Basic Beekeeping

LESSON 114: 6 Ways You Can Help Save Honey Bees www.honeybeesonline.com 217-427-2678

2012-01-23T09:29:00.001-06:00

Hello from David & Sheri Burns at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. We had a wonderful Christmas and we are looking forward to 2012. Already the new bee year is in FULL SWING!

In today’s lesson, I’ll be sharing 6 ways you can help save the honey bees. We MUST increase the number of people keeping hives so that we can maintain adequate pollination of our crops, vegetables and orchards.

Before today’s lesson, let me share with you some important beekeeping events, products and services we are offering here at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms.

First, one of our specialties is education. We have many beekeeping educational opportunities throughout the year. In fact, in 2012 we will be offering 12 beekeeping classes. Our first class was held on Saturday and was completely full. We always have lots of students from the Chicago area, and even though Chicago had 7 inches of snow, we only had a few students that could not make it due to the weather.

Our classes fill up fast. Here’s why others tell us they prefer our classes over others. They are one day classes. Our classes are taught by a certified master beekeeper. Our students become our friends and we are committed to their future success. Our classes are very educational but fun too! There are plenty of nice hotels and restaurants in the area so plan to join us for a class this year.

Our next class is our Advance Beekeeping Class coming up February 11th. Sign up now!

You can click on the links for more information:

FEBRUARY 11, 2012 ADVANCE BEEKEEPING SKILLS

MARCH 24, 2012 BASIC BEEKEEPING

MAY 12, 2012 HOW TO RAISE YOUR OWN QUEENS

JUNE 15th-16th, 2012 TWO DAY QUEEN REARING COURSE

FREE SHIPPING on our Freedom, Liberty and Independence beekeeping kits. Take advantage of huge savings on free shipping until January 25th. All of our hives are painted and assembled, ready to go. Order now to avoid the busy season.

We have WINTER-BEE-KIND candy boards on our hives and once again they are doing great. Here in Illinois our winter was mild until about two weeks ago. Then, the bottom dropped out and we fell into the single digits. Early January was so record setting warm that the bees were flying daily. While some new beekeepers might feel this is good, it is not. Many warm days in a row means the bees eat through lots of winter stores of honey. When it’s colder, the bees cluster, remain calm and eat very little. So now many beekeepers will find that there bees will be lacking sufficient food to make it through the winter. I used to worry about this but now our Winter-Bee-Kind boards give me confidence to know that my bees have food should they run out.

We’ve been monitoring our Winter-Bee-Kind boards and it is amazing how much they have eaten. A strong hive needs good nutrition. We now mix in an ample supply of pollen powder into our Winter-Bee-Kinds and it is giving the bees the protein and nutrition they need to survive the winter. You can put them on even on cold days by removing the top and inner cover, place it on with the candy facing down, and place your top back on and leave off the inner cover. Give your bees a treat by making sure they have enough food. Click here for more information on our very popular Winter-Bee-Kind candy boards.

Look at this video taken in early January showing how well the Winter-Bee-Kind works and it has an upper entrance/vent as well as an insulation panel all built in as one unit.

WARNING: Our packages of bees are selling out fast. We estimate that we will be sold out in 2 weeks, so please consider placing your orders soon! Each year thousands of potential beekeepers wait too long and cannot find packages. We have packages that are shipped or available for pickup here in Illinois. Order online at: www.honeybeesonline.com or call us at 217-427-2678

Now, for today’s lesson. I want to share 6 ways you can help save the honey bee.

1. Start Keeping Bees

There is a tremendous interest in beekeeping. So many people are getting back to nature, planting their own gardens, buying small farms, eating local food and striving to be more self sufficient. As a result, more and more people are putting bees on their farms for pollination and to provide a natural sweetener.

Remember as a kid how you had to be careful when you went barefooted across the backyard not to step on a honey bee. Not too long ago, it was common to have a jar of honey on the table as a natural sweetener and often it had a big chunk of comb in the jar. Remember seeing your grandpa or dad out there having so much fun working the bees. We need to rally folks to help restore beekeeping back to the way it was, when there were plenty of bees to pollinate our crops.

If your garden and orchards are not producing like they should, it may be that they are not being adequately pollinated. Please consider placing a couple of hives in your area. Bees can fly up to three miles, so you’ll be helping out others in your area too. Maybe you’ve always wanted to keep bees. Perhaps you’ve thought about it each year but waited too long. Read our special article for those interested in starting this year.

2. Encourage Others To Keep Bees

If you are a beekeeper you are in a perfect position to encourage someone else to keep bees. Ask them to assist you as you work your hives and give them a jar of raw honey. They’ll noticed the difference from store bought honey. Help set up their new hive and help install their new package. A couple of buddies that live near each other might want to keep bees. So many great friendships have been started through beekeeping.

Also, consider encouraging young men and women to keep bees. We need more young people to enter into beekeeping. Young beekeepers ensure a solid future in beekeeping. Beekeeping is a beautiful way to teach many categories of science to young children. It is also a great way to teach responsibility and work ethics.

3. Be An Ambassador For The Honey Bees

Even though public awareness of honey bees is really good, honey bees are sometimes viewed in the wrong way. Some people immediately are scared of honey bees and pass along wrong information such as all bees are killer bees. That’s not true at all. We now have queens that are so gentle that there is no reason to have a defensive hive. It is very easy to requeen an overly defensive hive and in 45 days the new queen will have produced bees that reflect her gentleness.

Speak positively about beekeeping and honey bees. Share with others that 1 out of 3 bites of food is a result of honey bee pollination. Tell others that raw honey never spoils and has many proven health benefits.

If you are a beekeeper, do not pass up opportunities to speak at schools, clubs and civic organizations. Talk with your local newspaper or TV stations and see if they are interested in doing a story on honeybees.

If you remove honeybees from homes, always call the news stations and ask them to do a story on the removal of honeybees from a home. When they interview you, speak positively about the need for honeybees. Be a good ambassador of the honey bee.

4. Buy USA Raw Honey

With so many beekeepers bottling US raw honey directly from their hives, there is no reason to purchase honey from unknown sources. Support your local beekeepers by buying local honey. It has even been suggested that raw honey from your local area can help relieve some allergies. By buying honey from a local beekeeper you are helping them continue their hobby or business.

5. Let Roadways, Ditches and Fields Grow Wild

For bees to have sufficient nutrition a variety of pollen and nectar is needed. Bees that have only one type of floral source are not able to receive the balance of nutrition needed. One way you can help is to allow wild flowers to grow freely along roadways, ditches, yards and fields. Every spring dandelions fill yards. These dandelions are needed by the bees for their first real strong source of nectar following a long winter. Yet, so many people use chemicals to destroy dandelions. Do your part and allow these and other flowers to grow freely, giving the bees the variety of nectar and pollen they need for a good start in the new year.

If you have fields available for cover crops consider planting clover, alfalfa or buckwheat.

6. Reduce Harmful Spraying Around Yards, Gardens & Orchards

Finally, be careful when spraying your yard, garden and trees with insecticides. When you use an insecticide powder dusting, bees can pick up this toxic chemical and carry it back into their hive which will kill the hive. Avoid using chemicals which are harmful to bees. If you live near agricultural fields start an open dialog with the farmer. Have your farmer notify you when chemicals will be used. This will give you time to either temporarily move your hives during the spraying or to seal the entrances to your hives to protect them from spraying.

Please forward this on to others so they too can help save the honey bee!

Thanks for joining us for another lesson from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. Here is our contact information:

Check out our website: www.honeybeesonline.com
Phone: 217-427-2678

LESSON 113: The Sticky Subject Of Propolis (www.honeybeesonline.com 217-427-2678)

2011-12-19T12:47:00.002-06:00

I’ve never written a lesson on propolis, that sticky stuff that ruins your nice, new, white bee suit, that stuff that won’t come off your fingers unless you use alcohol. But, propolis plays an important role in the colony’s health. This lesson will be very important for understanding how propolis can improve the health of your bees and be a fun lesson examining where propolis comes from, how the bees use it in the hive, the health benefits to humans and much more. But before we get started let me say...
Hello friends, we are David & Sheri Burns from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in central Illinois. Folks tell us we have the best website, most complete information on beekeeping and the best price on beekeeping equipment. Whether you are just thinking about getting into beekeeping or have kept bees for many years, we are here to help you. When you buy from us, we do not consider you a customer, but a friend!

Spectacular Beginner’s Beekeeping Workshop
Mark your calendars and join us on January 21st, 2012 for our Basic Beekeeper’s Workshop at the Farm Bureau in Danville, Illinois from 9am-3pm. This class is filling up fast, but we still have openings. This is for people who do not know anything at all about bees but want to start or for those who have kept bees for a year or two but want to be trained by an EAS certified master beekeeper.Click here for more information.

FEED YOUR BEES

Don’t “assume” your bees have enough food for winter. Check out our WINTER-BEE-KIND system that we’ve made. It insulates, ventilates and provides carbohydrates (sugar) and proteins (pollen) for your bees during the winter. It also provides an upper exit incase snow or ice blocks off your lower entrance. Order now.
ENCOURAGE OTHERS TO START KEEPING BEES
Here’s a great offer to help your friends and family get started in beekeeping. Click on the image for more information on this product.
Beekeeping is a hoot! It’s enjoyable, educational and provides natural and healthy products from the hive. Not to mention we need honey bees to pollinate our fruits and vegetables. One out of three bites of food can be enjoyed due to the pollination of the honey bee. If you are presently keeping bees, encourage your friends and family to keep bees. We would appreciate it if you’d lead your friends and family over to Long Lane Honey Bee Farms where we can provide them with hives and bees and protective gear. Have them check out our HOW TO GET STARTED IN BEEKEEPING or check out our COMPLETE VIDEO PAGE with videos on how to install a package, how to inspect a top bar hive and many more.
TO HELP OUT BEEKEEPERS, WE REFUSE TO RAISE OUR PRICE FOR THE 3rd CONSECUTIVE YEAR!
Let’s talk savings. Our complete hive is awesome for several reasons:
1) Made here at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms, handmade for you.
2) Don’t be fooled by cheaper prices because our hives are painted, and assembled, and have real wooden frames and includes foundation.
3) While others have raised their prices every year, and again this year, we are holding our hive prices the same now for the third consecutive year. Our complete hive comes with two hive bodies, 20 wooden, deep frames with foundation, a medium super, 10 wooden super frames with foundation, screen bottom board, inner cover, top cover, entrance feeder and entrance reducer for only $199. That’s been our same price for 2010, 2011 and now again in 2012. We’re proud of the quality of our assembled and painted hives. CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFORMATION.
In addition to beekeeping woodenware and equipment, we now carry a host of beekeeping specialty items. We’ve added shirts, candles, beekeeping key rings, etc. Most of our candles are made by the Amish in our area. Click here for more product information.
Finally, before our lesson, please sign up for our new beekeeping newsletter
LESSON 113: The Sticky Subject Of Propolis
(I’d like to thank some of our top bee experts in the country who spent time feeding me great information in preparation to this lesson. I’ve added their names at the end of this lesson.)
When we think of products from the hive we are most familiar with honey, wax and maybe pollen. But two more products from the hive are more obscure to us, royal jelly and propolis. Today, we’ll take an in depth look at propolis. Soon we’ll take a look at royal jelly.
If you have ever opened a hive of honey bees you have encountered propolis. You probably still have some on your bee suit. If you have a hive that produces copious amounts of propolis then you know what it’s like to fight gummed up frames and lids. Caucasians bees are known as excessive propolizers.
Propolis is sticky and it makes hive inspections more challenging. If you work your hives bare handed like I do, then you know what it feels like at the end of the day to have your fingers coated with propolis. All the dislikes aside, I love the appearance and smell of propolis. Each year I scrape off propolis and keep a ball of it handy to use in our queen rearing operation, to help set the cell cups and bars tight in position.
What Is Propolis And Where And How Do Bees Gather It?
Bees gather propolis from plants and trees such as the poplar, alders, birch, willows, and conifers. Trees and plants produce a sticky resin to protect their buds against bacteria and fungus. The makeup of propolis varies depending on the plant source, and therefore varies from region to region and colony to colony.Particular foragers are assigned the task of gathering propolis. Since propolis can only be gathered when it is pliable (between 77 and 113 degrees F), foragers gather it on warm, dry days. They fly out to the plant source, then use their mandibles to scrape off pieces of plant resins.
They pass the propolis from their mandibles to their forelegs, then to the inner surface of the middle leg or basitarsus. Here the propolis is packed into their pollen basket or corbicula on the back leg. When the foragers returns to the hive loaded with propolis, they go to the area of the hive where it is most needed.
Since they are unable to remove the sticky substance themselves, nearby house bees remove the propolis. The propolis foragers may even perform a dance to communicate to other foragers where the propolis is located, including robbing it from old abandoned equipment if it is sticky enough.
How Is It Used In The Hive
Propolis is undeniably the bee’s glue, sealing cracks, smoothing over rough wood and used to encase foreign objects too large to carry out of the hive. Bees have been known to kill mice inside their hive and since they cannot remove the mouse due to its size, they encase it in propolis so that the decaying mouse cannot spread disease. Notice in this photo how the bees have used propolis, here a bright reddish brown color, to smooth out the wood grain on a frame.
Bees coat much of the inside area of their brood nest, especially in more natural habitats such as trees and Warre hives that have rougher surfaces in the hive. When I remove colonies from homes, I always find that the bees have coated all the wood in their colony with a layer of propolis mixed with their own wax. We often find this even in traditional Langstroth’s hives over time, especially frames and lids. Here’s a picture I took showing how the bees have varnished the surroundings of their hive in a house.
Tests are being conducted to see if coating the insides of hive boxes improves the overall health of the colony. Many people are now recommending that we score or scratch the smooth service of the insides of our hives, forcing the bees to add propolis as they would in a natural hive in a tree. Bees also add wax to comb to give it strength. It is believed by some that house bees use propolis to polish brood cells between brood cycles.
We now sell Warre Hives made of cedar which is smooth on the outside but rough on the inside. This entices the bees to varnish the inside of their hive with propolis possibly launching a stronger defensive against various pathogens now on the rise. Click here for more information on our Warre hives.
It has also recently been discovered that bees will imprison small hive beetles in propolis jails by trapping SHB with walls of propolis. Unfortunately, every time we open a hive we release small hive beetles from their propolis jails, and even if we didn’t, the beetles have learned to rub their antennas with the bee and trick the bees to feed them while in jail.
More than a substance to seal openings and cracks bees need propolis in the hive for the overall well being of the colony. With over 180 different compounds, it is the colony’s chemical warfare against various pathogens. It is antiseptic, antifungal, antibiotic, antibacterial, antiviral, and antimicrobial. Beyond being used as a medicated sealant there is still much more to learn about propolis and how the bees use it in the hive.
Propolis is from the Greek words pro (before) and polis (city). Ancient beekeepers observed the wall of propolis the bees built at their entrance to protect the “city”, their hive.Last year I noticed how some of my mating nucs were sealing down their openings so small that only one bee at a time could pass through.
In the late 19th and early 20th century, comb honey production was at its peak, and beekeepers did not want comb honey darkened with excessive travel stains from propolis. Queen producers responded by raising queens whose colonies gathered very little propolis. Larger beekeeping operations found propolis to be a bother, slowing down hive inspections and honey harvesting. Yet, recent research reveals this was not a good idea because it has recently been found that bees benefit from propolis in the hive. We may have accidently removed an important part of the colony’s defensive mechanism.
How To Harvest Propolis From The Hive
Propolis can simply be scrapped from frames, lids and hive boxes. When I harvest propolis in this manner, I am careful not to also scrape up bee parts, paint or wood into my propolis. It can be filtered out, but it saves me time gathering the purist of propolis.
Another way propolis is harvested from the hive is by placing a propolis trap inside the hive. The propolis trap is plastic and flexible and placed inside the hive near the top. Since bees like to seal out drafts and light, prop open your top slightly above the propolis trap and this will encourage the bees to place propolis in the trap as a way of sealing off the top opening. Then, once filled, you can remove and freeze the trap, flex it and the frozen, hard propolis will fall off the trap. Propolis is soluble in alcohol. Click here for more info.
I placed a piece of cardboard on the bottom of a top cover to add some insulation to an overwintering colony. I left it on in the spring and summer and the bees plastered it with propolis. The bees did not like that it was corrugated and attempted to smooth it out with propolis. Click on the image to enlarge.
Health Benefits Of Propolis
Propolis is being studied extensively for its health benefits to humans, even with the AIDS virus. The health benefits may date back as far as Old Testament times as Jeremiah 2 may be referring to propolis as the balm of Gilead. Many people give strong testimony as to the health benefits of propolis in helping with colds, sore throats, wounds, pimples, ulcers, burns and even cancer. Some people can be allergic to propolis and too much can be toxic, so always consult your doctor before using propolis. Many health stores sell various propolis supplements and even Colgate makes a tooth paste with propolis that is said to promote healthier gums.
Acknowledgments:
In preparing this lesson on propolis, I learned so much. Most of the information on propolis was easy to research. But, in one area I hit a wall. I’ve always heard that house bees coat or polish brood cells with propolis between brood cycles. But as I read through books and literature I could not find a definite citation proving bees coat or polish brood cells with propolis. I found several websites that support the idea, but just because a website mentions something does not lend enough support. I contacted my friend and bee expert Jon Zawislak, at the University of Arkansas Extension, a fellow EAS certified master beekeeper and he flooded me with propolis papers and research, but he could not find a solid citation for house bees using propolis to coat brood cell linings. I then contacted David Tarpy, at North Carolina State University. He could not find an answer for me off the top of his head and said he would mention it to the world renown authority on propolis, Mike Simone-Finstrom. Mike was kind enough to flood me with many studies and his own thoughts that there is no studies verifying the use of propolis to coat individual cells between brood cycles. Jim Tew also sent me his extensive thoughts on whether bees add propolis to brood cells as did Diana Sammataro, and Keith Delaplane. Clarence Collison, who writes a column in Bee Culture went out of his way to scan and email me many pages on propolis. Jerry Hayes, the American Bee Culture Classroom answer man also gave me his feedback too. Thank you all!
We all know bees polish cells in preparation for the queen to lay an egg, but is it truly propolis that is used in the polishing stage? I think it is safe to say that it is believed that housecleaning bees coat the insides of their brood cells with propolis between brood cycles.
Thanks for joining us for another beekeeping lesson from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. We appreciate your business, so please give us a call to let us help you enjoy beekeeping to the fullest.

David and Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
Here’s our contact information:
PHONE AND ORDER LINE: 217-427-2678 WEBSITE: www.honeybeesonline.com
STUDIO BEE LIVE PODCASTS: www.honeybeesonline.com/studiobeelive.html

LESSON 112: HOW TO EXTRACT HONEY FROM A HIVE (www.honeybeesonline.com 217-427-2678)

2011-11-24T20:05:00.001-06:00

Hello everyone! We’re David & Sheri Burns, husband and wife duo and beekeeping gurus. Where else will you find a better looking couple to help you become a great beekeeper? If good looks aren’t enough, look at how hard we work to put the best bees and best products in your hands. If that’s not enough what about David being one of only two EAS certified master beekeepers in Illinois. Thanks for letting Long Lane Honey Bee Farms be the place that meets all your beekeeping needs.

We get lots of emails from people that tell us they’d rather order from us, a small, family bee business and we appreciate it so much. Your continued loyalty and business ensures that we’ll be around for a solid future. So whether you need bees, queens or equipment, please think of us first. Call us at: 217-427-2678 or order from us online at: www.honeybeesonline.com

Today’s lesson is all about honey extraction. Just how do you remove the bees from the super before you take it off? How do you know when the frames are ready to be removed? How much honey can a hive produce on average? We had lots of questions this fall regarding honey harvest so we thought we’d write a lesson about it. We want to help you get the most honey possible and with the most ease as well. But before our lesson today….

Sheri and I love to ride our motorcycles and this fall we squeezed in a few trips. Sheri and I started dating when Sheri was 14 and I was 16. I grew up on motorcycles and so I immediately taught Sheri how to ride a motorcycle in 1978. We have some nice bikes, but we’re still not ready for Harleys just yet. We are two of the most dog-gone-frugal people you’ll meet. So for now, Honda and Suzuki will have to do.

Spectacular Beginner’s Beekeeping Workshop

Mark your calendars and join us on January 21st, 2012 for our Basic Beekeeper’s Workshop at the Farm Bureau in Danville, Illinois from 9am-3pm. This class is filling up fast, but we still have openings. This is for people who do not know anything at all about bees but want to start or for those who have kept bees for a year or two but want to be trained by a certified master beekeeper.Click here for more information.

