taken:
- move the hive to the shade;
- if it is impossible to move, build a canopy over them;
- Lay thermal insulation outside the hives.
The canopy is often made of construction protective mesh, which creates a small shade and allows air to pass freely. When installing thermal insulation, it must be remembered that no material by itself heats or cools anything. It only maintains the existing temperature.
This property of heat insulators can be used to combine the need for early warming up in the spring and protection from the heat in the summer. The hive painted with white paint heats up less, but this is bad in the spring. A dark-colored hive will heat up quickly in the spring, but will overheat in the summer.
To meet the opposite requirements, the hive can also be painted in a dark color. But in the summer, its insulation from the outside with foam plastic, slate or other poorly heat-conducting material is mandatory.
The blind walls of the hive and the roof are closed with a clear conscience. Shading and thermal insulation are all that can be done when caring for bees during an abnormally hot summer.
What to do with bees after pumping honey
In August, the bees begin to prepare for wintering. The timing of pumping honey depends on the activity of the colony and the degree of maturity of the product. For pumping out, they take away the frames that the bees began to clog with wax. From mid-August, they begin to conduct an audit of families. At the same time, you can do the last extraction of honey, although many beekeepers prefer to carry out this procedure in early August.
Caring for bees after pumping honey is to prepare families for the winter. On August 15-20, an autumn revision of the hives is carried out.
Autumn bee care
Autumn care is the most troublesome. At the end of August, the hive is completely dismantled. They carefully examine all the frames, including the brood ones, which could not be touched all summer. Record the amount of honey, perga, brood and bees. In the presence of fresh open brood, the queen is not searched. If there is only a closed one, the uterus needs to be found.
The discovered queen is carefully examined. In the absence of any defects, the family is considered normal, and the female is left for the next year.
It should be borne in mind that the uterus can abruptly stop oviposition if the honey reserves suddenly decrease in the hive (pumping was performed). This situation is not related to the physical condition of the female and does not need to be replaced.
If there is no queen, or if she is physically handicapped, the colony is marked and its fate determined later. During the autumn inspection, all low-quality and old combs are discarded and the hive is pre-assembled for wintering: holes with a diameter of 8-10 mm are made in the remaining combs in the center so that in winter the bees can move freely around the nest.
After that, with the help of the compiled records, they analyze the apiary, the state of the families and decide how many colonies should be left for the winter. If necessary, weak and strong families unite. They also decide in which families and in what quantity frames with honey, bee bread and brood should be distributed.
This is due to the fact that the bees do not fall into anabiosis, but continue their vital activity in the winter. Although less than in warm weather, in winter the bees feed in the same way, feed the brood, and the queen lays new eggs. Because of the brood, the colony needs “extra” food supplies.
How much honey to leave for the family depends on the preferences of the owner. Some take away natural honey, and sugar syrup is offered to the bees for a quick replenishment of stocks. There is an opinion that bees get sick from such honey. Definitely do not recommend taking “sugar” honey for pumping next summer. Even if it remains with the bees.
With proper preparation for winter, care for bees until spring is not needed. With improper care and insulation, the colony will not survive the winter.
Transportation of bees
Transportation of bees over long distances is carried out 2 times a year or not at all. Depends on the location of the apiary. The apiary is transported not for the purpose of care, but to get more honey. If the apiary is well located, it does not need transportation.
In spring, they try to move the hives closer to the flowering gardens. In summer, it is better to place an apiary next to a flowering meadow. If the hives are located on the territory of a large agro-industrial company with diversified activities, then it is only necessary to take the colonies closer to the farmland in the spring, and pick them up for wintering in the fall.
When transporting beehives, certain rules must be followed in order to safely transport the apiary:
- When preparing the hives for transportation, the frames are fixed. If there are few frames, they are shifted to one side and a diaphragm is inserted, which is fixed with nails.
- The frames on top are covered with ceiling strips so that there are no gaps left.
- To ensure air circulation, a hole is made in one of the ceiling frames.
- They put the hives with notches back and securely fasten them.
- Transportation is best done when the bees have already finished their daytime flight, but have not yet flown out in the morning. In fact, such transportation is carried out at night.
The latter condition is not always feasible and it will be enough to drive slowly so that the bees that have flown out can find their home.
Transferring bees to a new hive
A transplant is required for spring and sometimes autumn apiary care. Partially transplanting bees occurs with good frames. Insects are not shaken off them, but carefully moved to a new place. The rest of the swarm will need to be moved manually. In order to transplant all the bees from one hive to another without damage, the queen is first transferred. The bees usually calmly follow her.
Since non-flying individuals may appear in the hive, the old and new houses are placed opposite each other with entrances. The landing sites must touch so that those who do not fly can crawl to a new place of residence. Or all those who cannot cross over after the uterus themselves are transferred manually.
Proper transplantation of bees:
What are bees fumigated with
When caring for bees, you can not do without a device that helps to avoid stings. It is called “smoke” and has a fairly simple design:
- cylindrical body made of two layers of metal;
- cover with spout;
- furs for air supply inside.
With simple care, material is laid in the smoker that will smolder, but will not give a flame. When treating smoldering coals, appropriate preparations are poured.
Fumigation “pacifies” the bees not because of the smoke, per se. Feeling the burning, insects instinctively begin to eat honey. In the event of a forest fire, they will have to move to a new place and it is better to do this with at least some food supplies. Therefore, working individuals “eat up” to a full abdomen. And such a belly bends badly and it becomes uncomfortable to sting. It is on the impossibility of stinging that the mechanism of “pacification” is based.
There can always be a bee that is not “full” enough or has just returned from the meadows.
How to fumigate
A material is placed in the smoker that can smolder for a long time without a flame. Store charcoal cannot be used, it gives too high a temperature and very little smoke. The best materials for a smoker are:
- wood rot;
- dried tinder fungus;
- oak bark.
Wood rot can be collected from stumps in the forest and dried this dust. The tinder fungus often settles even in gardens, it must be destroyed. In this case, two goals can be combined at once. Collect tinder fungus in the spring.
What absolutely can not be used:
- pieces of chipboard and fiberboard;
- fresh wood;
- fresh sawdust.
Chipboards are saturated with poisonous substances that will kill bees. Wood and sawdust burn, not smolder. The flames will anger the worker bees.
Proper fumigation
Smokers must not be abused. In order for the bees to calm down and begin to stock up on honey, it is enough to release 2-3 puffs of smoke. This is a signal for insects that there is a fire somewhere, but they can be bypassed. Or will not bypass and it is necessary to stock up on food. If you smoke too much bees in a hive, this will be a signal that a fire is nearby. We must rise and fly to a new place. Too much smoke will only piss off the bees.
Safety rules when working in the apiary
The instructions for caring for bees provide not only the use of a smoker, but also the wearing of special clothing that protects against bites:
- closed shoes;
- long pants;
- long-sleeve shirt;
- cuffs on the sleeves should be with elastic bands;
- gloves;
- mosquito hat.
When caring for bees, you can get 50 or more stings per day. If 1-2 can even be beneficial, then a large amount of bee venom will cause a severe allergic reaction, even death.
Conclusion
Caring for bees from the outside seems like a calm, leisurely activity, but this is due to the fact that insects do not like sudden movements. In fact, care requires attentiveness, accuracy and significant labor investments from the beekeeper.
