Lesson 50: Be A Courageous & Confident Beekeeper

Today's lesson includes topics on building your confidence as a beekeeper, queen rearing and our May 16th queen rearing course, a special we are offering on a small hive to have on hand to catch swarms and my recent speaking engagement in Chicago...this and a whole lot more.

Hello from David & Sheri Burns at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in East Central Illinois. Saturday night I had the privilege of speaking in Chicago to the Cook Dupage Beekeeping Association. It was great! Their president is Mike Rusnak and Mike took me out for super for some great Cajun food at Pappadeuax's restaurant in Oakbrook, Illinois.

This is a strong association with over 200 members. They ran their meeting more like a beekeeping conference. They had a white-board question & answer time, a book store, a pot-luck style food and dessert table and more. I met a lot of great people, some of whom have been following this blog for some time.

While I was making my presentation, I asked the audience to give a show of hands as to how many were raising their own queens. No hands went up. I asked a second time, because I thought maybe they didn't hear me. Still no one. I was amazed at how few beekeepers raise queens. And yet the queen is the most important bee in the hive. No doubt, a lack of courage and confidence in raising queens keeps many beekeepers from attempting to raise their own queens.

This gives me greater motivation to help more beekeepers learn the wonderful joy of raising their own queens. In fact, I'll be teaching a queen rearing class at my honey bee farm on May 16, a Saturday from 9am - 3pm. If we have a larger registration than expected I will hold the class in Champaign, Illinois (Central Illinois) at a larger facility. To register for this class online click here. Or call in to register now! 217-427-2678.

Register for this queen rearing class as soon as possible. Spots will be limited and will be given first to paid registrants. The cost is $89.00 and will include the following items:
1) Lunch 2) A queen rearing frame with cell bar and cell cups we make from own wax which has never been medicated 3) A Chinese grafting tool 4) Material documenting how to raise queens and one-on-one mentoring on how to graft. Call 217-427-2678 to register ASAP or register online at the link in the paragraph above. Our April 24th queen rearing class is full, which is why we are offering this class on May 16th. Hopefully, this will help more become confident as beekeepers.

Many beekeepers never really become beekeepers, but only remain bee-havers. They have bees, but they really don't work or manage their bees. There are many reasons why people remain bee-haves and never become beekeepers but I think one of the biggest reason is FEAR and a lack of courage. The second reason is similar and that is a lack of confidence. Many beekeepers just don't feel confident in knowing what they are doing. They are afraid that their lack of "knowing what they are doing" will result in doing something wrong and killing their hive.

This is why most beekeepers never raise queens. To them, the place where the queen lives is mysterious and so deep within the hive, a place where no man has gone before. Every year thousands of "beginner" beekeeping courses are given around the country. These are great to help beekeepers get started, but there is rarely a follow up mentorship or advance class.

As a result most bee-havers know enough to install a package, dump expensive and unnecessary medication on their bees, watch them die in the winter and buy packages the following year only to repeat the same techniques that may have led to their bees failing the first time. We've got to break this cycle!

With a bit more education and mentorship, a bee-haver can become a beekeeper and develop a level of skill, knowledge and confidence that can catapult their beekeeping hobby to a whole new level of success. Education is the answer. But no matter how "book-taught" a beekeeper is, the best education is through a hands on course.

Another way that you can build your confidence and courage in beekeeping is to catch swarms. Swarms rarely sting and always draw an audience. It builds your confidence to retrieve a swarm and place it into your bee yard.

Once people hear that you keep bees, they will be calling you asking you to remove a swarm. We've build a perfect swarm catch box so you can place the swarm in it and transport it back to your bee yard. Click here for more information. It comes with a screen to shut off the front entrance once the swarm is captured as well as a tie-down strap to hold it all together for transport. Every beekeeper should have one just in case your own hives swarm on you. You can catch them and keep them as a new hive.