A NEW MONTHLY NEWSLETTER FROM LONG LANE

We are now producing a FREE monthly beekeeping newsletter sent directly to your email. This will be in addition to this blog/lessons. Our new newsletter will contain articles, pictures and featured articles from entomologist and bee experts. Sign up now by following the below link. You can safely unsubscribe at anytime.

Join Our Monthly Beekeeping Newsletter

For Email Marketing you can trust

Our daughter Karee will be 21 in a few months and she is such a great help in our business. She’s answering the phones now, answering questions and taking orders. Karee is a master queen producer so she knows bees and how to work hives. Feel confident in her advice and answers. If you stump her, she’ll send you over to me. So be sure and give Karee a warm hello when you call in. Her name is pronounced like Marie but with a K…Ka-Ree. Sheri and I, being the free spirited people we are, made up her name out of the blue. It fits her well because she is a very independent and confident young woman. If I didn’t own this place, I would call up Karee and order anything just to have the privilege to talk with her. Karee is dating a young man that our family thinks is great too! Jesse Marsh has helped out a bunch with our business and he started with two hives this past spring and took off tons of honey from his hives this year! Maybe I should move my hives to his place, he’s sitting on a hotspot of honey production.

We are also very proud of our middle son, Seth. He’ll be 18 this Saturday. He’s a very hard worker. He’s our main builder now, building hives and special items like queen mansions, WINTER-BEE-KINDS, slatted racks etc. He helps us with package bees each year, but he has always wanted to be a Marine. So this year, he worked hard, passed his tests and has been accepted. We’ll have him around until he leaves July 23rd 2012. I guess he decided 3 months of Marine boot camp was easier than working around here!

We are now selling 3 lb packages either to be shipped or to be picked up from our farm.

If you’d like to order a 3lb package with queen to be shipped to you via USPS CLICK HERE

If you’d like to drive to our bee farm in central Illinois to pick up your 3lb package with queen, CLICK HERE

Please, drive out and pick your bees up if you can. If you live within 8 hours of us, it will probably be worth the road trip. If you cannot make the trip, we’ll ship them to you.

Our WINTER-BEE-KIND boards have been a smashing hit! Why not give one a try. It’s all one piece and contains insulation, pollen and 5 pounds of prepared sugar and Honey-B-Healthy, plus an exit/entrance slot in the top that helps with ventilation as well. They can be installed any time, even on cold days. Click Here For More Info

With only 30 days until Christmas it’s time to order that special someone a Hive Kit! We have a whole page of special kits with or without bees and hive kits includes free shipping through this month. CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFORMATION ON KITS.

Or here’s a great Christmas idea…We now have available special E-Gift Certificates from our website. You can click on our E-Gift Certificate and your special someone can go online and buy whatever they want. Click here for more info

LESSON 112: EXTRACTING HONEY FROM THE HIVE

So many of our first year customers extracted honey from their hives their first year. This is somewhat unusual. We tell most customers not to expect much their first year because the colony is using a large portion of their incoming nectar to produce wax. It takes 8 pounds of nectar to produce 1 pound of wax. However, their second year, after their comb is built more incoming nectar can be stored in honey supers. But, if all conditions are right, a first year hive can produce a large surplus of honey.

Let me take you step by step through the whole process of taking the honey out of the hive all the way through to putting it in the jar.

MAKE SURE IT IS CAPPED (RIPE)
Honey bees ripen nectar by removing the moisture and when the moisture level is to their satisfaction, they seal it off with wax, like putting a lid on a jar. This prevents the honey from drawing any additional moisture.

You must be patient and wait for the bees to cap the honey comb before you remove it. If you remove the super of honey prior to it being sealed your moisture level in the honey will be too high and could cause the honey to ferment which will cause your customers to complain and want their money back. So do not remove the honey combs until all frames are completely capped. If you pull out the frames prior to the caps being completely sealed, you can leave the frames in a room with a dehumidifier for a day or two and it will draw out moisture.

REMOVE THE BEES OUT OF THE SUPER

There are several ways this can be accomplished and no single way is better. It’s simply a matter of what fits your style. So here are the most common ways:

a) Brush the bees off each frame.

I did this when I first started with bees. I’d walk out to the hive with 10 frames in a medium super and I’d take two top covers. I would lay the first top cover on the bed of my truck upside down. Then, I would place my empty super into the top cover. Then, I would take out the 10 empty frames and set them aside. I would remove one frame of honey at a time, from the hive and brush the bees off, then place it in the empty super in the truck. I would place my second top cover on the super box to prevent robbing. I would repeat these steps until I had brushed all the bees off all 10 frames. I would then place the new frames where I had removed the frames filled with honey to allow the bees to start drawing out the foundation.

b) Blow the bees out of the super.

As our operation expanded I would load my air compressor into my truck with a generator to run it. I would open up a hive, and set the honey super on top of the hive on it’s front side. Then I would use my air compressor to blow off all the bees. The bees would land out in front of the hive and go back into the hive. This is the method that still works best for me.

You can use a leaf blower if you do not have an air compressor.

c) Use bee escapes which allow the bees to exit but not re-enter. Featured below are the three most common bee escapes, the triangle, conical and Porter escape.

The triangle bee escape board goes under the honey super and bees leave, but find it impossible to go back in through the maze.

Conical bee escapes work the same way, as this board goes under the super and the bees exit the small, red conical tubes but can re-enter. The side pictured faces down.

This Porter escape was invented by Mr. Porter in 1891 and fits into the inner cover oval hole. Bees exit but cannot re-enter.
Be aware that once these devices remove all the bees from your supers, the small hive beetle now has free reign throughout your honey supers. If you live in areas where SHB is well established, which is about everywhere now, you may be wise to use escape boards sparingly.

FUME BOARDS

Another common method to get the bees out of your super is to use a fume board. a fume is placed on top of the super with a little chemical poured onto the fabric on the fume board. This chemical has many names, but it’s either Butyric Acid or Benzaldehyde which is a chemical that the bees do not like nor does any human who hates the smell of vomit. The bees run out of the super to get away from the bad smell and the super is empty within 5 minutes. If the beekeepers spills some on their clothes, they can empty out the nearest coffee shop in 5 minutes too! Many love this easy method. I'm skeptical of the product being absorbed into the wax or honey and having an overall effect on the hive. However, smarter people than me have reassured me that these chemicals quickly evaporate.

HARVEST FOR DIFFERENT TYPES OF HONEY

Honey from specific flowers does have a different taste. I would not begin to describe the difference but believe me it is different. Here's how to harvest specific honey. Essentially you must remove your honey supers after that particular flower stops giving nectar, and place new supers on before the bees change to a different source. This way, the honey will not be mixed from different sources. Of course, some mixing may happen, but you'll get more of the type that had the largest nectar flow.

Here’s a picture of a frame that has a combination of light honey, and dark honey in the same frame. Sometimes a honey super may have contained a small amount of brood, but it appears more in the center in a circle starting at the bottom center of the frame.

Although this frames contains honey from two different sources, the dark honey is too small to extract separately so the two are combined. If you were going to enter your light honey in a contest, you should avoid a frame like this because the darker honey will darken the overall appearance ever so slightly.

HOW MUCH SHOULD YOU FILTER YOUR HONEY?
Here's a picture of Jesse using a hot knife to cut off the cappings. We sell “hot” electric uncapping knives as well as cold uncapping knives. Notice what the sealed area looks like. The capped area is white because the newly made wax is a bright color at first. As it ages through the years it becomes darker.

Once the comb is uncapped, the honey can be extracted. If you do not have an extractor, a frame can be left upside down to drip out over night. This method requires a warm/hot room, atleast 80 degrees. Let one side drain, then reverse so that the other side of the frame can drain as well. You can squeeze or crush out the honey from the comb, but this destroys precious drawn comb that you could reuse and it mixes in too much wax with the honey.

Once uncapped, place your frames in an extractor and spin the honey out. You can purchase a very simple plastic extractor for just over $100 but a more common extractor is a stainless steel hand crank 2 frame extractor for just over $300. This is our best seller. If you can afford a little more, then a 4 frame extractor does 4 frames at a time.

Once the honey is extracted out of the comb it collects in the bottom of the extractor which has a value on the bottom. At this point, you can bottle it, although you'll have pieces of wax, bee legs and wings and other things that came off your frames. So most beekeepers strain their honey. Straining is different than filtering. We use a 400 micron strainer. These might be referred to as filters, but they are really strainers.We sell a lot of these nylon strainers that fit down over a 5 gallon bucket. These strainers are $8 and can be washed and reused over and over again. The honey flows very fast through these strainers and important elements of the honey are allowed to stay within the honey but foreign particles are strained out. Filtering honey usually involves warming the honey and pushing it through very fine commercial filters. Some larger processors heat their honey and filter every grain of pollen from the honey so that the country of origin cannot be traced. In other words, there are some flora sources unique to particular countries, and pollen is often tested from imported honey so that illegally imported honey can be stopped. As a result, a large amount of honey purchased in larger stores has no traces of pollen. This is very unfortunate, which makes many of us suspect that America is still importing illegal honey. Read the entire story…

We are okay heating honey to 90-95 because often the internal temperature of the hive is maintained at these temperatures. However, flavor and some nutrients are lost at temperatures above 140 (f) Honey does not need to be heated to be pasteurized. It is a pure and natural product and the only raw food that never spoils. It does not need refrigerated and can be kept at room temperature forever without spoiling.

We like our honey to be free of air bubbles. So we allow our honey to sit after it has been strained. It sits for at least one week. Then we bottle it. Our settling tank allows all air bubbles to float up to the top. Then we drain from the pure honey at the bottom of the tank. You can do the same in a 5 gallon bucket with a valve on the bottom which we sell too.

Most honey will become hard, known as crystallized. This is normal and does not mean the honey is bad. It means it simply crystallized. This can be remedied simply by leaving a jar in warm water or using a mildly heated double boiler.

A CLEAN HONEY ROOM
Keep a clean honey room. One drop of honey on the floor soon gets tracked all over the place. It is a messy job, but fortunately honey cleans up easily with water. So, after you are finished harvesting your honey, clean up all your equipment.

Since honey is a natural product and all you are doing is bottling it, there are very little guidelines in most states. Check with your state and county for honey preparation. Here in Illinois, we passed legislation in January so that beekeepers can bottle up to 500 gallons of honey without inspections and permits. Since you will be giving away your honey or selling it, here are some common practices you should follow.

Wear a hairnet, clean clothes, keep your hands clean and properly wash all equipment including bottles. Use good judgment.

BOTTLING HONEY
Bottles are expensive. We use a combination of glass and plastic bottles. Many of our customers enjoy the small well liked teddy bear bottles. Bottles must be cleaned well and dry, free of any foreign objects and dust.

A common bottle for us to sell is the quart jar. Most of our customers buy the one quart size and the traditional canning jar with canning lid is very cost effective.

Thanks for joining us for yet another beekeeping lesson. With Thanksgiving just over, you’re probably thinking about Christmas presents. Why not surprise that special someone in your life with getting them started in beekeeping. Or if you want to tell the one buying the gift what to get, have them click on our hive kit link.

Here’s our contact information:

PHONE AND ORDER LINE: 217-427-2678
WEBSITE: www.honeybeesonline.com
STUDIO BEE LIVE PODCASTS: www.honeybeesonline.com/studiobeelive.html

LESSON 111: Top 7 Myths of Natural Beekeeping (Long Lane Honey Bee Farms 217-427-2678)

2011-10-25T11:10:00.001-05:00

Hello friends, from David and Sheri Burns at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in central Illinois. How are you?

Hello to our friends and fellow beekeepers and hello to all of you who are brand new to the idea of becoming a beekeeper. We are here to help you save the honey bee. One out of every three bites of food is from the pollination of a honey bee. We need our honey bees, and every hive that we keep means more bees pollinating gardens, crops and fruit trees. Do your part to help this effort by keeping honey bees, not to mention the health benefits of pure, raw honey from your hive! In today’s lesson I want to talk about the 7 Myths of Natural Beekeeping. Before I do, I have some important information to share…

Thanks so much for joining us for another beekeeping lesson. We hope you’ll consider making a purchase from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. We need your business. Buy a hive or two from us. Check out out hive kits below. Attend one of our classes. Your future business helps us raise our family, enjoy life and pay bills. Your donations helps us continue our work and research on the honey bee. These lessons are free and will provide you with as much if not more information than you would find in a $30 book. So if you are so inclined to make a $30 donation so that we might continue these lessons, CLICK HERE TO DONATE $30 Thank you in advance.

We are NOW TAKING ORDERS FOR PICK UP FOR 3lb Packages of Bees with queen. Pick Up will be around the second week of April, but order now! They sell out fast. CLICK HERE TO ORDER ONLINE

The packages that we ship will go on sale online Tuesday Nov. 1st, 2011

Last year we sold out of packages in 90 days, so do not delay!

(You can click on the images to enlarge)

We’ve met some wonderful people at our two most recent classes these past two weekends. We taught a basic beekeeping class and a natural beekeeping class. We meet some of the best people in the world! At our natural class we talk about how easy it is to be a natural beekeeper whether you use Langstorth, Top Bar or Warre Hives.

Dustin Copass is our resident natural expert, especially with top bar hives. We now carry the top bar hives that he builds. Here Dustin is demonstrating how to work a TBH, how to handle the frames and how to extract honey.

We also demonstrated the Warre hive and how to use it at our Natural Beekeeping class. Look at this Warre hive and you can see the beauty of the cedar as well as the unique quilt box filled with sawdust and with burlap attached.

We are also now carrying Warre hives built from Cedar that we get from our local lumber yard. While top bar hives have gained significant traction, Warre hives are starting to gain traction in popularity also. I’ll be writing a future lesson on the differences of these hives.

Today’s lesson is on natural beekeeping which can be accomplished in any hive.

Before our lesson today, we want to proudly introduce our hive kits for 2012 which is only a few months away. 2012 is election year and we are using an election theme for the names of our hive kits. We have 4 hive kits: Pioneer Kit, Independence Kit, Liberty Kit and Freedom Kit. We are now offering these kits with packages of bees.

We are a hard working American small business, a family business pursuing our dreams. Each of us should count it a privilege to live in America and to have our independence, liberty and freedom. All eyes will be on the election of 2012, and with the election and the economy dominating 2012 we all need a getaway hobby or maybe a way to potentially make extra money. We encourage you to elect beekeeping! Click on the images below to find out more information on our special hive kits which also include a full 3lb package of bees (with queen). The bees will ship out in April or May. FREE SHIPPING THOUGH NOVEMBER.

With only 61 days left before Christmas, these also make great Christmas gifts!

THE FREEDOM KIT---
This is our most complete kit. We always suggest starting with two hives. This kit comes with 2 completely assembled and painted hives, 2 3lb packages of bees with marked queen and all the supplies! Click here or on image to order. FREE SHIPPING

THE LIBERTY KIT--
This kit comes with one hive and one 3 lb package of bees with marked queen and supplies. This Liberty kit differs from the Freedom kit in that this kit only has one hive and one package of bees. FREE SHIPPING. Click here or on the image for more info or to order

THE INDEPENDENCE KIT--
This kit is a starter kit for those whose budgets are tight. You can buy additional boxes to add to the hive as the bees grow. This hive comes with one hive body and one package of bees and supplies. Click here or on the image for more info or to order.

THE PIONEER KIT--
This is a TOP BAR HIVE kit, complete with a top bar hive, 1 3lb package of bees and supplies such as a hat, veil, smoker and hive tool. Even if you already have a hive, why not try out a top bar hive! Yes, you can extract the honey. We enjoy ours. It’s been a lot of fun. What a great Christmas gift for someone you love that may already have traditional hives.

LESSON 111: Top 7 Myths of Natural Beekeeping

What does natural beekeeping really mean? Simply put, it means to keep bees naturally. Hobby beekeepers are quickly moving over to more natural beekeeping and to most this means little to no chemicals in the hive. Larger operations such as commercial and migratory beekeepers find that chemicals are essential to the success of their operations.

Years ago, we made a commitment to not use chemicals on our bees and instead focus our attention on raising queens that tend to be better survivors. It’s painful at first, but eventually pays off.

I’m a little bothered by saying I’m a natural beekeeper even though I do not use chemicals. Why? Because a truly natural hive is one that is in a hollow tree in the middle of a forest, or a hive in a tropical climate. Certainly we have learned to take really good care of bees in our boxes in our environment and in some cases we have saved colonies that may have died out on their own, from various pests and diseases. My point is that there are various levels of natural beekeeping.

An important part of natural beekeeping is natural comb, that is, allowing the bees to build their own comb without foundation. Ultimately, regressing bees (aka smaller bees) enter into the discussion and I promise to address this in a future lesson but not today.

Sheri and I have a beekeeping philosophy that we’ve embraced:

What we are doing is leaving the bees alone to a great extent, to do their own thing, in their own time, in their own way—as much as possible while we ask them to stay in OUR environment, in OUR boxes, and to share their resources with US.

This is about as natural as we can get. You may choose to be even more natural or you may choose to be less natural, maybe using some mite treatments here or there.

To help explain what natural beekeeping is or isn’t, we’d like to share our Top 7 Myths of Natural Beekeeping:

1. All natural beekeeping can only be done in a top bar hive.

This is not true. Especially if you are wanting your bees to make their own wax without foundation. This can be accomplished in any type of hive. In a Langstorth hive, let the bees build their foundation simply by not putting foundation in the frames. Police their growth carefully to prevent the combs from being built in the wrong directions, through the frames instead of on the frames.

2. When bees are allowed to make their own beeswax, it is and remains chemical free.

True and false. Studies have shown that at first new comb is chemical free, but over time, wax may have slight traces of beekeeper’s chemicals, carried in by drifting bees from hives where beekeepers are using chemicals or just from the environment. We recommend replacing your oldest comb. Each year remove 3 of your oldest frames of comb and let them build new comb.

3. Organic means that the final product (honey) from a top bar hive is more pure than honey from a Langstroth hive.

4. Natural, sustainable beekeeping means I will not have pests and diseases in my hives.

Pests and diseases are part of nature. However, preventing, reducing and getting rid of pests and diseases is workable in any type of beekeeping operation.

5. You can’t harvest honey from a top bar hive.

It is very easy to harvest honey from either a TBH or a Warre hive. Certainly not as easy as a Langstorth, but still not difficult.

6. You can’t overwinter in a top bar hive.

Healthy bees overwinter well provided they have enough pollen and honey in store for winter.

7. You can make money on a commercial level from natural beekeeping.

Certainly money can be made from a top bar or Warre hive, but not on a commercial level. Langstroth’s hives transport and stack nicely and the ability to change boxes is a big plus. However, most people do not keep TBH for commercial reasons but for enjoyment, pollination and a little honey on the table.

There are so many ways to keep a strong colony by using Integrated Pest Management techniques and holding off on chemicals.

We ship 3 lb packages of bees with marked queens. These will go on sale online on Nov. 1st but will not ship until April or May.

We are now selling online, 3 lb packages with queen. These are for pickup at our place only, in April 2012. These sell out fast, so order by clicking here.

Thanks for joining us for Lesson 111.

Our next two classes are coming up in January:

Basic Beekeeping January 21, 2012 Click Here

Advance Beekeeping February 11, 2012 Click Here

See you next time!
David & Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
Fairmount, Illinois
217-427-2678

www.honeybeesonline.com

Winter Preparation: Candy Frame Feeder

2011-10-06T00:41:00.001-05:00

Hello from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms! We’re David & Sheri Burns and we are hard at work gearing up for the 2012 beekeeping season. It is shaping up to have tremendous interest, especially more and more new beekeepers getting in line to buy equipment and bees. Already some equipment is becoming harder and harder to get due to demand. We are so excited!

We are also excited about a new product that we just had to share with you. We’re known for our candy boards and our Winter-Bee-Kind boards. Now, we’ve got another exciting product to help feed your bees this cold winter. It’s a candy frame. Take a look:

It’s the same size as a deep frame but it is full of candy and pollen for the bees to eat during winter. There is a 2 inch hole in the center of the frame to allow the winter cluster to move through for more efficient feeding and warming.

ORDER NOW FOR $19 plus $10 for shipping. Click here for more information.

This is a deep frame candy board. There is candy on both sides of the frame just less than 1" thick on each side. We recommend two of these frames to be placed in the hive prior to December 21st. It must be warm enough outside to pull frames (60 f or above). Place one candy frame in the center of each deep hive body. As the cluster moves upward it can draw nutrition from the candy and pollen on the candy board frame.

These candy frame feeders work great alone or with our Winter-Bee-Kind boards as well.

Give your bees alittle help to have a better shot at not starving this winter.

ORDER NOW FOR $19 plus $10 for shipping. Click here for more information.

LESSON 110: HOW TO PREPARE A WEAK HIVE FOR WINTER (www.honeybeesonline.com 217-427-2678)

2011-09-28T00:02:00.001-05:00

Proverbs 24:13 “Eat honey, my son, for it is good; honey from the comb is sweet to your taste”. Hi, we are David and Sheri Burns from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in central Illinois. We know that you are reading this because of your interest in beekeeping. Thank you for choosing us to help you become a successful beekeeper! Please allow us the opportunity to provide all your equipment needs as well as your bees and queens!

For readers joining us today who are thinking about getting started in beekeeping, we have developed a special page just for you, to help answer fundamental questions on how to get started. CLICK HERE HOW TO BECOME A BEEKEEPER

In today’s lesson I want to address a very common question, especially this time of the year. This question is mostly asked by people with more than one hive. Beekeepers with two or more hives often observe that one hive can be weaker than another, and may not be building up as well. They wonder if they should combine it with a strong colony or re-queen and feed it heavily in the fall. So, I thought this would make a great lesson. Before I get into today’s lesson, take a look at this photo.

I know it may look like another ordinary egg in a cell. Something is different. Obviously, the base of the cell does not look shinny and clean. It’s not. This egg was laid in a cell that was half full of pollen. I noticed it while grafting.

Why would a queen lay an egg in a cell with pollen? Since it is half full of pollen the cell does not have enough room to allow the developing bee to pupate. To me, it appears the pollen bed was actually manipulated toward the center to accept the egg, as the center appears smooth. So I’ll keep you posted on what becomes of this egg. If it is made into a queen cell, then it will be a staggering discovery.

This is the sort of work that we are constantly doing here at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms, watching for new clues and trying to unlock so many honey bee mysteries that have not been solved. I want to say a special thank you to those who made donations from our last blog. Your donations affords us the opportunity to continue to investigate the mysteries in the hive and to use that information to write better lessons. If you’ve been thinking about making a donation in appreciation of these free lessons, click here, and thank you in advance.

SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS:

I spoke at the Three Rivers Beekeepers Association this month, led by John Timmons. I spoke on Sustainable and Natural Beekeeping. This is an outstanding beekeeping association. They treated me great, and even made me an honorary member of their club awarding me with an official metal name tag!

Sign up for our upcoming classes.
Basic Beekeeping Oct. 8th (Saturday) Danville, IL 9-3pm (FULL-SOLD OUT) Our next Basic Beekeeping Course is Jan. 21, 2012. This is a popular class, so sign up early to secure your seat! Click here for more information.

Natural, Organic and Sustainable Beekeeping Oct. 15th, (Saturday) Danville, IL 9-3pm. 6 seats left! Click here for more information.

We have our entire roster of 2012 beekeeping courses now online at: www.honeybeesonlinecom/classes.html Our popular classes are: Basic Beginning, Advance Beekeeping, Queen Rearing and Natural Beekeeping.

EXCITING NEW EDUCATIONAL OPPORTUNITIES

We are currently putting the finishing touches on holding classes online. This is one of the most requested items from our customers who live too far away to attend our classes. These LIVE Webinars of our classes are going through the testing stages this week so stay tuned.

Also, we will be recording our four popular classes and placing them on DVD for those who cannot attend. These DVDs will be made available for our following courses: Basic Beginner, Advance, Queen Rearing and Natural Beekeeping. We are excited to enter into the production stage of these new classroom DVDs.

The State of Illinois should be proud of a new initiative designed to improve queen stock. The Illinois Queen Initiative is made up of beekeepers throughout the state who share ideas, stock and nucs for better queens. Many of you in other states enjoy the queens we produce on our farm, and we are happy to be part of the IQI. Join us for our IQI meeting on October 1, 2011 at the Farm Bureau building in Bloomington, Illinois. EAS certified master beekeeper Kent Williams from Kentucky will be our keynote speaker. This year, all of our queen rearing courses here at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms were filled to capacity. If you attended one of our classes or not, you are welcome to join us for this IQI meeting. Cost is $15. You can arrive and pay at the door but it wouldn’t hurt to contact Carolyn Gerberding (217) 498-8307 cboy8307@aol.com and let her know you’ll be joining us.

Finally before our lesson begins, I want to suggest you watch a very disturbing documentary on honey bees by Dan Rather. This documentary points the finger at the EPA mishandling a farm chemical that may be contributing to Colony Collapse Disorder and other reasons bees are dying each winter. Here’s the link:

http://vimeo.com/29419200

LESSON 110: HOW TO PREPARE A WEAK HIVE FOR WINTER

This lesson will answer the following questions: What is considered a weak hive? What causes a hive to become weak? What action should be taken to strengthen a weak hive going into winter?

WHAT IS CONSIDERED A WEAK HIVE

While some hives are easy to identify as weak, other hives might be only marginally weak. Often it is easier to identify a weak hive when the beekeeper has other hives to compare it to. So let’s consider what we would look at to qualify a hive as “weak.”

1) Number of adult bees
2) Amount of sealed and open brood
3) Amount of pollen, nectar and sealed honey
4) Queen’s laying pattern
5) Diseases and pests
6) Number of drawn comb

Colonies in the south require fewer bees and food resources to survive the shorter winter season. However, in the north, the colonies require more bees for warmth and insulation and more stored food resources (honey and pollen) to feed on during the longer winter seasons. Depending on where you live, you will need to adjust your evaluation somewhat.

First, number of adult bees. Let’s not get too technical here. We want to see lots of bees in an established hive, preferably, bees covering both sides of every frame. Of course, there will be fewer bees in the hive during foraging hours, so examine the hive prior to or after foraging hours (10am-5pm).

Secondly, there should be an ample amount of sealed and open brood. Here is an image of sealed brood. New beekeepers may confuse sealed brood with a frame of sealed honey. Here’s some difference: Sealed brood is sealed with a dryer looking wax capping, almost like velvet or fabric in appearance. Honey is sealed with wax that looks wet or lacking texture. If you’re still in doubt when examining your hive, use a toothpick to examine what is below the capping. You’ll know immediately whether it is filled with honey or a pupating honey bee.

A strong colony consisting of two deep hive bodies will have a total of 10 or more frames of sealed and open brood in the hive, usually at least 5 frames in each deep box. These brood frames will always be located in the center of the hive box. If a hive only has one or two frames of brood in each hive body, it is a weak colony and something is wrong. Keep in mind that the queen reduces laying during extreme heat and when the days begin to shorten in fall and winter.

Thirdly, a strong colony will have sufficient nectar, honey and pollen stored in combs. Since a strong colony will have 10 frames of brood, and some of these frames contain open brood, lots of resources are needed to care for young developing brood. A weak colony may only have 1 or 2 frames of pollen. A strong colony will have 4 or more and the same is true with nectar. But keep in mind that these resources will usually be shared on the same frames with brood. Often bees will make a rainbow appearance on a frame, with the brood being in the center, pollen next and nectar/honey on the outside edges of the frame. This all must be taken into consideration when assessing the content of a hive. Rarely is the brood, nectar and pollen on separate frames.

Fourthly, evaluate your queen’s laying pattern. A well mated queen should quickly lay a beautiful laying pattern. To evaluate our queens we use a brood vitality test. Pull out a frame of sealed brood and identify a section 10 cells by 10 cells. Now count the number of open cells within this 10 x 10 cell square. Subtract the open cells from 100 and this is your brood viability. Usually, 85% and higher is acceptable, but you may want to select your own criteria.

Fifthly, check for diseases and pests. Strong colonies control pests and diseases much better than smaller, weak colonies. For example, a strong colony will not allow wax moths to destroy the hive. They will kill moths and carry out wax moth larva. Strong colonies are much better at controlling small hive beetles as well.

When Small Hive Beetle (SHB) and wax moths are present, the colony is usually very weak. Diseases can also spread in a weak colony because fewer bees in a colony means fewer bees that could be controlling the disease.

Lastly, how many combs are drawn out? This depends on the time of year. A new colony will have to draw out all new comb. If spring is wet and cooler, very little comb will be drawn. Colonies will draw comb out best during a heavy nectar flow. A healthy colony may be misdiagnosed as a weak hive simply because of poor weather conditions. Once conditions improve, the colony may pull out comb in a matter of weeks.

WHAT IF I TRULY HAVE A WEAK HIVE?

Usually there are two options available when faced with a weak hive. First, it can be combined with a stronger colony. Be sure there are no pests or diseases in the weak hive before you combine it with a strong colony. Otherwise, you might weaken the strong colony by combining. When combining hives, pull out the queen in the weak colony and lay sheets of newspaper on the top of the strong colony, just above the frames of the brood nest. Poke a few holes in it so that the bees between the two opposing colonies will gradually become familiar with each other, as they eat through the newsprint.

A second option is to strengthen the weak hive. This means that you will need to feed the weak hive. Do not use an entrance feeder as this may entice robbing. Instead use a frame feeder or a top feeder. Try to feed pollen as well. If the hive is weak going into winter, be sure the queen is good and then begin to feed the bees two parts sugar to one part water. Continue this feeding regiment until the hive becomes strong with more brood and more stored food.

There is really no advantage to nursing along a very weak and small hive. It will only attract pests and diseases. If you combine a weak colony to a strong colony in the fall, you can always divide them in the spring, giving the split a new queen.

TIP OF THE DAY: Do not leave a queen excluder in an overwintering hive. The colony may move above the queen excluder and strand the queen to freeze to death below. And, never leave a partially filled medium super on an overwintering hive. Only leave the super on top if it has a minimum of 7 frames of sealed honey, otherwise the colony may move up but quickly run out of food.

EMERGENCY FEEDING: In the event that your weak hive goes into winter, but runs out of food, we suggest you use one of our WINTER-BEE-KIND boards that feeds the bees, provides insulation of the top to reduce moisture and allows trapped moisture to escape through the top. Order our Winter-BEE-Kind board by clicking here.

LONG LANE HONEY BEE FARMS PRODUCT SPOTLIGHT!

Last year one of our most popular items was our Silver Kit. One complete hive along with all the supplies. The hive is assembled and painted. Click here for more information. This makes a great Christmas present and Christmas is only 89 days away. Are you ready??

Thanks for joining us for another lesson in beekeeping. We’d love to hear from you and hopefully peak your interest in beekeeping. Feel free to contact us at:

Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
14556 N 1020 E. Rd
Fairmount, IL 61841
217.427.2678

LESSON 109: Small Hive Beetle (217) 427-2678 www.honeybeesonline.com

2011-08-04T19:03:00.001-05:00

Hello we are David & Sheri Burns from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in Central Illinois! Although 2011 was a huge year for new beekeepers, it will pale compared to what’s in store for 2012 based on emails and phone calls we’ve already received. We hope that experience beekeepers and new beekeepers will make Long Lane Honey Bee Farms your single beekeeping supplier. We sell hives, bees, queens, wooden ware, protective clothing…everything…even Warre hives and now Top Bar Hives. Visit our online store at: www.honeybeesonline.com

As I write lesson number 109 on the small hive beetle, I can’t believe that it will soon be fall. Where did the summer go? Here at our farm we stay so busy during the summer that time gets away from us. Our bees worked hard all summer in preparation for winter and I hope they have done their job. Winter is still several months away, so the bees will enjoy a couple of months of fall foraging on asters and golden rod.

Sheri and I have been busy with speaking engagements and interviews. A few weeks ago we had an FFA (Future Farmers of America) school class tour our apiary and right after that Lori Casey and Kate Pleasant of Heartland Highways came out to film our farm for a future Heartland Highways show to air this winter. It will air on PBS and RFD-TV.

Sheri and I will be speaking in Chicago tomorrow Saturday Sept. 10th at the Morton Arboretum. Click here for more information. Come join us.

And I’ll be speaking on Sustainable and Natural Beekeeping at the Three Rivers Beekeepers Association in St. Louis the evening of Sept. 19th. CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFO.

Our mating yards are doing great producing queens and hopefully we’ll continue selling queens through the month of October. Feel free to call us if you need a queen: 217-427-2678

Now that it is late into summer most beekeepers will be harvesting honey, a great time to be aware of the small hive beetle. In today’s lesson we’ll learn about the SHB and ways to combat this pest. Before we do, let me tell you about a couple of courses we are offering in October.

Fall is the time to take a beekeeping course, and in October, Sheri and I are offering two courses which still have openings but are filling up fast. Both courses are held on Saturdays in Danville, Illinois at the Vermilion County Agricultural Center (Farm Bureau Building)which is only a few miles from our house but allows us to hold larger classes.

Our first class is October 8th, from 9am – 3pm and is a Basic Beginner’s Course. This is for those who either know nothing about beekeeping or those who have been keeping bees 1-2 years. Click here for more information.

Our second class is a new one for us to teach:

SUSTAINABLE, NATURAL AND ORGANIC BEEKEEPING COURSE
Saturday October 15, 2011 9am – 3pm
LOCATION: Vermilion County Agricultural Center
Danville, IL

This is a special class for several reasons. First, you can take Part One in the morning by itself, or take Part Two in the afternoon by itself, or take both!

This class will be held in Danville, Illinois at the Vermilion County Agricultural Center, Saturday October 15th, 2011. Part one will be held from 9am - Noon and Part two will be held from 1pm - 4pm. There are several places to eat lunch near by. Part 1 will deal primarily with how to keep bees naturally.

Part 2 will deal primarily with explaining how natural beekeeping can be accomplished in traditional Langstroth hives as well as Top Bar Hives and Warre Hives. We will have a TBH (Top Bar Hive) full of bees at the location for demonstration on how to manage a TBH. We will also have a Warre hive on display (without bees) for demonstration.

This is also a special class because it is very difficult to find natural, sustainable and organic beekeeping courses. Most beekeeping classes duplicate the same known beginner info over and over. Haven’t our bees had enough chemicals? Isn’t it time to think outside the box? Shouldn’t we become better stewards of the bees? Tell your friends!

Here’s how to register now:

TAKE BOTH THE MORNING AND AFTERNOON CLASS AND SAVE $10. To take both Part 1 and 2, click here

If you only want to take Part 1 where we will give an overview of natural, sustainable and organic beekeeping just in the morning from 9am-noon, click here

If you only want to take Part 2 in the afternoon where we will give demonstrations of a real Top Bar Hive with bees and a Warre hive without bees and various management techniques, click here

LESSON 110: SMALL HIVE BEETLE – YOU GOTTA LOVE ‘EM
(All small hive beetle and sap beetle photos in this lesson are provided courtesy of my friend Alex Wild. Alex is a biologist at the University of Illinois where he studies the evolutionary history of various groups of insects. He conducts photography as an aesthetic complement to his scientific work. Be sure to look at his honeybee photography at: www.alexanderwild.com

Today, I’d like to teach on the small hive beetle. We’ll take a look at: What does it look like? Where did it come from? What does it do to a hive? How to check for it. What to do to help prevent it and how to reduce their numbers.

Summer is the time to take special precautions in dealing with SHB especially since this is the season to remove and extract honey supers. Small hive beetles are waiting for you to make a mistake so they can take over your supers in and out of the hive. SHB can ruin your honey and destroy your colony.

HOW TO RECOGNIZE A SMALL HIVE BEETLE

The SHB has has the typical clubbed antennas but can retract all appendages. When you become familiar with identifying the SHB you’ll easily recognize it if you see one in your hive. So become familiar with these great photos.

There are lots of beetles in our world. Around the hive, especially when using entrance feeders, sap beetles can help themselves to the dripping sugar. Some people cannot tell the difference between sap beetles and small hive beetles.

The sap beetle to the left is different than the SHB above and below this photo. The sap beetle has a noticeable white mid section whereas the SHB is one solid dark color, appearing dark brown or black.

Typically the SHB is about the length of a cell in the comb around 5 mm. When you open your hive by removing the inner cover SHB will scurry quickly across the top bars of frames to flee from the light. Adult beetles like to hide down in a cell when exposed to light.

WHERE DID IT COME FROM? The small hive beetle is officially called Aethina Tumida. It is native to Africa but entered the US in the late 1990s. Since that time it has crippled the beekeeping industry mainly in southern states that have longer tropical summers.

Another challenge in identifying SHB is knowing the difference between SHB larvae and wax moth larvae. This photo shows that the SHB larva (bottom larva) has numerous spines along the body as well as three distinct pairs of legs. The wax moth larva (top larva) lacks spines and has an additional four pairs of short, less developed prolegs. Both SHB and wax moth can be found in a hive at the same time. (Larvae photo from the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences webpage)

HOW DOES IT EFFECT A HIVE? It flies into the entrance of a hive and lays eggs. The larvae feed on pollen and honey and defecate when eating honey and a slimy mess is left in the hive, even fermenting and ruining all honey. The larvae exit the hive and enter the ground around the hive to pupate, then emerge from the soil as an adult SHB capable of flying 5-12 miles to find a weak colony. A severe infestation can even cause the bees to abscond, that is, to totally leave the hive.

HOW TO CHECK FOR SHB. The practical way to check to see if you have SHB is to lay your top cover upside down on the ground. Then place your honey super or top hive box flat inside your top cover and smoke the box. Now, lift it out of the top cover quickly and see if any small hive beetles are left in the top cover. They are fast, so have your hive tool ready to smash them. Smashing them with the blunt end of the hive tool is the best natural treatment :)

HOW TO PREVENT AND REDUCE SHB

Since SHB seeks out weak and distressed hives, keep your colonies strong and healthy. SHB can also be reduced through trapping and keeping the apiary and honey house clean.

NEVER…cut out stray comb and throw it on the ground.
NEVER…leave honey supers or frames laying around.
NEVER…give your bees more space than they can patrol in the hive.
NEVER…place colonies in full shade as beetles love shady areas. Place hives in full sun when possible.

If you live in an area heavily infested with the presence of SHB be very cautious in using bee-escapes as a means to empty bees from your honey super. As the bees are trapped out of the super, the beetle can have unprotected free-range of the super. A bee escape is a small plastic gadget with small metal pieces that is placed in the oval shaped hole in an inner cover. The inner cover is then placed under a super allowing the bees to walk out of the honey super, but not back in.

If you do have beetles and suspect that eggs are on your frames, freeze honey supers for 24 hours to kill all stages of SHB.

There are many traps available: West Trap, Freeman Trap, Hood Trap, Cut Beetle Trap, AJ’s Beetle Eater, and Sonny-Mel Trap. These are very effective at reducing overall SHB infestation in the hive. When you have a severe infestation, a ground drench is often suggested. Permethrin as a ground drench that will kill the pupating SHB in the soil. Sold as GardStar, mix 1 teaspoon (GardStar 40% EC) into one gallon of water. Carefully follow label directions and precautions. It is toxic to you and your bees if misapplied. Do not use a sprayer as the vapors can kill bees. Instead use a watering can. Drench a two foot area around and under the hive to adequately kill SHB beetle larvae entering the soil.

INTERESTING FACTS ABOUT SMALL HIVE BEETLES:
First found in South Carolina in 1996.
SHB will not hatch when humidity below 49%.
SHB vector diseases such as Deformed Wing Virus.
Attracted to stressed hives and other beetles.
Attracted to bee alarm pheromones.
Females lay 4,000 eggs a month for 2 months.

LIFE CYCLE OF SHB:
Egg 19-24 hours
Pupae 5-14 days (Soil temps must be 70-80 to survive)
Adult 100-540 days.

Now for the pep talk. SHB are everywhere. Do not panic when you see them in your hive. It does not mean you are a bad beekeeper or that your hive is ruined. Not at all. Look at beetles as just another insect in the insect kingdom. Learn to keep bees among the SHB. It means keeping a better eye on your bees and modifying your management styles, but it will be okay.

Thanks so much for joining us for another beekeeping lesson. We hope you’ll consider making a purchase from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. We need your business. Buy a hive or two from us. Our completely assembled and painted hive is only $199. Click here for more info. Attend one of our classes. Your future business helps us raise our family, enjoy life and pay bills. Or consider making a donation so that we might continue our work and research on the honey bee. These lessons are free and will provide you with as much if not more information than you would find in a $30 book. So if you are so inclined to make a $30 donation so that we might continue these lessons, CLICK HERE TO DONATE $30 Thank you in advance.

David and Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
www.honeybeesonline.com

LESSON 107: When And How To Add Supers In The Summer (www.honeybeesonline.com) 217-427-2678

2011-07-10T20:04:00.001-05:00

Hello from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in central Illinois where the weather is hot and the bees are hard at work. We are David and Sheri Burns, beekeepers helping beekeepers.

As a note of correction and clarification from our last lesson, it takes 8 pounds of honey to produce 1 pound of wax.

In today’s lesson, I’ll walk us through some tips on when and how to place honey supers on the hive during the summer.