This extra hive will build your confidence know that you have extra equipment should you want to raise an extra queen or keep a smaller hive going or to support an observation hive. Lots of uses. During the month of May, many beekeepers call us and want us to rush a hive to them because they found a swarm. But, by time the hive arrives the swarm has left. So have one on hand! It is worth the investment. It will nearly pay for itself in one swarm catch because you save the cost of a package of bees.

The final way that we want to help build your courage and confidence as a beekeeper is to invite you to our place for a special course on beekeeping May 23rd. We believe if you can join us for this one day course in basic beekeeping that many of your hesitancy and fears will be alleviated. And on that day, we will also have hives available and bees. We will help you install your bees in your new hive. In one day you can receive your beekeeping education, purchase your hive and bees and drive home a beekeeper with everything you need to be a successful beekeeper. May 23rd is not too late because you'll be getting 5 frames of brood/bees/honey/pollen and a queen! Click here for more information. If your friends have been think about it, this one day course will be perfect for them.

We are here to help you keep bees with courage and confidence!

Visit our website at www.honeybeesonline.com

And listen to our beekeeping podcast available at:

www.honeybeesonline.com/studiobeelive.html And if you have questions about beekeeping that you want us to answer on our next broadcast just email them to: david@honeybeesonline.com

Feel free to call at: 217-427-2678. Until next time, remember to bee-have yourself!

David & Sheri Burns

Long Lane Honey Bee Farms

We Need Your Help

Hello beekeeping friends from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in Central Illinois. I've never done this before, but I'd like to present before you a worthy cause for you to consider a donation to help a local Boy Scout Troop wanting to get into beekeeping. Please read more...

The bees have taken advantage of the recent warm spell to pull in pollen from the maple trees and other early bloomers. It has put everyone in the "beekeeping" mood, including Boy Scout Troop 107. Troop leader Randy Cartwright contacted me a few weeks ago and told me that his troop wanted to start a honey bee farm, maybe with a couple of hives and sell the honey to help fund their project while at the same time taking an active role in protecting and supporting the honey bee.

After speaking with Randy on the phone, I was excited to hear how this project will not only benefit the bees, but these young boys as well. I was so excited that I donated one hive toward their endeavor. They are located in Elizabeth City, North Carolina.

I told Randy that there are many subscribers to our beekeeping lessons that I'm sure if I told them about the needs of the boy in his scout troop, that many would respond.

Randy responded by email to me and said, "Thank you for your generous donation. Our boyscout troop (107) and parents are very excited about starting a bee farm. It is our goal to do our part to mother nature by replenishing the honey bee population, well at least help. We understand the importance of the honey bee to our Eco system. We will be the first boyscout troop in history to own a bee farm or to even try but we need help. We are currently trying to raise funds to start our hive anything anyone could do to help would be grateful. The bee farm we are trying to make will not only aid us in our conservation efforts but we will be able to sell the honey to support the boys in our troop. If anyone can help please make checks to : Boyscout Troop 107 and mail to scoutmaster Randy Cartwright, 945 Wellfield Road Elizabeth City, North Carolina 27909 Thank you and god bless".

So, I'm encouarging our readership to be generous and send these eager young beekeepers a donation to help them get started. Whether you can or cannot send a donation, at least drop Troop 107 a note through Randy, and let them know that we are proud to see more young people enter into beekeeping.

Again, your donation can be sent to:

Boyscout Troop 107
C/O Randy Cartwright
945 Wellfield Road
Elizabeth City, NC 27909

EMAIL the troop at: theforge81@yahoo.com

If you're like me, it always makes me feel good to know that I can stop thinking about me, and be kind and generous to worthy causes. Who knows, maybe one of these future beekeepers will find the solution to some of the pests and diseases facing the honey bee.

Thanks for your consideration.