Before we jump into lesson 107, I want to let you know that we had such a great time at the Heartland Apicultural Society conference at Vincennes University in Vincennes, Indiana. Finally, a regional conference within 2 hours of our home. Sheri taught a class on honey extraction and I taught one on summer management. It was nice meeting many of you there! If you missed this opportunity, do not despair. Mark your calendars for July 25-29 in Warwick, RI for the Eastern Apicultural Society conference. I’ll be there and can’t wait! Click here for EAS registration information.

QUEENS, QUEENS, QUEENS FOR SALE!!

We have nice mated queens available for sale. We are shipping queens out this Tuesday and Wednesday (June 12- June 13). You can order your queens online by clicking here. Or give us a call after 8:30 am on Monday June 11th. 217-427-2678.

LONG LANE CLASSES

Here at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms one of our specialties is offering classes on beekeeping. We offer basic beekeeping classes several times a year. The next basic beginner’s class is coming up Saturday, October 8th, 2011. This will be a perfect time of the year to take a class to either sharpen your skills or to prepare for keeping bees next year. Sign up now!

We also offer advance beekeeping courses as well.

Two Day Queen Rearing Course. We now have moved the location of our queen rearing course to the Farm Bureau building in Danville, Illinois. This will allow us room for more students and we have permission to place hives on the property for hands on demonstration. Sign up now for our two day queen rearing course July 22-23 (Friday- Saturday). Queen rearing has caught on like a wild fire. So many people are learning how to raise their own queens either to save the expense of buying queens, or to make money selling queens. Sign up now. Feel free to call to sign up during business hours 217-427-2678.

Sheri did another great job hosting the extraction class on Friday night July 1st. She gave a great PowerPoint presentation on the history of harvesting honey and then I took the class out to a hive and demonstrated ways to remove the bees then rob the honey frames. We then had students uncap the frames of honey and took turns spinning or extracting the honey. We strained and bottled the honey as well. Lots of fun.

Watch our newest YouTube video below on our new Top Bar Hive. If you cannot view it below CLICK HERE

Remember to watch for Sheri in Country Woman magazine due out in the stands this week. Our queen rearing operation is featured in this edition of this national magazine (Aug/Sept edition). Or read a condensed version online.

Before we began today’s lesson on when and how to add honey supers in the summer, I would like to spotlight several items that we are proud to sell. Remember, when you buy from us you are helping us pay our bills, offer these free lessons and to be here for you tomorrow.

Since today’s lesson is about putting on honey supers, make sure you have enough supers ready for your honey harvest! Our 10 frame, rabbet joint honey super is fully assembled, painted and includes metal frame rests, 10 wooden frames and plastic foundation sprayed with beeswax. Click here to order yours now.

Queens! At the HAS meeting I heard that throughout the country the average production life of a queen is between 12-18 months. Make sure you have a new queen going into winter. I suggest queens be replaced between June 21 and early fall. A new queen will lay eggs that will become your overwintering bees. And a new queen is likely to have a stronger queen substance which might help reduce spring swarming. Click here to order a new queen ready to ship this week.

LESSON 107: When and How To Add Honey Supers In The Summer

Most beekeepers are hoping to take off some honey from their hives. Honey has become a precious commodity. Prices for raw honey have soared through the roof. In most places, beekeepers can name their price and sell all the honey they can produce.

I want to give you a few tips today on maximizing your honey production. This comes through these proper summer management techniques: 1) Strategically supering the hive 2) Mite and Disease control and 3) Maintaining a Prolific Queen.

In this lesson we’ll talk about strategically placing supers on the hive. A good practice is to over super (placing several honey supers on a hive) in late spring and early summer and to under super (limit the number of honey supers used) during late summer and early fall. Why?

Over super in late spring and early summer because studies have shown that the more supers are on the hive in the spring, the more the bees will be motivated to go out and forage. And two or more supers on will make sure you have plenty of room for a harvest. However, in late summer and early fall, it is best to reduce the number of supers because at this time of the season the bees are consolidating their resources in preparation for winter. They are likely to transfer honey from a super above down into the brood nest area.

How and when to add supers?

When 6-8 frames in the existing box on the hive has been drawn out (the bees have added wax, built comb and are using the comb) then add the next honey super.

How? The challenging aspect of adding a honey super is ensuring that the bees will draw out the comb on the frames. Some beekeepers have the luxury of adding already drawn comb, but most have to use undrawn foundation. A common mistake is to add a new, undrawn honey super on top of a queen excluder. This can be a mistake and slow or halt the progress of the bees from ever moving up into the honey super.

So when your second deep hive body has 6-8 frames drawn out, place your undrawn honey super on as follows:

1) Spray all frames with 1:1 sugar water containing honey-b-healthy (follow the label). Make sure the sugar water has covered the frames well and is slightly dripping down off the new frames in the honey super.

2) Leave the queen excluder off for now. Place the honey super on and wait a week. In one week, examine to see if the bees have worked their way up into the honey super. You will likely see some progress. Keep checking every 3-5 days and when you see that 2-3 frames have been started, you can now add your queen excluder, but check first to make sure she is not up on the frames in the honey super. If she is, pick her up by her wings and set her down between the frames in the top deep.

3) Place on the queen excluder with the cross-ribs facing down. Place several supers on if it is early to mid summer. Use minimal supers if it is late summer to early fall.

It is better to have too many supers on than not enough. However, if you see lots of small hive beetles in your hive, you may not want to over super as this will provide extra and unprotected space where the bees are not monitoring, giving freedom for SHB to spread.

TOP SUPERING OR BOTTOM SUPERING

This terminology refers to adding a new super on top of an existing super or under the existing super. In other words, when your first super is almost full of nectar, should you add your second honey super below that super or above it.

This is a matter of opinion. Some bottom super because they feel the bees will have to walk through the new super to reach the one they were working. And while passing through the new one they will stop and pull out the wax. Others, like me, want a honey barrier and so we will use our first full honey super to serve as a honey barrier. By honey barrier I am referring to the limitations placed on the queen because she will not lay eggs in a cell which has honey in it. The queen is only looking for empty cells to lay eggs. When she reaches stored honey on the outer edges of the brood nest area, she will return to the area of opened cells.

I leave the super just above the brood nest area full of nectar to hold down the queen and therefore I do not have to use a queen excluder. I place my new super on top of my nearly full super. This is known as top supering.

Thanks for joining us today! Feel free to contact us:

Website: http://www.honeybeesonline.com

Call us: 217-427-2678 Mon. – Thu 8:30am – 4: 30pm Central Time (Closed Fridays)

LESSON 106: Festooning & FoxNews (LONG LANE HONEY BEE FARMS 217-427-2678) www.honeybeesonline.com

2011-06-24T15:41:00.002-05:00

Welcome to Long Lane Honey Bee Farms, we are David & Sheri Burns with a passion to help others become beekeepers, and a compassion toward honey bees.
WE WANT TO HELP YOU KEEP HONEY BEES!!
In today’s lesson, I’ll take a look at honey bees festooning. To me it is almost as much fun to watch bees festoon as it is to say the word, festoon. But before we get into today’s lesson, we’ve had lots going on around the apiary!

FoxNews was here for a whole day on Thursday doing a story about the rapid increase in honey prices. It was really fun for us to hang out with the news team. They brought a large satellite truck from Chicago and several others, like reporters and producers and a sound tech.
Their goal was to produce some “teasers” live, and then to have 3 live segments on beekeeping. The rain held off and the bees were very cooperative.

They installed a small camera in one of our Top Bar Hives and they called it the honey cam. They ran large cables and set up a couple of satellite dishes and wireless antennas for camera and mics…our farm has never seen such technology!
The fellow setting up the honey cam never wore a hat or veil and never got stung. In fact, the only person that was stung was the camera woman. That’s pretty common because those large cameras are black with a huge black fuzzy bear like mic cover and cameras usually give off a vibration which the bees can detect. She took a sting on the arm, but took it like a beekeeping pro.
The interviewer was Jeff Flock, a well-known reporter who actually worked and help start CNN. Jeff was amazed that he could touch bees and not get stung.

They were reporting on the rapidly rising price of honey, showing that it’s gone up about 11% and may continue to climb due to the stresses placed on producing honey.
I always welcome the opportunity to promote beekeeping nationally. I was on FoxNews a couple of years ago with Nel Cavuto talking about bees, so this was another fun time at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms! There are two archives of the live broadcasts:
Click here for the first broadcast Click here for the second broadcast
And, we were featured in Country Woman Magazine in their August/September edition which is due out any day, so watch magazine stands and get a copy of this 4 page article on how we raise queens! Look for the cover to the left for the magazine that we are in.
This was another great opportunity to promote beekeeping in a national magazine as this magazine has a annual circulation of over 3 million!
Many people have asked us where they can find Country Woman Magazine, and it’s available in bookstores, farm stores and most places that sell magazines.
But if you can’t find the magazine, you can read a condensed version of the article online. The article is called, Bow To The Queens (Illinois bee farmers raise royalty for hives nationwide. )
This Saturday join me at the ISBA summer meeting! For several years I have served as the president of the Central Eastern Illinois Beekeeper’s Association and our local association is hosting the summer meeting of the Illinois State Beekeeper’s Association. Wow! We have a great day in store. Great speakers such as May Berenbaum, Jon Zawislak, Larry Bergman, Paul Tenczar and a visit to the new Pollinatarium. Sign up now at: www.ceiba.us or just drop in. 9am-4pm Saturday June 25th.
Then, July 7-9, Sheri and I will be sharing at the Heartland Apicultural Society conference at Vincennes University in Vincennes, IN. Come join us by visiting the Heartland Apicultural Society’s Website.
We also have several spots open for our 2 day queen rearing course July 22nd-23rd. Join us by clicking here.
LESSON 106: Festooning Of The Honey Bee
The word festoon usually relates to flowers or fabric that is loosely linked together with ribbon and is extended between two points. So when we say that bees are festooning, we mean that they are linked together by hanging on to each other’s legs forming a long line or bee web, sometimes extending the full size of a frame.
To teach a lesson on this, I researched why bees festoon. I found several speculations, but more serious research reveals that the reason for festooning is somewhat unknown. Some claim that bees festoon in order to build new comb or to pass along wax scales, certainly that is true. Some research found that bees build as much comb and produce as much wax without having to festoon.
Worker honey bees are able to build wax combs because of their wax glands on the underside of their abdomen. Bees between 12-18 days old secret wax scales from these glands. The last four visible sections of the abdomen secret these wax scales, two on each side, making a total of 8 small oval wax chips. But here’s the catcher! In order for bees to build comb they have to produce lots of wax scales AND in order to produce lots of wax scales they must consume large amounts of honey or nectar. Bees must eat about 8 ounces of honey to then be able to produce 1 ounce of wax.
Due to a cold and rainy spring and a late start to summer, our bees are far behind on wax building because they have not been able to fly and gather as much nectar. The less incoming nectar, the less wax can be made and the less wax, the less combs are drawn out. The less nectar, and wax, the less the queen is fed, and the less she will lay. The entire colony’s progress is stunted. And to really build comb nicely, it must be hot, not cool outside. So hot, dry days with lots of flowers to forage on makes a healthy, growing hive of honey bees. Anything short of that and the colony will suffer.
The entire process for a bee to remove 1 scale from it’s abdomen and manipulate it and attaching it to the comb takes 4 minutes.
Normally, bees do not need fed after sufficient natural nectar sources are available. However, during poor weather, feeding bees 1:1 sugar water can help compensate for a lack of nectar or rainy, cool days when bees cannot fly and gather nectar.
Thanks for joining us for another popular lesson on beekeeping from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. Visit us online at: www.honeybeesonline.com or call us during our regular business, summer hours:

Mon. – Thur 8:30 a.m. – 4:30 p.m. central time
217-427-2678

Gotta run now and deal with a bunch of swarm cells. See you next time!

LESSON 105: Best Advice In Beekeeping (www.honeybeesonline.com 217-427-2678)

2011-06-17T09:21:00.001-05:00

Hello from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in central Illinois. We are David and Sheri Burns, beekeepers helping beekeepers enjoy beekeeping. Thanks for joining us today for our 105th lesson in beekeeping.

Long Lane Honey Bee Farms is a family operated beekeeping farm business. Rather than being a large box store or warehouse of parts, we are a hands on, personal beekeeping business/farm. Folks who return to do business with us do so because they like the personal and friendly atmosphere and the accessibility of information through a master beekeeper. And since we have less overhead as a family farm business, we can offer great pricing.

Check Out Our Completely Assembled And Painted Hive! Save $20 if you order between June 18 – 21, 2011. Call in with code or ORDER ONLINE NOW.
We have not raised our price on our completely assembled and painted hive this year! It’s the same price as last year. When comparing pricing, be sure to see what type of frames are included and if it is assembled or painted. If other places do not paint their hive, that might cause you another $25 for a gallon of paint and a lot of labor. We want to earn your business! Keep a spare hive on hand to split your hive or for a captured swarm.

We are knee deep in our queen operation and we’d love to sell you a queen. We have another batch of great queens we are shipping out this Monday and Tuesday (June 21st-22nd) This batch will sell out fast. To purchase a queen from us, visit: www.honeybeesonline.com/queens.html.

In today’s lesson, I’m going to give out the best advice possible to make your beekeeping endeavor as successful as possible.

Before we start today’s lesson, let me tell you that we have been very busy the last few months. Beekeeping has carried us across many states recently and last weekend I enjoyed teaching a basic beekeeping course at Heartland Community College in Bloomington, Illinois. They are already booking two more courses, another basic class as well as a more advance class. I am so amazed at the number of people that continue to enter into beekeeping. This Saturday I’ll be offering my Advance Beekeeping Course, but sorry, this class is sold out. The following Saturday, June 25th is another great beekeeping conference in Champaign, Illinois. For several years I have served as the president of the Central Eastern Illinois Beekeeper’s Association and our local association is hosting the summer meeting of the Illinois State Beekeeper’s Association. Wow! We have a great day in store. Great speakers such as May Berenbaum, Jon Zawislak, Larry Bergman, Paul Tenczar and a visit to the new Pollinatarium. Sign up now at: www.ceiba.us

Then, July 7-9, Sheri and I will be sharing at the Heartland Apicultural Society conference at Vincennes University in Vincennes, IN. Come join us by visiting the Heartland Apicultural Society’s Website.

We also have several spots open for our 2 day queen rearing course July 22nd-23rd. Join us by clicking here.

LESSON 105: BEST ADVICE IN BEEKEEPING

While beekeeping is easy, it can go much better when you are armed with knowledge and experience. But, we all start out lacking some degree of knowledge and experience that only time can bring. During those early years when we are trying to figure things out, we make mistakes or fail to manage our hives correctly. Often, beekeepers do not want to admit their mistakes or neglect and want to blame the bees, the weather or point the finger at having been sold a poor queen or package.

For example, recently I have become more uncomfortable using marked queens. I don’t mind marking them…it’s kinda fun. But, off and on over the years I’ve heard beekeepers suggest that a mark on the queen might cause the queen to be viewed as having a infirmity. Thus, they might replace her. I can’t say I’ve seen that. Occasionally the queen is missing, but how can I be sure it was because she wore a blob of paint on her thorax?

Beekeepers like to have marked queens. Why? For selfish reasons of course. We want to find her faster and easier. But, does a farmer paint his female cows? There are some things about being a beekeeper that we just have to learn, develop and improve upon as we gain more experience, and finding the queen is one. I have not found any research to prove that a marked queen is more quickly superseded, but I hear that often. One thing that I have noticed is that the queens retinue, those bees surrounding the queen, work at trying to remove her marking. This bothers me greatly. Instead of feeding her, and allowing her lay continually, bees are picking at her marking. Twice I’ve noticed this activity caused her thorax to cave in. Though we do sell marked queens upon request, I don’t run marked queens in my hives, simply because queens are not marked in nature.

So I have narrowed down my best advice I can give into two:

1. Take responsibility for the welfare of your bees.

Certainly you can rely for a while on fellow club members, these lessons and books. But when it comes down to it, you have to know your hive and the biology of bees well enough to make decision which are best for your bees. If your bees aren’t building up fast enough, should you move them to a place that has better nectar sources? Should you feed? Maybe you need to requeen.

I was inspecting my hives yesterday and became concerned that several hives showed low pollen and honey stores for this time of the year. If I choose to do nothing, brood will diminish. So I will have to decide if I should feed them, or wait to see if a flow will pick up soon. Or I can choose to do absolutely nothing. But if my decision results in my bees not building up good, then it’s my responsibility. My management style determines the welfare of my bees. If a provider gives me a package, nuc or a queen, I cannot blame them for poor stock if my management style is poor.

When you see or don’t see mites, but you have them, you have to make a decision if you are going to do something or not. We have to accept responsibility of our choices. If we have mites, and choose to do nothing, our hives are less likely to build up or survive the winter. Our management style caused our hive to die in the winter.

2. Keep A Strong Colony!

As I travel and attend various conferences on beekeeping, I keep hearing over and over that keeping strong colonies is the answer to everything, and I believe that to be true! Strong colonies keep out small hive beetles, wax moth, and many other pests and diseases. But, let a colony become small, and the battle begins. Beekeepers are responsible for colonies becoming small. For example, if a queen fails, the beekeeper should quickly identify that and take immediate action. Discovering a failing queen too late now means the colony is failing.

If a beekeeper allows a colony to replace a queen that was accidently killed or a queen that simply failed, then it will take 30 days for the queen to emerge, mate and start laying. That’s 30 days without new brood. A queen lays around 2,000 eggs a day, so in 30 days, a decision to let the bees requeen the hive lost 60,000 bees! You could have purchased a queen and maybe only lost a week of laying instead of one full month. To keep a colony strong the beekeeper must always have a very strong queen in the hive.

It’s not uncommon for beekeepers to struggle at keeping hives strong. With today’s challenges it takes extra care, attention and work to keep colonies strong. There are several basic requirements in order to keep strong colonies:

1) Keep varroa mite levels down. As beekeepers, we must take responsibility and become aggressive in keeping mite levels down. Green drone comb, screen bottom boards, powdered sugar dustings and briefly removing the queen to break the brood cycle are non-chemical approaches to controlling the varroa mite. Formic acid is becoming an effective treatment if conditions call for the use of chemicals.

2) There must be an ample amount of a variety of nectar and pollen within 2 miles of your colony.

The more nutrition and variety of nutrition available to your bees, the healthier and stronger they will be. Of course the weather must cooperate in order for the bees to be able to forage and gather nectar, but there is little the beekeeper can do about that.

3) The colony must have a very prolific queen at all times.

With queens mating with 15-20 drones, no one can control genetics to the point of making a perfect queen. We can certainly improve upon certain qualities, but we must continually monitor our queens and replace them the minute they start to fail.

4) The colony must have room to expand into additional frames preferably, drawn comb, as opposed to undrawn foundation. This is another important aspect of beekeeping…knowing when to add additional frames for the bees to expand onto. If too many frames are given too soon, the bees seem to stall and not expand. However, if additional frames are not given soon enough, the bees can become crowded and congested and swarm, thus greatly reducing the numbers in the hive.

Finally, I’ve created a FREE inspection sheet for you to use when inspecting your hives. It’s a .pdf file that you can download and print off as many as you need. Use this inspection form to gather and use information on each hive to help you make good and responsible decisions on what to do next.

Thanks for joining me today or lesson 105. Remember you can have these lessons arrive in your Inbox of your email FREE. And as always, you help us greatly when you tell others about these free lessons and about our business. We appreciate it.

David and Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
www.honeybeesonline.com
217-427-2678

LESSON 104: Slatted Bottom Racks (217-427-2678 www.honeybeesoline.com)

2011-06-03T00:13:00.001-05:00

Hello, we are David & Sheri Burns from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms, beekeepers helping beekeepers. We are a family business and spend our time manufacturing beekeeping equipment, producing queens and holding classes on beekeeping, advance beekeeping, queen rearing and more.

These free lessons are a big hit within the beekeeping community. So, please help us pass this site on to other folks who would enjoy learning about beekeeping on a regular basis. These lessons can be sent right to your Email inbox--FREE. Sign up now!

QUEENS AVAILABLE TO BE SHIPPED TUESDAY AND WEDNESDAY JUNE 7th and 8th. ORDER NOW BY CLICKING HERE These queens are marked and mated. We only ship UPS Overnight. If you were a queen, you’d want to be shipped overnight too. You can order online, or call Sheri on Monday after 8:30am. But remember when we sell out for the week, you’ll have to wait to the following week.