David & Sheri Burns

Long Lane Honey Bee Farms

LESSON 49: FEEDING BEES

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Call us at: 217-427-2678

Hello from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms, a family beekeeping operation of my wife and family, David & Sheri Burns. In today's lesson, I want to teach on feeding bees especially during late winter and early spring. Before I do, let me share a few personal thoughts with you. Our family spent last weekend in Chicago along with our oldest daughter and son-n-law and our granddaughter. My oldest son held down hive production while we were away. Our family works hard, and these occasional get-aways keep us going.

I was on TV again promoting beekeeping. You can watch the three and a half minute video by clicking here.

My wife and I have a passion for promoting beekeeping. We love it, enjoy it, and find it the perfect match for a family business. As we spend so much time teaching beekeeping classes, posting lessons online and talking to prospective beekeepers one on one, we realize that not everyone will make their beekeeping purchase from us. Even though most people who take advantage of all our free information do purchase equipment and bees from us, we also realize that some people will learn all they can from us but purchase their equipment and bees from some place else. But let me just say that when you do purchase from us you are supporting our efforts to promote beekeeping. Your support gives us the ability to continue to offer our FREE online beekeeping lessons and conduct our endless experiments and sustain our small business in these tough economical times. We appreciate your loyal support and business!

Support from our satisfied customers is what we count on! So thank you for recommending Long Lane Honey Bee Farms to your friends and among your bee clubs.

BUY YOUR BEES FROM US NOW!! DON'T WAIT! AND BE SURE TO GET YOUR HIVE EQUIPMENT, PACKAGE BEES AND NUCS FROM US SOON TOO!! You can call us Monday - Saturday from 8am- 5pm Central Time. If you reach our answering machine, it means we are on the other line or that we stepped out. Leave you name and phone number and we'll return your call.

We are selling lots of nucs this year, and can still take lots more orders. These nucs will have the queens that we raise from here in Illinois. Local pick up only, though. $80

LESSON 48: FEEDING BEES

This is the time of the year when bees start running out of stored honey if they haven't already. To help them not die from starvation, it's important to feed your bees. If your bees die with their heads stuck in cells, they starved. Knock out the dead bees and try again! If the haven't died yet, there are many ways to feed your bees during late winter and early spring. All feeding methods have some pros anc cons so these are my experiences and opinions.

For those of us in the mid to northern part of the US we need to check our bees to be sure they still have stored honey they can live on until flowers start to produce nectar. Here in Illinois, we have a long way to go, probably 4-5 more weeks.

Pollen patties are a good source of protein for the bees. These can be purchased or can be made up from a dry powder mix. Also, if the bees are short on honey an easy solution is to feed them 1:1 sugar water. I do this by placing a zip-loc sandwhich bag of sugar water on the top frames just above the cluster. I poke a few holes on the top side of the bag and the bees figure out how to draw out the sugar water. Another method is to use a jar normally used on the entrance feeder. Place it on top of the inner cover just above the cluster over the oval shaped hole. Then place an empty deep hive body to surround the jar and then place the top cover on this deep hive body. Place a heavy rock or block on top to hold everything tight.

I can open a hive for just a few minutes if the temperture is 40 or above and little to no wind. But I never remove a frame for inspection until the temperature reaches 60.

Fondant is a good winter and early spring feeding method for bees. Here is a recipe a fellow beekeeper gave me: 5 cups of water, 15 pounds of sugar, 3 cups of Karo light corn syrup. Bring water to a boil and put in sugar. When all the sugar is dissolved add corn syrup and bring temp up to a soft boil or 252 degrees (F). Then pour into aluminum pie pans. When set, put fondant on a sheet of wax paper above bees. Cut slits in wax paper so bees can get at the feed.

Other recipes can be found at: www.perfect-wedding-day.com/fondant-recipe-2.htm

Some top feeders may work well as the temperature continues to warm up. But feed your bees!

I'll be speaking at the Cook-DuPage Beekeeping Association in the Chicago area on March 21. I always welcome speaking engagements. It is always a blast talking to groups about honey bees!

That's all for now! Until next time remember to Bee-Have yourselves!

David & Sheri Burns