We are really excited about our two day queen rearing course. We offer one day courses, but two days allows us more individual time with each student to teach queen rearing basics. Join us as we still have room. The course is July 22nd – 23rd, 2011, 9am – 3pm each day. Click here to register.

Our Advance Beekeeping Course is coming up June Sat. June 18th, 2011, 9am – 3pm. Stop repeating the same mistakes year after year. We’ll take an in depth look at these topics: Queen Rearing, Swarm Management, Pests & Diseases, Seasonal Management and weather permitting, lots of time in the hives. Click here to register for our advance beekeeping course.

And on Saturday June 11th, I’ll be teaching a beekeeping course (Community Education course) at Heartland Community College in Normal, Illinois. For more information on registration, Click on Beekeeping Course Information Here is Heartland’s Contact Info:

Heartland Community College
1500 W. Raab Road
Normal, IL 61761
(309) 268-8402
Email: Rebecca Rossi

Before our lesson today, let me tell you how much we enjoyed teaching queen rearing at the Arkansas Advance Beekeeping Workshop presented by the University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension Service. Sheri, little Christian and me enjoyed the beautiful setting.

I enjoyed working with Dr. Clarence Collison, Jon Zawislak, Ed Levi, and Yong Park. Topics included: Morphology of the Honey Bee, Honey Bee Bee-haviors Explained, Honey Bee Pheromones, Biology of Bee Breeding: Superorganism Genectics, Small Hive Beetle Management, Diseases of Bee Brood, Diseases of Adult Bees, Package Bee Production, Pollination: Biology & Contracts, Honey Plants, Marketing Your Hive Products and Honey: A Perfect Product. We also had hives set up for field work and more!

LESSON 104: SLATTED BOTTOM RACK

I’ve mentioned slatted bottom racks briefly in previous lessons, but I want to dedicate an entire lesson to this mysterious invention. When you look at it, you really aren’t sure what it is, how it works, or even how it fits on the hive. Just what is it good for?

We make these here at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms, and we cannot keep them in stock. They are challenging to build with 15 different pieces.

If you look at it carefully, you’ll notice that on one side the slates are very close to top and if you flip it over there is a larger opening underneath.

So let’s find out what all the talk is about regarding slatted racks.

It fits on the top of a bottom board just below the bottom deep hive body. Carl Killion used a similar idea to allow space for bees and extra ventilation. C. C. Miller believed in the idea but he simply made 2” bottom boards but found that the bees would build comb on the bottom of the frames to fill the extra space provided. But with a false bottom (the slatted rack), the bees are tricked not to build comb.

People are always confused which way to place these on the hive because on one side the slats are close to the top and the other side they are a over an inch away. Place it on the hive with the slats as close as possible to the frames.

The slatted bottom rack is also thought to help reduce swarming by giving extra space for bees to hang out. Those who use the racks really believe in them, and use them on all their hive. Perhaps you should try one and test it for yourself to see if there is any difference.

Some claim that since the rack keeps the end of the frame 2 inches from the opening that the queen will lay to the bottom of the deep frames.

Click here to order a 10 Frame Slatted Rack.

Please remember to have a hive ready when you get that swarm call. We are selling our popular completely assembled and painted hive so, consider having one ready by clicking here. Don’t be fooled by catchy ads that show cheaper pricing. Compare apples to apples. Our hives have two coats of exterior latex (Valspar) paint, glued wooden frames, frame rests, plastic foundation that has been sprayed with bees wax in the US and our inner covers are not thin pieces of Masonite. Instead, our inner covers are made from 1/2 plywood and have 4 vent slots cut into the rails. Order your complete hive now!

Until next time….

David and Sheri Burns
14556 N 1020 E. Rd
Fairmount, IL 61841
(217) 427-2678

LESSON 103: HOW TO INTRODUCE A NEW QUEEN AND WE ARE SELLING QUEENS THIS WEEK (217) 427-2678 (www.honeybeesonline.com)

2011-05-16T12:40:00.001-05:00

Hi, David and Sheri Burns here from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in central Illinois.

We had a great queen rearing class over the weekend with people from around the area and as far away as Kentucky and Newfoundland!

Our next queen rearing course is a two day course on July 22-23, 2011 and we hope you’ll join us.

We are excited to be selling queens again this year! We have produced and sold large numbers of queens for 4 years now and we are excited to be producing more queens this year.

We have mated and marked queens ready to ship this week. Look at the links below for the day and shipping method and click to order.

Queens shipped Thursday May 19th via UPS OVERNIGHT

Queens shipped Friday May20th 2nd Day UPS

Queens shipped Thursday May 19th via USPS PRIORITY MAIL (2-8 days)

Queens shipped Friday May 20th USPS PRIORITY MAIL

So many people are on the hunt for good queens either because a queen has died, stopped laying a good brood pattern or the hive is too defensive. These are essential reasons to re-queen. Another reason is to help your hive make it through the winter. A new queen installed after June 21st can lay like a spring queen all the way through fall, and those bees can become your overwintered bees. But when you buy a new queen, what is the best way to install the queen so that she is accepted?

In today’s lesson I’ll share with you several things you can do to help your queenless colony better accept your new queen.

LESSON 103: How To Introduce A New Queen

It can be a challenge to keep a hive queen-right. Sometimes queens are rejected even after they have been accepted. Perhaps the queen stops laying well, for example. But once the queen is no longer in the hive, the colony is queenless. Several things can happen to a queenless colony:

1) They can raise their own queen from a young larva but it can take up to 30 days for the new queen to begin laying. So you can lose up to a month of brood production.

2) If the colony fails to raise a queen, several laying workers can start laying unfertile eggs which will be small drones raised in worker cells. Those laying workers will mimic a queen making it almost impossible to introduce a new queen. Thelytoky can also occur, which basically means that sometimes a colony can raise a queen from an unfertile egg laid by a laying worker. If your hive goes too long without a queen and without brood pheromone, some workers will poorly take over the queen’s job and you’ll see drones everywhere. So requeen fast!

3) They are suppose to raise their own queen and usually do a good job, but sometimes it does fail.

Now, here are several pointers on installing a new queen in an existing hive where the queen cannot be found.

1) Look for eggs. Make sure you do not have a laying queen.
2) If you do not have eggs, you could have a virgin queen or a mated queen that will start laying in a couple of days. Look through your hive after 6pm to spot virgin queens. Before 6pm they might be out on a mating flight.
3) Destroy all queen cells before installing a new queen.
4) Do not remove the candy from the candy plug.
5) Only remove the cork or plastic cap that is covering the candy.
6) Hang the cage in the center of the brood nest area.
7) Do not place the open screen into the comb or the bees cannot feed the queen through the screen nor can the queen’s pheromones spread throughout the colony.
8) Some beekeepers hang the cage so that the opening faces up so that dying attendant bees do not clog the exit hole.
9) Do not remove attendants from the queen cage.
10) Wait 5 days to examine the cage to make sure she has been released. If not, open the screen and release.

Often the queen cage is held in place between frames by sliding pressure between two frames to hold the wooden or plastic cage. However, you can attach a string or thin metal such as a Christmas tree ornament hanger and attach the other end to the top of a frame to suspend the cage. Just don’t kill the queen.

If the queen cage falls to the bottom of the hive, bees will quickly cover the cage. Use your curved in of your hive tool to pick it up, shake the bees off and re-install.

Thanks for joining us for another lesson!

David & Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
14556 N 1020 E. Rd
Fairmount, IL 61841
217-427-2678

www.honeybeesonline.com

LESSON 102: Adding Hive Bodies & Supers At The Right Time (217) 427-2678 www.honeybeesonline.com

2011-05-13T20:54:00.002-05:00

Hello from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in Central Illinois. We are David & Sheri Burns. If this is your first time to stop by, welcome and you’ll grow to really like us.
We are an everyday, hard working family desiring to make a living from our bees. We are fun natured and likeable. So get to know us more and you’ll be glad you did.
We have such great customers who continue to express their gratefulness for all that we do. Here’s some recent feedback from our customers:
Dear David -
My husband and I would like to thank you for the delivery of the Italian queen for his hive. She arrived today, and she is in the hive. We will be sure to tell our beekeeping friends the great service we received from your company.
Thank you, Pam
Thanks for putting me on the late list and telephoning me personally when you had extra bees. You are the greatest! Just the few tips you gave me will make all the difference in the world with this new batch.
Thanks so much for your superior customer service,
Anita
Thank you. Please take this opportunity to support our FREE online beekeeping lessons by placing an order with us. We sell all beekeeping equipment and our big sellers this month are: fully assembled and painted hives, queens, slatted racks, green drone comb (varroa traps) and fully assembled supers. A few years ago we were some of the first to sell fully assembled and painted equipment. Now almost all other companies are doing the same but at a much higher cost. For example, two other companies sell their assembled and painted deep hive bodies for 61.00 and 52.50. We sell ours for $45. So take advantage of our great savings.
This week was really a special week for us, especially Sheri and Karee. Ann Kaiser, Contributing Editor at Country Woman Magazine spent Monday and Tuesday at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms to do an article on our queen bee operation. Ann writes an article for each edition called Editor in the Country, focusing upon unique agricultural niches.
It was so fun having Ann here for two days. Sheri has read Country Woman for a couple of decades so Sheri was so thrilled to have Ann here! Ann even marked someone’s queen that we shipped out. The article will appear in Country Woman in the Aug/Sept issue of Country Woman. It was a fun two days! To read more about those two days, visit Sheri’s Sweet Life blog.
Queen requests are off the charts. We are shipping out queens like I’ve never seen before. Some new customers have identified that there seems to be a shortage of queens and that some companies are sold out. Not us, we are fully stocked, grafting is going well and we are in full swing. The weather has finally improved and finally the bees are working hard to make up for lost time.
We hope to double our queen production this year and even Sheri is out there helping us graft and taking care of the mating nucs.
Raising queens is so much fun and we’re glad to see the queen rearing season finally here. If you’d like for us to train you how to raise queens, come to our two day queen rearing course, Friday-Saturday July 22-23, 2011.
Because we have increased our queen production, you can now order your queens online. Pick your dates and shipping options!
It was a very rough spring for beekeepers here in the Midwest and north. Cold weather lingered on with lots of cold nights and rainy days. Because we are also nuc producers we were forced to work our new nucs in the rain, trying to get food to them during those times when the rain trapped them in the hive for days. Small splits will die if they become too cold. Food in the hive helps them generate heat so we prepared bags of sugar water and placed them in the hive under an umbrella, using a super as a spacer to surround the bag of sugar water.
Before today’s lesson let me remind you that we have invaluable classes on beekeeping coming up in the next few weeks. Classes include Queen Rearing, Advance Beekeeping, Basic Beekeeping, Honey Marketing and many more. Visit our website for all upcoming classes.
LESSON 102:Adding Hive Bodies & Supers At The Right Time
Just when is the right time to add the next hive body or super? This is very important in order to control swarming and to hold down the spread of pests. New beekeepers as well as experienced beekeepers can make big mistakes when it comes time to add another box. So let me walk you through some sensible advice.
Bees love to be crowded, but not congested. Heavily populated colonies are always healthier colonies. Honey bees function more efficiently when the colony is well populated. Small colonies have an increased likelihood of struggling with pests and diseases.
For example, if you have a typical hive that consist of two deep hive bodies and a medium super, and you shook your package into those three boxes with 10 frames each, the bees would have too large of an area to protect. Wax moth and small hive beetle could gain access to the hive and lay eggs in unprotected corners.
I have found that it works best for me to make my splits in small 3 frame nuc boxes, and then when those frames are full, move them to a 5 frame nuc, then finally to a 10 frame nuc. But I do not add my 2nd deep box on until at least all 10 frames have some wax being drawn out. This allows the bees to work in a heavily populated environment but still have plenty of open cells in frames so as not to become congested and swarm.
In this picture, a second hive body could have been added weeks earlier. Although I will push my bees harder and wait till all 10 frames are started, I tell new beekeepers to add their second hive body on when 6-7 frames in the first deep are drawn out and full of bees. By “drawn out” I mean the bees have added their comb to the foundation and have extended out their comb on both sides of the frames.
Let’s talk about adding the third box, the honey super. Lots of mistakes are made here. First, add your super when 6 or 7 frames have been drawn out in the 2nd deep box. DO NOT use a queen excluder just yet. Place your super on, but without the excluder. This allows ease of access for bees to find and move up into the super to begin drawing out the comb. Once you see a minimum of 2 frames that are being worked by the bees add your queen excluder, but do so carefully.
When adding the queen excluder below a super after the bees have started drawing out the comb, make sure to inspect each frame of the super to ensure the queen is not in that super. This is very important or else you will trap your queen in your honey super and you will have a super of brood not honey. If you find that she is in your super, simply pick her up by her wings or thorax and place her in one of the deep hive bodies below.
Now place your queen excluder below your honey super (usually the third box from the bottom). When placing on your queen excluder, be sure to place the excluder with the cross wires facing down. Otherwise, queens might try to slide along the metal and slip in. Plastic excluders do not have this problem and can be place on either way.
One final tip: When placing on your second deep hive body, remove one frame from the bottom deep, preferably a frame of nectar with bees on it and place it in the new deep hive box on the top and place the undrawn frame from the top into the box below where you removed the frame of nectar. With this frame of bees and nectar now above the lower deep, the bees will more quickly get the idea to move up.
There you go, now you know when and how to add your other boxes to your hive.
Plan now to learn more! Great conferences are coming up. I’ll be speaking at the Arkansas Advance Beekeeping Workshop in Little Rock, Arkansas May 26-28, 2011. Come join us! Look at the schedule and register now! Speakers include Dr. Clarence Collison, Ed Levi, Dr. Yong Park and Jon Zawislak and I’ll be heading up the queen rearing course.
Sheri and I will also be speaking at the Heartland Apicultural Society meeting July 7-9, 2011. This is the 10th anniversary of HAS and the theme is: “Helping bees to help themselves: Breeding for healthy bees” It will be held at historic Vincennes University in Vincennes, Indiana. Cost is only $40 for three days. Registration information is now available online, so come join us by visiting them at: http://www.heartlandbees.com Big hitter speakers are lined up such as: Ernesto Guzman-Novoa, Jerry Hayes, Clarence Collison, Greg Hunt, Tom Webster, John Skinner and Larry Connor. THIS IS A MUST ATTEND CONFERENCE!!
And plan now for the Eastern Apicultural Society---simply the best. It’s geared for beginners and advanced beekeepers with two separate tracks you can chose from depending on where you are at in your beekeeping experience. Who is speaking? Think of everyone you’ve always wanted to hear…they will be there, no kidding. Click on http://www.easternapiculture.org/ Why not start working on your Master Beekeeper Certification while you are there too!
Thanks for joining us again today for another great lesson in beekeeping!
David & Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
14556 N. 1020 E. Rd
Fairmount, IL 61841
(217) 427-2678 www.honeybeesonline.com

LESSON 101: The Inside Scoop On Feeding Bees (www.honeybeesonline.com 217-427-2678)

2011-05-04T09:51:00.001-05:00

Hey there beekeepers and beekeeper wanna-bes. We’re David and Sheri Burns of Long Lane Honey Bee Farms with another lesson, and what a great lesson. Finally, answers to frequently asked question about feeding bees.

I have lots of information to share with you on feeding bees, but before we do, let me tell you of some upcoming events.

I’ll be speaking at the Arkansas Advance Beekeeping Workshop in Little Rock, Arkansas May 26-28, 2011. Come join us! Look at the schedule and register now! Speakers include Dr. Clarence Collison, Ed Levi, Dr. Yong Park and Jon Zawislak and I’ll be heading up the queen rearing course.

Sheri and I will also be speaking at the Heartland Apicultural Society meeting July 7-9, 2011. This is the 10th anniversary of HAS and the theme is: “Helping bees to help themselves: Breeding for healthy bees” It will be held at historic Vincennes University in Vincennes, Indiana. Cost is only $40 for three days. They will have registration information online anytime, so come join us by visiting them at: http://www.heartlandbees.com/ Big hitter speakers are lined up such as: Ernesto Guzman-Novoa, Jerry Hayes, Clarence Collison, Greg Hunt, Tom Webster, John Skinner and Larry Connor. THIS IS A MUST ATTEND CONFERENCE!!

And plan now for the Eastern Apicultural Society---simply the best. It’s geared for beginners and advanced beekeepers with two separate tracks you can chose from depending on where you are at in your beekeeping experience. Who is speaking? Thinking of everyone you’ve always wanted to hear…they will be there, no kidding. Click on http://www.easternapiculture.org/ Why not start working on your Master Beekeeper Certification while you are there too!

QUEENS… QUEENS… QUEENS… QUEENS… QUEENS…

We now have queens for the 2011 beekeeping season…HURRAY!!
Call now to order your queens. Help spread the word too, because as queens are in great demand and harder to find, we’re here for you and this year are set up to double our queen production. So encourage others to try one of our unique queens from Long Lane Apiaries. Call 217-427-2678 to order now. It is important to requeen your hive every 2 years and once a year if possible, so maybe it’s time!

We working our way through sending out our packages. This has consumed so much of our time. We work very hard to ensure all packages are strong, healthy and fresh before we send them out. We also have a few valuable techniques that we use to ensure our packages do well in shipment. Three of our children are out package team, our oldest son David (25), middle son Seth(17) and our youngest daughter Karee (20). They do a great job.

Next week Sheri and Karee will be hosting Ann Kaiser, editor of Country Woman Magazine. She’ll be featuring out queen rearing operation and even trying her hand at raising some of our outstanding queens. We’ll keep you posted on when the article if finally posted.

We have lots to do to spruce up the place for some great photos, and if it EVER warms up, we’ll get to work!

JOIN US FOR OUR UPCOMING CLASSES! Classes are filling up FAST! So register today to reserve your spot. Classes are held at our honey bee farms here in central Illinois. (Directions)

May 20th 6pm - 8pm BACK BY DEMAND Pest & Disease

May 6th 6pm - 8pm How To Make & Keep an Observation Hive

June 18 Advance Beekeeping Class

July 23 & 24 Queen Rearing class

LESSON 101: The Inside Scoop On Feeding Bees

I’ve written lessons on feeding bees but for some reason I’ve received enough email to know that some people do not understand how to feed bees. So, let me break it down to where it is easy to understand.

First, there are several ways to feed bees such as: entrance feeders, top feeders, division feeders(frame feeders), pail feeders and several others probably.

Which feeder to use depends on what you want to accomplish and what time of the year it is. For example, entrance feeders are great for spring and early summer but cannot be used in the fall or they will excite robbing. And, entrance feeders will freeze in the winter and when the bees cluster at temperatures below 50, the bees cannot go down to the entrance feeder.

Top feeders work well during the spring and summer and early fall, but are not to be used in cold weather as the syrup will freeze or crystalize and the bees can freeze while eating and fail to re-cluster if the temperature drops fast.

Division or Frame feeders are simply a reservoir that takes the place of a frame. They work well year round because the syrup can remain warm in the nest area. However, it requires opening the hive and exposing the bees in order to refill.

A pail feeder is a pail, it can be a purchased pre-drilled pail or you can make your own, such as the same jar and lid that is used for an entrance feeder can become a pail feeder. Here’s how it works. Simply place the pail feeder above the cluster. It can either sit on the top of frames or it can be placed above the hole on the inner cover, that oval shaped hole. Pail feeders can be used year round, but in the winter it is best to use an inner cover to hold the heat in the cluster and place the pail above the hole on the inner cover. We sell a premium inner cover that has the small mouth hole pre-cut into the inner cover to feed during the winter. Since the jar is above the cluster it usually does not freeze, but it can if really cold or the cluster is really small.

Next, a common question is how long to feed bees after installing a package. Some say that as long as bees are pulling out wax on new foundation, it is good to feed them. There is wisdom in this approach as bees do need sugar to produce wax. 6-8 pounds of honey are needed for the bees to produce a pound of wax. And it takes 500000 flakes of wax to make one pound. As the young bees consume sugar/nectar/honey, they produce wax in their wax glands under their abdomen. However, sugar is expensive and most sugar is GMO beet sugar and so we prefer to only feed new packages about two weeks. Once dandelions are in full bloom we slow down or entirely stop feeding our bees. It seems to us, that if bees are fed too long in the spring and summer they do not forage as much.

When a new package is first installed, there can still be cold spells in the north which can kill packages on undrawn comb. Drawn comb seems to provide a better way for the new colony to stay warm on a cold night. Bees produce heat by eating syrup or sugar. This year, on our small divides which we did in mid April, we made up a sugar patty and placed it on the top frames of our splits. This is made with powdered sugar mixed with just a little water to bring it to a dough consistency. These sugar patties saved the small splits.

How to mix the sugar syrup. Syrup should be mixed 1:1 in the spring and 2:1 in the fall. So in the spring, use one part water and one part sugar. No need to boil, just mix well with warm or hot water. 2:1 is 2 parts sugar and 1 part water. This is good to feed weak hives in the fall because they can store the 2:1 mixture sooner before the weather turns cold.

Thanks for joining us today. Call us today to order all your beekeeping equipment, hives, suits, woodenware, queens and more!
217-427-2678. Or visit us online at: www.honeybeesonline.com

Please be patient when calling as this is a busy time of the year for beekeeping questions and orders.

David & Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
(217)427-2678

LESSON 100: What 17 Years In Beekeeping Has Taught Me

2011-04-20T09:29:00.002-05:00

Hello, we are David & Sheri Burns from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms, sharing a passion to help save the honey bee by encouraging more people to become beekeepers. This year, we surpassed all our goals and hopes. It is wonderful to see the thousands of people who have decided to keep bees.
Sheri and I are so thankful for all our customers who have become like family to us. I’m not sure why we have such loyal and supportive customers other than our customers see that we are honest, hard working and knowledgeable beekeepers. You’re the best!
Today, I want to share what I’ve learned over the last 17 years in beekeeping. But before I start our monumental 100th lesson, let me share with you what we’ve been doing and what’s coming up.
First, thanks for the OVERWHELMING calls this morning for queens. Unbelievable!! We are sold out for the week!
JOIN US FOR OUR UPCOMING CLASSES! Classes are filling up FAST! So register today to reserve your spot. Classes are held at our honey bee farms here in central Illinois. (Directions)
May 20th 6pm - 8pm BACK BY DEMAND Pest & Disease
May 6th 6pm - 8pm How To Make & Keep an Observation Hive
June 18 Advance Beekeeping Class
June 25 Queen Rearing Class
July 23 & 24 Queen Rearing class
Every April, we make up our packages for pickup. Our package bee pick up day was a huge success, with folks coming from states away to pick up packages. We shake packages for pick up from our friend’s hives, Larry Bergman. We’ve worked with Larry for 3 years now and Larry has been prepare packages for over 30 years.
It’s always a fun time for me to prepare packages. We always have a great team of folks who have experience in preparing packages and are hard workers. So much goes in to shaking packages. An entire year goes into preparing to shake bees and it all comes to a head as we move colonies into one yard for the shake down day. Here’s a video of us shaking packages this year. I’m the fellow pouring the bees into the cages. If you have trouble watching the video in your Email version of this lesson, go to: http://youtu.be/a83c9gJPAsw

As soon as the bees are shaken into beekeeper’s hives they go right to work! Here is a honey bee that has only been in the hive several hours and already she is out, busy collecting nectar and pollen. My son Christian noticed her on a dandelion. Why in the world do people destroy dandelions? They are the first real food source to get honey bees going after long winter. As the bee flies through the air, she develops a static charge and upon approaching the dandelion, the pollen leaps off the flower and collects all over her body.
LESSON 100: What 17 Years In Beekeeping Has Taught Me
Today, I want to share what I’ve learned over the last 17 years in beekeeping. Maybe what I’ve learned can help you be a better beekeeper.
1) Do not believe everything you hear or are taught. Not everyone who is a beekeeper is an expert, though they may sound like one. Be careful to always take opinions with a grain of salt. When in doubt rely upon proven assays. There is so much wrong information out there, so keep bees based on good information.
2) Beekeepers are finger pointers. When our bees die, we do not want to blame our poor management styles, so we are quick to point the finger. First, we may blame the bee providers or queen providers as giving us bad stock. Or we may blame the weather or farm chemicals and on goes the list. Certainly, these can be the culprit. However, we must always honestly evaluate our own individual management success. Gone are the days when we could keep bees and not do much and they would be fine. Now, we have to be good managers of honey bees are they will perish.
3) Understanding bee biology helps tremendously in keeping bees. In fact, most beekeeping questions I’m asked would not be asked of me if more people knew about bee biology. So it is so important for every beekeeper to be a continual student of the honey bee. You do not have to know everything before you start, but continue to learn to be a better beekeeper.
4) I’ve learned to let the honey bee teach me. Books are great, but bees teach us so much. Bees make better beekeepers, than beekeepers make bees. So allow the bees to teach you what works best for the colony, not what works best for you.
5) I’ve learned I’m an ambassador for the honey bee. We must speak in a positive light when representing the honey bee. Do not use the “A” word (Aggressive). Instead, use the word defensive. Do not refer to the Africanized bees as killer bees. It’s best not to talk about how many times you were stung. Speak about the advantages of the honey bee instead, such as how well they pollinate our crops and the health benefits of honey!
6) I’ve learned that beekeepers are some of the best people around. I’ve learned that beekeepers are good people, kind and nice. Beekeeping demands that you too should be good too. Treat other beekeepers with respect and kindness. Do not become resentful or territorial. With all the challenges in beekeeping, we do not need to be at odds with each other. We need to work together. We are in this together. Be a good person and you’ll contribute to better beekeeping.
7) I’ve learned that the little things make me a better beekeeper. The Bible says, “Catch for us the foxes, the little foxes that ruin the vineyards, our vineyards that are in bloom” (Song of Solomon 2:15.) If I fail to take care of the little things, I fail at beekeeping. Little things means keeping my equipment repaired. Keeping my store comb in good shape, equipment in good repair, putting back hive tools where they go, plugging up my smoke when done, and micromanaging my hives.
8) I’ve learned that I must keep extensive notes and logs on each hive. If I fail to keep a good hive log, my hives suffer from my lack of memory. A good log will provide for me a “to do list” that I can follow to keep my hives strong.
9) I’ve learned that I can learn something from everyone. I’ve had the privilege to work with several large scale beekeepers and they have all the tricks! I learned one last week. When you are working with several beekeepers in one place, lay your smoker on the ground so that the smoke does not bother the other beekeepers. So do not be a know-it-all. Be open minded so that you can learn from others.
10) I’ve learned that what I know should be shared with others. Freely it came to me, so why not share it with others. Hopefully a publisher will come along and make me an offer to turn these lessons into a book for my retirement, but until then, I will freely share with others what I’m learning about beekeeping.
11) I’ve learned that bees are healthier as they are building up. If I start a hive in a 5 frame nuc, it seems to grow faster and then I move it into a 10 frame deep. As it continues to grow, it is very healthy. Older hives seem to become more effected by pests and diseases. Keeping a colony crowded provides better pest and disease control.
12) I’ve learned to attend every conference I can afford. Join a local club and attend your state beekeepers meetings. Here are two of my favorite conferences:
Heartland Apicultural Society Sheri and I will be speaking at this conference which is July 7-9 in historic Vincennes University in Vincennes, Indiana. It is the 10th anniversary of HAS.
Eastern Apicultural Society The annual conference for EAS is a MUST ATTEND! All the big names in beekeeping hold classes for this outstanding event. This year, it will be held in beautiful Warwick, Rhode Island July 25-29.

Thanks for joining me again today for another great lesson, and lesson 100!
We are getting an early start to queens, so call us back and be patient. We’ll have more available each week as the year progresses.

Remember, we make our living from our bees and by selling equipment that we make here in our family business. We know you can go to the larger companies, but we always appreciate you supporting our family business. See you next time!

David & Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
14556 N. 1020 E. Rd
Fairmount, IL 61841
(217) 427-2678
www.honeybeesonline.com
Email For Beekeeping Questions Only: david@honeybeesonline.com
Due to the overwhelming number of daily emails, please allow 7 days for an answer. (Please be advised that we do not accept orders, changes or questions about orders through email. With spam filters, email is not a reliable source for order information.)

QUEENS FOR SALE

2011-04-19T16:02:00.001-05:00

Hello from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms, we are David & Sheri Burns. We are working on lesson 100, but I wanted to let you know that we have some queens available to be shipped out tomorrow only. If you need a queen, be sure and call us tomorrow after 8:30 am central time. 217-427-2678

David & Sheri Burns

LESSON 99: Beekeeper Or Bee-haver (www.honeybeesonline.com 217-427-2678)

2011-03-26T00:07:00.001-05:00

Hello from David & Sheri Burns from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in Central Illinois. It’s nice to be with you again for another beekeeping lesson.

This is lesson 99, which means our next lesson will be Lesson 100, a mile stone no doubt! We want to make Lesson 100 something special. If you have something special to suggest for lesson 100, let us know!

Watch our recent Bee Dance Video below. If you cannot see it below, click here to go to our lesson directly.

SPECIAL BLOG READER DISCOUNT!

We are once again offering a special for those reading our blog. You can receive $20 off our completely assembled and painted hives. Call ins only. Good starting Monday March 28th and ending on March 29th, 2011. Call us Monday or Tuesday and save! 217-427-2678. Must use COUPON CODE: 32711 when calling.

We’re knee deep in honey bees, and we love it! In one week I taught and spoke at 4 different clubs and classes. It was great.

Our outstanding colonies headed up by our own Pioneer Queens all survived the winter. Yea! It’s always a good feeling to go out and find the hives strong and healthy in Illinois after such a bad winter. We do not treat our colonies and they go through the winter on screen bottom boards. Again, this year there was no difference between the hives that we wrapped and the ones we did not. Every year we provide larger upper openings for ventilation on our hives and each year they do better!

I’m leaning toward the opinion that most winter hives die from the following in this order:

1) Lack of proper fall and winter management (Froze or starved out)
2) Varroa mites – the diseases they vector
3) Nosema
4) Trachea mites

So in today’s lesson let me give you some workable solutions. But first…

Our next 2 hours short course will bee Friday April 1, 2011 from 6pm – 8pm. Swarm Prevention & Bee Removal (Removing Bees Professionally). This short course will be held at our honey bee farm here in central Illinois. Join me for a night of learning how to minimize swarming and how to remove bees from structures. Special construction specialist Roger Faulkner will share on how to open up and close up a home when removing bees. Stop trying to learn everything from a book, and come learn under a mentor, hands on.This event is limited so register early! Register Now!

We have queen rearing classes, advance beekeeping classes and classes on observation hives, honey extraction, marketing your honey and more coming up in the next few months. Click on any of the classes below to make sure you are registered.

April 1 – How To Remove Swarms & Remove Bees From Homes
May 6 - How To Make & Keep Observation Hives
May 14 – How To Raise Queens—FILLED & OVERBOOKED
May 20 – Pest & Disease – Open
May 21 – Basic Beekeeping Course - Still Have Openings
June 3 – How To Market & Sell Your Honey
June 18- Advance Beekeeping – Very Popular Course – Still Open
June 25- How To Raise Queens – Still Have Openings
July 1 - How To Extract, Filter & Bottle Honey
July 23-24- Two Day Course on Queen Rearing – Open
Oct 8 – Basic Beekeeping Course – Open

Over the last few weeks, I’ve taught classes in Decatur, Champaign and Danville, Illinois. We are introducing so many people into beekeeping and my wife Sheri helps me teach the courses and she does such a fantastic job. I’ve attended many conferences and courses, and I have never heard anyone as good as Sheri! Remember to check out her blog at: Sheri’s Sweet Life

And before our lesson today, let me tell you about a few new products we are carrying that are great!

First, Bucko Goat Skin Beekeeping Gloves. Wow, what a nice glove! The goat skin is a better, less clumsy fit, and it has extended ventilated sleeves. We are selling these $5 cheaper than most places for only $15.

And for all of you Top Bar Hive Enthusiasts we are now selling TBHs!!! (Pretend you hear a loud crowd applauding). Do not be tricked by tiny TBHs made of plywood. This is a full 46” TBH made from 3/4” pine. Even the top is made with pine, and covered with aluminum. Comes with 30 top bars (frame starters) with wooden splines. This TBH also comes with a screen bottom board with a slide in board to open and close the bottom. This TBH also has three holes in the side and two follower boards. Stand and bees not included. Click on the image or click here to purchase your TBH. Have some fun with a Top Bar Hive!

LESSON 99: BEE-KEEPER or BEE-HAVER

A BEE-HAVER is someone who can say they “HAVE” bees but they do not want beekeeping to consume their time or interest, so they spend little to no time keeping bees, they simply have bees. That’s certainly one approach.

Then there are those who want to evolve from just having bees to truly doing all they can to make sure their bees are as healthy as possible.

Probably somewhere between these two groups is where most beekeepers find themselves.

I recently held a class on “Pest & Diseases” and SO MANY BEEKEEPERS NEED TO TAKE THIS CLASS. I’m offering it again on Friday night, May 20. Click Here To Register. In order for beekeepers to overwinter colonies, produce more honey from colonies and have overall stronger colonies, beekeepers must know pests and diseases. There are many practical ways to prevent many pests and diseases, but until you are taught and trained, you will probably experience avoidable problems .

Let me show you what I mean by taking you on an inspection of a hive. A friend asked me to inspect his hive in the fall. Join me and let me demonstrate how easy it is to “think all is well” when it is not. As we inspect the hive, you’ll need to click on each image so that it will enlarge to its original size. Look at this comb of brood and bees. Click on it and see what you think?

Most beekeepers would feel okay about this comb. The brood looks fine, though it is a small area of brood, it’s fall and queens are cutting back laying so it’s fine. But if we look closer we’ll several things that are wrong, this hive will not make it through the winter. In fact, nothing was done to my friend’s hive and it died in the winter from the major two factors visible upon the above image, both could have been prevented. So let’s zoom in.

Do you see the two major problems? I’ll give you a hint. Look at the bees, not the brood. Ah ha…see it now? Among several female workers we see DWV, deformed wing virus and one has K-wing. Let me zoom in and show you.

Her wings have been damaged by this virus (DWV) usually transmitted by the varroa destructor mite. In the larger image above, you can find two with DWV. MITE INFESTATION! That’s the first major problem that will kill this colony during the winter. But, there is even a greater threat to the hive surviving winter. Let me show you the image, by zooming in from our initial larger image:

This image reveals further evidence of varroa infestation because you can see mite feces on the bottom and walls of open cells. Small white particles. Another bee with DWV is in the upper center, but what is unusual to you about the bee below the one with DWV? Her back wing has slipped forward to advance in front of her front wing, forming what looks like the letter K, thus K-wing. Damage is done to the flight muscle area by the Tracheal mite. So in this image, we are probably looking at symptoms from two different mites. Usually K-wing always demands a further investigation for Tracheal mite testing.

Most beekeepers do not have a microscope or the patience to pull out the bee’s trachea tube and look for the tiny tracheal mite in the tracheal tube, a bit smaller than a speck of a tiny dust particle. But you can buy a microscope and learn to do the dissection yourself or send in your bees to the Beltsville, Maryland Bee Lab. So here I have pinned down a bee, removed the head and first two legs and collar to pull out the trachea tube. It is lots of work but I never found any. Two pins in a pencil eraser works well to hold the bee in position during surgery.

While I was doing Tracheal mite testing I went ahead and inspected the bee further.

One thing in particular that was interesting was the honey stomach. Where else, but here, will you finally see what a honeybee’s honey stomach looks like? Rather than thinking of it as a human’s digestive stomach, think of it as a flexible holding tank. I went ahead and dissected the bee and pulled out a nearly fully expanded honey stomach, and I’m holding it between my fingers.

Now, back to our hive that we are examining. So here are our two signs that my friend’s large hive, with plenty of honey, will not see spring and it didn’t. VARROA & TRACHEAL MITES. It died leaving plenty of stored bee bread and honey. So to become a beekeeper who desires to know more to better assist your bees in overcoming these possible problems---I want to help you. But remember, almost all bees have varroa mites, but not all mites vector diseases to such a level as seen in the hive we are inspecting.

To help your bees have a fighting chance against what we have seen above, consider a few essential techniques. First, let’s deal with tracheal mites. Tracheal mite resistant bees are the best defense. Certainly it is nearly impossible to develop bees that are 100% resistant. However, if a colony survives the winter, it is probably a good indication they have some degree of tracheal mite resistance. That’s why the queens we sell are only from hives that have been overwintered without any treatment. Hives that suffer from tracheal mite infestation are unable to properly thermoregulate their hive during the winter and the hive simply freezes out.

I recently wrote an article on formic acid and the Mite Away Quick Strips that will soon be approved in many states. It is not a harsh treatment and only requires 7 days and can be used with honey supers on. It will take care of both varroa and trachea mites.

To address the tracheal mite naturally use a grease patty in the hive. Mix 2 parts powdered sugar with one part Crisco vegetable shortening. You can add a bit of honey-b-healthy or lemon grass oil extract. Compact this mixture between two sheets of wax paper and lay on the top bar of each deep brood body. Keep it on all year! As the bees nibble at the sugar in the patty, they will track traces of the vegetable oil around thus it is enough to make it nearly impossible for the tracheal mite to find a young bee as a new host. It is difficult for a tracheal mite to enter an older bee because of the more developed hair near the first breathing airway on the mature bee.

Remember, tracheal mites are not usually a serious problem, certainly not like varroa mites. This is partly because bees in America are becoming more resistant, but also because beekeepers are treating for varroa which is also knocking out tracheal mite populations. But if you want to become a better beekeeper, this lesson is for you!

Lastly, you HAVE to keep your varroa mite levels down as much as possible. I am always amused at beekeepers who say they do not have mites but their only test is a quick visual glance. These are the same beekeepers who can’t spot queens but they can spot varroa mites?? You cannot see tracheal mites and most beekeepers find it very hard to see varroa mites. Do not assume you are mite free simple because you cannot see mites. Become more aggressive toward mites to save your hive.

If you don’t like formic acid, then use IPM (Integrated Pest Management) methods for varroa such as 1) Freezing drone comb traps 2) Screen bottom boards 3) Powdered Sugar Drop and 4) Removing the queen temporarily to break up the bee’s (and varroa’s) brood cycle.

If you lost bees this winter, do not assume it was the cold winter. It could have been, but it is very possible that with a little more perfected management, your hives could have survived the winter. So move over and become a beekeeper, not just a bee-haver.

These lessons are free, but they do cost to research, write and publish and post. If you cannot afford a donation, no problem and please enjoy. If you can help support our ongoing research and lessons, we would certainly use your gift wisely to further freely sharing these valuable lessons which help others successfully keep bees! Please see the link below to make a donation or send your gift to our address at the end of this Lesson. And thank you in advance.

Thanks so much for joining us again today, and please know that we appreciate your business. When you purchase from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms it helps us pay the bills and make a living and to continue our research on honey bees. So keep us in mind next time you need a hive, a queen or any beekeeping equipment. Our phone is: 217-427-2678

One of our most dearly loved hives that customers enjoy so much is our copper top garden hive. Looks absolutely beautiful in any garden or yard. We sell these with a cypress hive stand and these are 8 frame garden hive, so they are just alittle bit easier to handle and sure look cute. Click on our garden hive image to purchase one today. Click here for more information on our copper top garden hives.

Also we are now carrying a new style of top feeders, an all wooden top feeder with two large reservoirs. Each reservoir has a wooden platform where the bees can stand and eat and not drown. Place it on the top hive box and place the top cover on the feeder. Works great! Click on the image to purchase.

One more item is a queen mansion.

Queen Mansions is just what it sounds like, a hive body that allows you to raise 3 queens at one time, or keep three queens in one deep hive body. We use them in our queen rearing operation and they work nicely. There are three separate areas in one deep hive body.

Each section is completely sealed from the other sections so each queen has her very own three frame section with separate entrance. Three top pieces made for 3/4" pine serve as the individual top pieces so you can remove one at a time to work one section while the other two remain sealed closed. This is a great flexible unit, because once you no longer want to hold queens, simply slide out the dividers and use it as a regular deep hive body and a regular screen bottom board. 9 Frames included. Top cover not included.

Here’s our contact Information…
Phone: 217-427-2678
Email: david@honeybeesonline.com
(Please call us rather than emailing us about orders)
Web: www.honeybeesonline.com
Twitter: www.twitter.com/longlanehoney
Podcasts: www.honeybeesonline.com/studiobeelive.html
Mailing Address: Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
14556 N 1020 E. Rd
Fairmount, IL 61841

See you next time,
David & Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
In Central Illinois

LESSON 98: BEEKEEPING IS FUN, EASY & SIMPLE

2011-03-03T21:39:00.002-06:00

Hello from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. We’re keeping warm in central Illinois with high hopes that spring will come once again as it always does, but we are hoping it will come earlier!
We are David & Sheri Burns and it’s our pleasure to share with you about honey bees. Today, I want to share a lesson on just how fun, easy and simple keeping honey bees really is. It’s about time someone simplified the whole honey bee thing, right!
Before I get into today’s lesson, I want to share what we’ve been up to.
We are still in winter! Even after spring arrives, we will still have cool weather for some time, making it difficult to work bee as much as we’d like. I push the envelope with my nuc and queen rearing operation! I have to work bees with a coat on to get a head start. I could move my operation south, but then I would have other issues. Cold is easy to deal with. While bees are out flying in our southern states, Midwest and northern bees are still in their winter cluster, gradually coming out more and more each week. This gives us time to continue to prepare for when spring finally arrives. We are getting hundreds of frames prepared for the spring along with boxes for splits, swarms and mating nuc boxes.
On March 4th, 2011, we are offering a special 2 hour course on Pests & Diseases at our honey bee farm. March 4th from 6-8pm. Click here to sign up now. If you want to just show up at our bee farm, just call us and let us know you are coming: 217-427-2678
We are gearing up for our March 19th, 2011 (Saturday)Basic Beekeeping Class in Danville, Illinois. We still have room for more, so spread the word. Sign up for our Basic Beekeeping Class

We just produced another Studio Bee Live podcast so be sure and listen.
This is the time of the year, when there is a huge demand for our hives, beekeeping equipment and bees, we spend a large part of our day on the phone. The men are cutting and building and the women are on the phone and packing up shipments. It’s hectic but lots of fun.
We enjoyed speaking to a group of beekeepers in Arthur, Illinois, mostly Amish and they were very gracious and generous. The Arthur Library has a perfect facility to host a meeting and we just had a super time and looks like we’re going down again next month. If you look real close in the photo above you can see a couple of our hives that we make inside the buggy.
We have a special we are offering on our single hives. For being committed to following our blog we are offering $20 off our complete hive to our blog readers. Instead of $199, we are offering it for $179. This is available for call-in orders only. When you call in use PRODUCT CODE: 3247 and you’ll receive $20 off our complete hive which is two deeps, one medium super, screen bottom board, inner cover and top cover with metal. And all wooden frames with plasticell foundation bees wax coated. ASSEMBLED & PAINTED! This offer is only good from March 4th-10th, 2011. Buy 5 and save $100! Our phone hours are Mon. – Sat. 8:30-4:30 central time.
LESSON 98: Beekeeping is Fun, Easy Simple!
In all walks of life you have some people who see the glass as half full and others who see it as half empty. It’s that way with beekeeping, some will complain, pout and talk about how the “bees are all dying”. But others love keeping bees, take off honey and enjoy it. While some hives die, others flourish.
So let me tell you how good it really is. Okay, sure, bees can die because they are livestock. But, dogs die, chickens die and all livestock can die from nearly anything. Yes, bees have mites but dogs have fleas. I’m trying to be honest but also let you know that it isn’t gloom and doom as some make it out to be. It is my opinion that around 50% of bee problems are management issues. With more knowledge and skill the beekeeper could have saved the hive.
Bees certainly have more challenges now than they’ve probably ever had. But, there are so many management practices that can overcome many of these potential setbacks.
Okay, now let talk fun! When my wife first started keeping chickens she read everything she could on raising chickens. We were alittle worried that it would be hard, that our chickens would contract some respiratory disease, mites or be eaten up by predators. We’ve raised free range chickens for several years now and those things never happened---not to any large degree. Every time we lost a chicken it was because we forgot to close the fence or something else to do with our mismanagement. We were told that we had to heat our chicken coop in the winter or else the chickens would freeze. We didn’t and they were fine. That’s not to say something bad can’t happen, but after all the scare we’ve had so much fun raising chickens.
Often new beekeepers become so attached to their bees that the thought of the bees being unhealthy or dying is reason enough not to even start at all. WRONG! Think what life would be like if we took this approach toward apple trees or even a married couple not having children because something could happen to their child.
The fact that it is more challenging to keep bees now than it was 30 years ago is all the more reason we need more beekeepers. We are making significant advances in keeping healthier bees.
Come on, and jump into beekeeping with the idea of having fun. Don’t worry about what might happen and be always in a fret over every mite or problem. Relax already and have fun keeping bees. Let me give 3 tips on how to have fun with your bees:
1) Acknowledge that your hive is pollinating crops, yards, gardens and fruit trees within 3 miles of your home. Pull up a lawn chair and watch the bees fly in and out, knowing that these gals are working hard to pollinate your valuable plant life. Take comfort in the fact that you are doing your part to help save the bees.
2) Have fun learning about bees and keeping your mind sharp through reading about bees and planning your apiary. Sometimes if we have too much time to think on things, we can become depressed and sad. Having a hobby that really interests us can really improve our overall mental health.
3) Have fun running your own bee lab and beekeeping experiments. I’m serious! You might be the next Langstroth. Certainly university studies can shed more light on beekeeping success, but let’s face it, sometimes our own discoveries work inspite of what the studies show. Run your own trials and keep track of your results. Incorporate your discoveries into your approach to successful beekeeping.
HOW TO COPE WITH PROBLEMS
Don’t take everything so seriously. If your bees develop a problem, deal with it. If they die out in the winter, do not despair. Chalk it up as experience and order more bees next year and make the last hive that you lost worth something by applying what you learned from them to your next successful colony.
Now go out here and be excited about beekeeping. Bees are still thriving in our country. Beekeeping is rebounding with more and more new beekeepers.
One Last Pep Talk
Still not sure if you want to keep bees this year? Maybe you can remember helping out a family member years ago when they had bees. Perhaps it was Grandpa or an Aunt. Or maybe you’ve been reading about how we need more bees to make up for the shortage of pollination and you’ve decided to do your part, so do it!
Sheri and I receive calls all week from people who have finally decided to jump in and keep bees! Come on and do it. Stop putting it off another year. You are not getting any younger, so let this year be the year you become a beekeeper.
I know, I know, people complicate it and make it sound so complex. Baloney! It is easy. Buy a hive, shake the bees in and let them do their thing. If you don’t want to feed the bees, don’t! If you don’t want to use medication in the hive, don’t! If you don’t want to harvest the honey, leave it for the bees. If you don’t want to mow around your hive, don’t! Keep it simple.
Sheri and I want to help you get started. We now have 98 FREE lessons! We still have hive kits for sale with bees! We sell complete kits with all the equipment too. We will be your personal beekeeping mentors. Give us a call and say, “I’m finally taking the big step”. 217-427-2678
Don’t forget our Blog Reader’s Only Special $20 off per hive. Call in only: 217-427-2678 Good only from March 4th – March 10th, 2011

Next Lesson: Top Bar Hives
Here’s Our Free Beekeeping Newsletter & Podcast Info:
STUDIO BEE LIVE BEEKEEPING PODCAST BEEKEEPING LESSONS FOR KINDLE ON AMAZON.COM BEE SMART NEWSLETTER
Here’s Our Contact Information Phone: 217-427-2678
Website: www.honeybeesonline.com
Email: david@honeybeesonline.com
Twitter:twitter.com/longlanehoney
Mailing Address: Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
14556 N. 1020 E. Rd
Fairmount, IL 61841
See you next time!
David & Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms

Lesson 97: Dead Bees In The Snow (www.honeybeesonline.com) 217-427-2678

2011-02-20T09:28:00.003-06:00

Listen To Our Newest Beekeeping Podcast. In our program today we introduce Tob Bar Hives, more magnificent mistakes in beekeeping along with answers to your emails. Take a listen and enjoy! This and more at Studio Bee Live.

Hello From David & Sheri Burns at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. With a tremendous cold winter, we’ve finally experienced a few days of thawing out and the bees have taken advantage of the warm weather to take cleansing flights. Finally!
In today’s lesson we’ll take a look at some dead bees outside the hive and what it means in the winter. Before we get into today’s lesson let me mention our March specials. We still have our Gold, Silver and Bronze kits available, but not at the February special pricing, but it’s still a great deal. We also have a new March kit which is a complete hive and a package of bees. Click on the image below for more information.

We have a special podcast coming up on March 17, St. Patrick’s Day, in which I will be hosting a live podcast on “Integrated Pest Management: Avoiding Most Pests & Diseases”. Please call in and be part of this live podcast. I’d love to be flooded with guests such as you who can call in, and ask questions and share your failures and successes in fighting mites, small hive beetles and other pests and diseases. Then, I’ll share how beekeepers can do better at keeping these out of your hives. So, mark your calendar, set your blackberry and calendars to alert you to March 17th, at 6:45pm central time. Call in around 6:55pm to make sure you are joined in prior to the podcast which starts at 7:00pm.
Simply call our beekeeping podcast direct line at 1-724-444-7444 An automated voice will ask for a Call ID and use 16456 followed by the # sign. If the automated voice asks for your pin, use the number 1. I really hope you can join us for this podcast. Again, March 17th at 7:00pm central time, but call in a few minutes early so we can be set by 7pm.
One more thing…I’m writing a beekeeping blog on Mother Earth News. Mother Earth News has been a popular magazine since 1970 and has half a million circulation. To access the beekeeping blog, go to:
www.MotherEarthNews.com/Beekeeping

Our Basic Beekeeping Class
is filling up but we still have plenty of openings since we are in a large facilities for this class. We will be having this class on Saturday March 19th, from 9am – 3pm in Danville, IL at the Farm Bureau area. This class is for those who may not know anything about beekeeping and those who may have kept bees for 1-2 years. Lunch is provided so click on this link or the image above for more information on how to register, or call us now to register: 217-427-2678 It is fun, entertaining and educational. Join us!
Sheri and I really appreciate the friends we have made through Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. We’ve had several bee clubs order their bees and equipment from us this year and we really appreciate your kindness and commitment to help our business succeed. This helps us make a living! We know that you can always buy your beekeeping equipment from larger beekeeping companies, but we do our best to give you a personal touch, a friend on the other end that you can talk to about keeping bees. We make our living from our bee business, so we appreciate your business! So please consider giving us your 2011 beekeeping business.
Lesson 97: Dead Bees In The Snow
While bees are quite capable of surviving the winter, it can be a stressful time for colonies. During the winter when bees are closed up in their hives, they cannot do what bees need to do, fly, gather nectar, consume fresh pollen and nectar and defecate regularly outside the hive.
On the first, not so cold winter day, the bees will break cluster, fly out and finally defecate outside the hive after holding it for weeks and sometimes months. These are called cleansing flights and are very important for the hive to remain healthy. The further north, the fewer days when cleansing flights can occur. Most hives will take these flights at temperatures much below foraging temperatures. The bees simply make a quick flight around and return to the hive.
Often, the bees defecate on the hive near the entrance. Many new beekeepers become worried and believe their bees have dysentery or Nosema when they see the spotting on their hives.
However, though that may be a possible problem, usually it is a healthy sign that bees are finally able to take a cleansing flight. In fact, it is not uncommon to see bees use any crack in the hive for a quick out door potting break.
During these cleansing flights, house cleaning bees may also take advantage of the nice day and begin carrying out the bees that have died during the winter months. Dead bees laying outside a winter hive often alarms new beekeepers. New beekeepers fear the worst when they spot dead bees and begin wondering if the whole hive is doomed. However, this is a normal activity that occurs throughout the winter and early part of spring. After a snow, it becomes more apparent, not because there are more dead bees, but because the snow make dead bees easier to see. That same number of bees would not be noticeable without the snow.
Why do bees die in the winter? First, bees are aging. Most spring and summer bees can live to be around 35 days old. However, bees born in the fall can live several months through the winter because they have more fat bodies and have not exhausted their glandular secretions, nor worn themselves out foraging like a bee during the summer. Yet, winter bees often still die of old age in late winter.
There are other maladies which can cause bees to die during the winter. The most common causes of individual bees dying in a colony are: starvation, disease, cold and pests.
Starvation. The winter cluster will move gradually to always be in the proximity of stored honey and pollen. Long, cold winters can result in the depletion of stored resources of food for the colony. It is not uncommon to examine a colony that died during the winter and discover the dead colony not too far away from stored honey. Yet, they still starved. It was too cold for the bees to move into stored honey.
Also, once the queen begins laying eggs in mid to late winter, the cluster will remain on the brood to keep it warm and will sometimes consume all food sources near the brood. The bees in this photo died trying to keep the brood warm in the winter with no nearby honey. They were faced with a choice to abandon the brood and move to stored food, or keep the brood warm. Usually the cluster will remain on the brood and starve to death if the weather fails to warm up above 30. If the weather had warmed up prior to the depletion of food, they could have sent other bees into the stored honey and carried it back down to the brood area.
How do you know if a colony starved to death? Bees will be head first in cells, attempting to stay warm and eating the last drop of honey out of the bottom of cells such as these dead bees in the photo.
Disease. Nosema is hard on the winter cluster because Nosema is worse when bees are confined and cannot defecate. Nosema is a gut disease so it is most deadly during late winter. If the Nosema level was high in late fall, this can cause bees to perish during the winter and early spring. However, spring can quickly bring Nosema under control as the bees are able to fly, gather nectar and defecate regularly outside the hive.
But do not jump to conclusion at the first sign of bees defecating on the outside of the hive box. This is pretty common on the first warm winter day after a long winter. Bees will mess up the outside of the hive, but it will clear up after several good flying days.
Cold. While the winter cluster moves gradually upward into the stored honey, some bees may drift too far within the hive, away from the heat of the cluster and freeze. Bees do not heat the entire inside of the hive, but only the area within the cluster of bees. This is especially true on warm winter days that suddenly turn cold. Inside the hive, the winter cluster breaks up on warmer days and bees begin to search for stored honey on other frames within the hives. But, at the sudden drop of temperature the colony sometimes cannot re- form into a tight cluster. Bees might be stranded to freeze to death outside of the cluster. Or the colony may become divided into several clusters, each too small to produce the heat needed to withstand the rapidly dropping temperature.
Pests. Varrora and Trachea mites are extremely hard on the winter cluster and can lead to bees dying. These pests need to be controlled with grease patties during the summer and early fall to reduce the infestation level.
Even though starvation, disease, cold and pests can kill winter bees, do not assume that your bees have a problem just from dead bees in the snow. It is normal to see large amounts of dead bees throughout the winter. Dead bees accumulate on the bottom board and around the outside of the hive. Most hives will quickly clean out the dead bees once spring arrives, but if you want to speed up their work, you can clean out the dead bees from the bottom board. And, expect to see the bees defecating heavily around and even on the hive late winter and early spring. This will clear up once the bees have had several flying days.
Remember, there is nothing you can do to help your bees once they have clustered and it is cold. Feeding bees candy can help if they are starved, but you can only open the hive briefly and can never pull out a frame until it reaches 67 degrees (f) outside.
Here’s Our FREE BEEKEEPING NEWSLETTERS & PODCASTS THAT WE PRODUCE: STUDIO BEE LIVE BEEKEEPING PODCAST BEEKEEPING LESSONS FOR KINDLE ON AMAZON.COM BEE SMART NEWSLETTER
Here’s Our Contact Information Phone: 217-427-2678
Website: www.honeybeesonline.com
Email: david@honeybeesonline.com
Twitter:twitter.com/longlanehoney
Mailing Address: Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
14556 N. 1020 E. Rd
Fairmount, IL 61841
See you next time!
David & Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms

Technorati Tags: dead bees in snow,beekeeping,mites,beekeeping classes,beekeeping supplies,master beekeeper

LESSON 96: Feed Your Bees in Late Winter (www.honeybeesonline.com) 217-427-2678

2011-02-09T22:13:00.002-06:00

Hello! We are David and Sheri Burns, beekeeper extraordinaires. Thinking about getting started in beekeeping, search no further. Wanting to become a better beekeeper and have less hives die each year, you’ve stopped at the right website! And thank you for visiting us today.
Before we get into today’s lesson, feel free to visit our main website at: www.honeybeesonline.com or give us a call at 217-427-2678. Also, before today’s lesson let me fill you in on some important information.
Sheri and I are looking forward to our March 19th Basic Beekeeping Class! This is going to be great. Due to the size, we’ve moved the class location to the Farm Bureau building in Danville, Illinois which his only about 5 miles from our Apiary. We still have plenty of spots open due to the larger size facility that they are providing for us. CHECK OUT MORE INFO ON OUR MARCH 19th CLASS BY CLICKING HERE Join us as we’d love to meet you!
NEW WEBSITE! Sheri and I have secured the services of a noted and highly recommended web design service out of California to tackle revamping our website. We’ve seen preliminary shots of pages and wow are we excited. This will also improve our store and bring greater accuracy to our products, shipping and more! We are still months away, but stay tuned.
THE BIG QUESTION??? ARE WE STILL SELLING PACKAGES OF BEES (as of Feb 10th, 2011). YES, but let me define the answer. We are still selling 3 lb. packages for PICK UP and packages to be shipped to customers who purchase our Gold, Silver or Bronze kits. Or if you just buy a hive, we can also sell you a package of bees and ship them to you. What WE CANNOT DO is ship you a package of bees if you are not buying a hive. We have to reserve a certain number of shipped bees for those who call in and want to buy an entire kit. So if you want JUST a package of bees, we have those available for pick up only. If you want a package shipped to you, you’ll have to either buy a hive or a kit. This is our way of accommodating first time beekeepers who enter into beekeeping late in the year.
THE SECOND BIGGEST QUESTION: When Will You Start Selling Queens. We’ve pulled out all stops and should be able to sell twice as many queens this year as we did last year. While we do not take orders for queens in advance, please call us after April 20th to see how early we can get you a queen. We really think our queens are unique and prolific, so consider requeening your old hive with one of our Pioneer Queens! Winter hearty, gentle, good honey producers, and from hives that are untreated.
Finally, if you’re looking to get started with one hive or two, check our our Valentine Specials good through Feb. 15th.
Please check out our current Valentine Specials on hive equipment and bees. Click on the image for more info.

LESSON 96: FEED YOUR BEES IN LATE WINTER
It's important for beekeepers to be well prepared to properly manage hives that have survived the winter. In our last installment we looked at how to inspect the productivity of the queen. Today we are looking at how to feed our bees in late winter just before spring. Use this acronym to help you remember how to prepare:
Stimulate For Rapid Foraging Force
Prevent Swarms
Rotate Hive Bodies
Inspect The Productivity Of The Queen
New Queen
Give 1:1 Sugar, Sugar Water & Pollen Patties
Beekeepers celebrate when they see that their hive survived the winter. However, to make this overwintered colony as productive and healthy as possible, providing proper nutrition is essential.
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 bees. When bees die with their heads stuck in cells, they starved. If they haven't died yet, there are many ways to feed your bees during late winter and early spring. All feeding methods have some pros and 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. Here in Illinois, we have a long way to go, probably 6 more weeks of possible cold. Pollen patties are a good source of protein for the bees. These can be purchased or can be made from a dry powder mix.
If the bees are short on honey an easy solution is to feed solid sugar. I do this by placing a candy board with a pollen patty embedded in the candy. I never want to give the bees liquid sugar in late winter because the bees have less opportunities to defecate outside the hive and liquid sugar will require more visits outside the hive.
Once the bees are able to fly more, a sandwich bag of sugar water on the top frames just above the cluster works well. I poke a few holes on the top side of the bag and the bees figure out how to draw out the sugar water. I use the double zip bags. Another method is to use a jar placed 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. Remember, it is best not to feed liquid sugar until the bees can fly to defecate.
Fondant is a good winter and early spring feeding method. 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. This is a fondant type feed, and not the recipe for candy boards. Some top feeders may work well as the temperature continues to warm up. But feed your bees! Your bees have survived the worst winter conditions. Do not let them die now that winter is almost over. Candy boards are an excellent choice for late winter. They can be tricky to make. To purchase candy boards from us go to: www.honeybeesonline.com/candyboard.html

Candy boards can make the difference in late winter.

...in our next article Dead Bees In The Snow
Here’s Our FREE BEEKEEPING NEWSLETTERS & PODCASTS THAT WE PRODUCE:
STUDIO BEE LIVE BEEKEEPING PODCAST
BEEKEEPING LESSONS FOR KINDLE ON AMAZON.COM
BEE SMART NEWSLETTER
Here’s Our Contact Information
Phone: 217-427-2678
Website: www.honeybeesonline.com
Email: david@honeybeesonline.com
Twitter:twitter.com/longlanehoney
Mailing Address: Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
14556 N. 1020 E. Rd
Fairmount, IL 61841
See you next time!
David & Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms

LESSON 95: When To Replace Your Queen In An Overwintered Hive (www.honeybeesonline.com) 217-427-2678

2011-02-03T13:10:00.002-06:00

Hello from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms and thanks for joining us for an important beekeeping lessons.
We’re David & Sheri Burns and we operate Long Lane Honey Bee Farms where we manufacture and sell beekeeping equipment, package bees, queens, honey and everything to do with bees! As an EAS certified Master Beekeeper I offer these lessons FREE on a weekly basis and I answer hundreds of beekeeping questions a week, FREE! But, if you want to help us pay bills and live, consider buying all your beekeeping supplies, packages and queens from us. We appreciate your business. We are a family business with a personal touch. Thank you in advance for your business.
UPCOMING SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS
Join me as I speak at the following events:
Arthur, Illinois Public Library Sat. Feb 19th. 9am-12 "How To Have More Hives & Healthier Hives”
Fairmount, Illinois At Our Bee Farm Mar 4th 6-8pm “Pest & Diseases Diagnosis & Treatment” Click here to register.
Decatur, Illinois At The Old Fire House Mar. 15th “Urban Beekeeping” Contact Don Miller to register.
Danville, Illinois At The Farm Bureau Mar. 19th 9am-3pm “Basic Beekeeping” Click here to register. Filling up fast.
Little Rock, Arkansas At The 4H Center May 26th, 27th and 28th “Queen Rearing” There will be many topics and speakers at this conference and I’ll be speaking on queen rearing. Email Jon for more information
Please check out our current Valentine Specials on hive equipment and bees. Click on the image for more info.

LESSON 95: WHEN & HOW TO REPLACE YOUR QUEEN
In today’s lesson I want to share an important and timely lesson on how to determine when to replace your queen in your hive that survives the winter. We’ll also discuss just how to replace her for increased acceptance.
It's important for beekeepers to be well prepared to properly manage hives that have survived the winter. In our last installment we looked at how to inspect the productivity of the queen. Today we are looking at how to know when to replace the queen. Use this acronym to help you remember how to prepare:

Stimulate For Rapid Foraging Force
Prevent Swarms
Rotate Hive Bodies
Inspect The Productivity Of The Queen
New Queen
Give 1:1 Sugar Water & Pollen Patties

Beekeepers celebrate when they see that their hive survived the winter. However, to make this overwintered colony as productive and as healthy as
possible, the queen may need to be replaced. As the queen ages, her pheromones are not as predominant and her laying can become insufficient.
The bees spend their entire working season preparing for winter. The beekeeper should do the same, monitoring the hive throughout the season to
ensure the colony will survive the winter. There are three essential factors that contribute to the success of the colony: 1) A young queen, 2) Strong population build up and 3) Sufficient stores of honey and pollen. If any of these factors are not present in a colony it is unlikely the
colony will do well during the summer and will have trouble surviving the winter.
Without a strong, healthy queen, the colony will not build up in numbers and thus it will not be able to store up sufficient stores of pollen and honey. So the health of the hive is dependent on the queen. Therefore, it is important for beekeepers to keep good records of how well their hives are building up and how well the queen is laying. How is her brood pattern? At the first sign of the queen not performing up to par, she should be
replaced immediately. During the working season, one week with a substandard queen can make a difference on whether the hive builds up sufficiently to survive the winter, particularly if the queen fails during the time when the hive needs to build up their foraging force.
In late winter or early spring, when the temperature reaches 67 degrees (f) or higher, inspect your frames of comb and determine how well your queen is doing. If you see several frames of sealed and unsealed brood, your queen is doing a good job. But you must learn not to trust your queen for more than two weeks at a time. She may be laying well now, but fail tomorrow. If you see the brood is lacking, or do not see any brood, you
will need to replace your queen as soon as possible.
It is believed that "early queens," such as queens purchased in April, may not be as prolific as May and summer queens. This is, of course, debatable and subject to many factors. The reason later queens are better is because as the season progresses the DCAs (Drone Congregation Areas) are better populated with drones than in early spring, therefore, mating is more sufficient.
WHEN & HOW TO REPLACE A QUEEN
Replace your queen after she has failed your evaluation of her. Some beekeepers replace queens that are laying great, but have a defensive characteristic. Once a new queen is introduced with a more gentle disposition, her daughters will replace the defensive bees within 35 days and the hive will become gentle. But usually the queen is replaced because she is subpar.
First, order a new queen. Do not kill your current queen until you have your new queen on hand. When you have received your new queen, go into your hive, locate the queen and remove her from the hive. Kill her and remove her from the apiary. There is no need to place the dead queen back in her hive.
They will know within hours that their queen is gone. Feed the colony 1:1 sugar water. Queens are better accepted if there is strong nectar flow and feeding the hive can simulate a strong nectar flow. After removing your queen, wait 24 hours before introducing your new queen. Your new queen will come with either a cork or a plastic cap over the filled candy hole. Remove the plastic or cork plug. DO NOT pierce the candy or remove any of it.
Place the new queen cage between the frames at the top of the brood area. Some people believe the hole of the queen cage should face up to prevent any dead attendant bees in the cage from blocking the entrance. However, bees are more than able to remove dead sisters. It really will not matter how you place the queen cage in the hive as long as it is placed between the frames at the top.
NEVER directly release a new queen. Sometimes they are accepted, but the risk is too high that the colony might kill the queen. In a week, return to the hive to ensure the queen is released and walking on frames. If she is not laying after one week, be patient. It might take a new queen more than a week to establish her presence and start the laying process.
How often should you replace your queen? Certainly replacing the queen yearly has its benefits. The newer queen replaced after June 21 will lay eggs that will become the overwintering bees. Those bees will have fatter bodies, more gland enzymes, and will not be worn out from feeding brood and foraging.
This will aid in the colony overwintering well. Also, a young queen has a better distribution of pheromones which can help prevent swarming in the spring. You can replace your queen any time after June 21st all the way up until the first frost.
If you choose not to replace your queen each year, certainly that is understandable and your queen might do well for 2 or 3 years. However, keep an eye on her every two weeks. At the first sign of substandard performance, replace her immediately. Once she fails, she will not improve. A $25 queen is a good investment if it means not losing the hive in the winter. Replacing the queen does not guarantee the colony's winter survival, but it's one step in the right direction.
...in our next article When & How To Give A Colony Sugar Water & Pollen Patties
Here’s Our FREE BEEKEEPING NEWSLETTERS & PODCASTS THAT WE PRODUCE:
STUDIO BEE LIVE BEEKEEPING PODCAST BEEKEEPING LESSONS FOR KINDLE ON AMAZON.COM BEE SMART NEWSLETTER
Here’s Our Contact Information
Phone: 217-427-2678
Website: www.honeybeesonline.com
Email: david@honeybeesonline.com
Twitter:twitter.com/longlanehoney
Mailing Address: Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
14556 N. 1020 E. Rd
Fairmount, IL 61841
See you next time!
David & Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms

Lesson 94: Inspect The Queen After Winter (www.honeybeesonline.com) 217-427-2678

2011-01-30T18:25:00.002-06:00

Hello from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms, we’re David & Sheri Burns, certified EAS master beekeeper here to help you succeed at beekeeping. Our contact phone number is: 217-427-2678 and our website is: www.honeybeesonline.com
In today’s lesson you MUST read carefully so that your hive that survived the winter will survive the early part of spring. Today' we’ll look at how to evaluate your queen following a cold winter. But before our lesson today, let me tell you about a few things going on here at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms in Central Illinois.
It has not been warm enough to open any hives, but we’ve been peaking in and all looks good. Our bees have not been able to take a cleansing flight for nearly 3 months. Here’s what one of our hives looked like on Jan. 29th, 2011 as they finally took a cleansing flight.

First Flight After A Long Winter

UPCOMING CLASSES
(We have openings at all classes, so click on the link to reserve your spot now!) How To Make Cream Honey Friday Feb. 4th 6pm-8pm
Basic Beekeeping Saturday, March 19th 9am- 3pm
Queen Rearing Saturday May 14th 9am-3pm
Our Media Opportunities To Learn
We have several opportunities for you to learn more about beekeeping. Here’s a list of newsletters, podcast and lessons we produce FREE for you to enjoy:
Basic Beekeeping Lessons Enter your Email and we'll send you these lessons automatically
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And, Amazon is now carrying these Basic Beekeeping Lessons for the Kindle. If you have a Kindle and want to receive these lesson on the go, this is perfect for you. CLICK HERE FOR MORE INFO

STUDIO BEE LIVE is a fun beekeeping podcast that Sheri and I produce. Check it out at: http://www.honeybeesonline.com/studiobeelive.html
OUR PACKAGES AND NUCS ARE ALMOST SOLD OUT. CALL SOON TO RESERVE YOUR BEES: 217-427-2678
Lesson 94: Inspect The Queen After Winter
On the first nice, warm day, it is important to open up the hive and make an inspection to determine the welfare of the queen. In the worst case scenario the queen died in late fall or winter and now there is no new brood and no new bees. The hive will become smaller and smaller and eventually perish. Or perhaps the queen is failing, unable to lay fertile eggs and has become a drone layer. Now your hive will become over populated with drones, and will soon perish.
Let me walk you through an inspection. First, choose a warm sunny day when the temperature is no less than 67 (F). Smoke the hive and beginning inspecting frames. Depending on when you do your inspection, you'll want to see a fair amount of sealed worker brood and uncapped brood such as eggs and larvae. It is not essential that you find the queen as long as you see eggs. Seeing eggs mean that you have a queen. In fact, if you spot your queen but fail to look for eggs, you have not gained useful information about the state of your queen. You must evaluate her ability to lay.
Several factors might influence what you see. First, if you have a Carniolan queen, she is less likely to lay early in the spring. She will, however, start laying when the nectar flow starts. All queens will lay more once the nectar flow increases. But you should expect to see some brood. How early you inspect your hive may change the results as well. The queen begins to lay more as there is more daylight and the days become longer.
Usually here in Illinois there is a day or two in February warm enough to allow me to inspect my hives. If I spot my queen, but she is not laying yet, I do not become concerned just yet. I will make a note in my log to check on her in two weeks. Or I may feed the hive 1:1 sugar water to see if this will stimulate her to start laying. It's not a bad idea to start feeding 1:1 sugar water to an overwintered colony to stimulate early laying.
What do you do if you discover you are queenless or in need of a new queen. It is more difficult to resolve this problem early in the spring. Queen producers often cannot provide queens this early or they already have long waiting lists. Every spring we receive calls from desperate beekeepers who have discovered that their hive survived winter but their queen did not. There is little we can do except to have them feed their hive and keep it going until we can ship out a queen. However, if you discover in May that your queen is not laying an impressive brood pattern, then you should have no trouble buying
a new queen. Replace her as soon as possible.
If you can make a February inspection and find your queen is gone, one option is to purchase a new package. Even though your package will not arrive until April, your new bees and queen will be a huge boost to the failing overwintered queenless hive. But, remember that most package providers are sold out in March, so you'll have to hope for a warm day in February to order a replacement package.
Starting today through Wednesday of this week (Jan. 30-Feb. 2nd) we are offering $50 off on our GOLD VALENTINE SPECIAL. Normally $749, but for three days only $699 and FREE SHIPPING. This is only a 3 day special, so call in or order 217-427-2678 or online Sun-Wed. CLICK HERE TO ORDER NOW BEFORE THE SPECIAL ENDS This is for 2 complete hives, supplies and bees too!
Please forward these on to other and encourage your friends to subscribe!
Here’s our Contact Information: www.honeybeesonline.com
217-427-2678 david@honeybeesonline.com
See you next time and remember to bee-have yourself!

David & Sheri Burns

LESSON 93: Rotating Hive Bodies In Spring (www.honeybeesonline.com) 217-427-2678

2011-01-20T14:21:00.002-06:00

Hello, we are David & Sheri Burns, beekeepers operating Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. Feel free to contact us at: 217-427-2678. We’re having the time of our life enjoying helping others get started in beekeeping.
In today’s Lesson, I will be explaining the importance of rotating hive bodies in early spring. Before we start today’s lesson, let me invite you to two our our upcoming classes.
We have a 2 hour short course, hands-on, demonstrating how to make cream honey, Feb. 4th (Friday) 6-8pm. CLICK HERE to register for this class.

BEGINNER’S COURSE MARCH 19TH JOIN US!
Another upcoming class is our Basic Beginners Course on March 19th, Sat. from 9am-3pm. CLICK HERE TO REGISTER FOR THIS COURSE.

And, Sheri and I love recording beekeeping podcasts. We call it, Studio Bee Live. CLICK HERE TO LISTEN NOW!
Join me this Thursday for the Wild Life Pro Network Podcast. We’d love to have you join us and ask questions about installing package bees. We were mistaken last week and were a week early. It’s this Thursday night at 7pm Central time. Our number is: 1-724-444-7444 A recording will ask for a show or call ID. Enter our ID: 16456. Then, if you are asked for a pin number, use the number 1.
1-724-444-7444 Call ID 16456# Pin # 1#
LESSON 93: ROTATING HIVE BODIES
It's important for beekeepers to be well prepared to properly manage hives that have survived the winter. In our last lesson we looked into a more detailed look at the Demaree swarm prevention method. Use this acronym to help you remember how to prepare:

Stimulate For Rapid Foraging Force
Prevent Swarms
Rotate Hive Bodies Inspect The Productivity Of The Queen
New Queen
Give 1:1 Sugar Water & Pollen Patties

It is important for the second year beekeeper to understand how the bees gradually move upward in the hive during the winter. During the winter the cluster gradually moves upward into the top hive body eating its way into stored honey above the cluster.

Normally the colony is found in the upper deep hive body during the start of spring, leaving the bottom deep hive body empty of bees and honey. The colony will expand in the upper hive body but will quickly become congested and will not likely move down.
The congestion can cause the colony to swarm. Therefore, by reversing the hive bodies the main nesting area is placed on the bottom, giving the colony room to expand into the upper hive body thus elevating congestion and helping to prevent swarming.
This is referred to by beekeepers as rotating the hive bodies or also as reversing the hive bodies. Many beekeepers become too eager to reverse the hive bodies and make a mistake so huge that it devastates the hive, and the colony usually never fully recovers. So let me give some practical advice on rotating the hive bodies.
First, DO NOT ROTATE TOO EARLY. Many beekeepers rotate the boxes too early in the season when the nights are still below freezing.

While a large hive may not be too effected, a smaller hive can suffer from being moved to the bottom. Why? When they were in the top of the hive, they enjoyed living in the pocket of heat that became trapped in the upper part of the hive. This provided assistance in heating the newly reared brood. If the hive bodies are rotated and the temperature drops drastically from a surprise spring cold snap, the colony is now on the
bottom and may have difficulty keeping the brood warm. In Illinois I make it a firm practice never to make splits or rotate hive bodies until after May 1. I simply want warmer nights.
Secondly, many beekeepers make the mistake of not fully inspecting and locating the nesting area. Before reversing the hive bodies it is essential that the hive be inspected. If any of the capped or uncapped brood dips down into the lower hive body, DO NOT REVERSE. If the brood/nesting area was in the upper half of the lower deep, and into the lower half of the upped deep then rotating will damage and break up the brood area and the hive will likely not recover throughout the summer.
So before rotating, make sure there is no brood in the lower hive body. It must be empty of brood, capped or uncapped. If there are some bees in the lower hive, but no brood, it is okay to rotate.

Rotating Hive Bodies & Cleaning Out Bees That Died In Winter

Let me summarize rotating hive bodies:
* Be sure the nights are warm enough not to chill the brood.
* Check and make certain all capped and uncapped brood is found in the upper hive body.
* To rotate, simply reverse the locations of the hive bodies. Place the bottom one on top and the tope one on the bottom.
...in our next article Inspecting The Productivity Of The Queen
Our first Queen Rearing Class is coming up Saturday May 14 from 9am-3pm. Sign up now before the class is full!

Click the image above to view our currently specials on hive kits.

Thanks for joining us today and here is our contact information:
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
14556 N. 1020. E. Rd
Fairmount, IL 61841
(217) 427-2678
http://www.honeybeesonline.com/
EMAIL: david@honeybeesonline.com

Lesson 92: Swarm Prevention, Demaree Method (www.honeybeesonline.com) 217-427-2678

2011-01-13T17:21:00.002-06:00

We are David & Sheri Burns from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. Our main website is: www.honeybeesonline.com
Thanks for joining us today as we continue to look at important preparations for hives that survive the winter. We call these hives overwintered colonies. Today we’ll specifically look at an effective swarm prevention method known as the Demaree method.
But first, let me thank you for your interest in honey bees. Thank you for realizing how important honey bees are to our food supply. 1 out of 3 bites of food is the result of honey bee pollination. Do your part by keeping bees.
Can You Join Me Tonight?
Each month I host a beekeeping podcast on the Wild Life Pro Network. Tonight at 7pm CENTRAL TIME, I’ll be speaking about how to install a new package of bees. Please join in on the discussion and learn how to install your bees correctly. Here’s how you can join me LIVE: Call in from any phone. Our number is: 1-724-444-7444 A recording will ask for a show or call ID. Enter our ID: 16456. Then, if you are asked for a pin number, use the number 1.
1-724-444-7444 Call ID 16456# Pin # 1#
Feel free to ask me any questions you might have on installing a package or let us know how it works best for you. That’s 7pm tonight, central time.
My wife has a fun blog that you might enjoy following. She tells how to cook with honey, and now she’s on a journey to get fit by 50. CLICK HERE to follow Sheri’s Sweet Life
I’m blogging on Mother Earth News and if you can read those blogs and leave comments, it will make my editor happy to have beekeeping blogs online. So CLICK HERE to visit my blogs on Mother Earth News, and please leave a comment at the bottom of those blogs.
And before we get into today’s lesson, let me ask you to consider making a donation to support our efforts to provide FREE beekeeping information. Think of the money you are saving by not having to buy books! If you feel these lessons have benefited you and you’d like to put a smile on our face and a gift of kindness in our front pocket, click on the image below.
Your donation (tip) helps us pay the bills and to keep these essential lessons coming. You can send a gift to: David & Sheri Burns, 14556 N 1020 E Rd, Fairmount, IL 61841. Or use the secure donate button below. Thanks in advance.

LESSON 92: SWARM PREVENTION
It's important for beekeepers to be well prepared to properly manage hives that have survived the winter. In our last lesson we looked at how to stimulate the colony to produce a large population of foraging bees prior to the first strong nectar flow. In this lesson we look into the very challenging task of swarm prevention. I'm using an acronym to make it easier to remember 6 important management practices to implement in the SPRING and today we'll look at number 2, Prevent Swarms.
Stimulate For Rapid Foraging Force

Prevent Swarms
Rotate Hive Bodies

Inspect The Productivity Of The Queen

New Queen

Give 1:1 Sugar Water & Pollen Patties
In this lesson, we'll look at a few techniques to prevent swarming. Swarming is probably the greatest cause of low honey production.

First, I'll give some important bullet points on swarming, then I'll give three swarm prevention methods. Keep in mind that swarming is not completely understood and no matter what methods are used colonies may still swarm. There is no 100% sure method that works every time.
* 60 percent of the colony swarms with the older queen.
* Clipping a queen's wing does not prevent swarming, because they will wait and swarm with the new, virgin queen.
* The primary cause of swarming is congestion in the brood area of the hive.
* The swarm is made up largely of young bees at the optimal age for producing wax since the swarm must quickly build new comb.
* A large hive (one that has not swarmed) has more foraging bees than bees caring for brood even though the large hive has more brood. In other words, once a hive swarms it will greatly reduce its ability to produce surplus honey.

* A healthy colony will swarm in order to reproduce another colony.
* Colonies are most likely to swarm during spring and early summer during the start of a nectar flow.
* Colonies with queens that are more than 1 year old are more likely to swarm.
* Keeping a young queen in the hive is a very effective swarm control method.
* A colony makes queens in preparation to swarming and as soon as the newly created queen cells are capped, they can swarm at any time.
* Beekeepers who capture swarms often have queen issues afterward because the swarm is accompanied by the old queen that may soon die or not lay well, and be unsuccessfully replaced.
* The main swarm is headed by the old queen, and normally additional swarms (afterswarms) are headed by virgin queens.
Swarm prevention has always been a challenge. There are many methods to control swarming, but three are most often followed: 1) Reversal of brood bodies 2) Providing a young queen 3) Demaree method
Reversal of Brood Bodies
During the winter the cluster gradually moves upward into the top hive body eating its way into stored honey above the cluster. Normally the colony is found in the upper deep hive body during the start of spring, leaving the bottom deep hive body empty of bees and honey.
The colony will expand in the upper hive body but quickly becomes congested and will not likely move down. The congestion will likely cause the colony to
swarm. Therefore, reversing the hive bodies places the main nesting area on the bottom, giving the colony room to expand into the upper hive body thus elevating congestion and helping to prevent swarming. We'll talk more about this method in our next article as it is part of our SPRING acronym.
Providing a Young Queen
As the queen ages she is less likely to produce queen pheromones as strongly as a young queen. With the reduced queen pheromone the hive is more likely to swarm. Providing a new queen is part of our SPRING acronym so I will deal with this more in a future article. But for now, realize that a new queen each year can greatly reduce swarm tendency.
Demaree Method of Swarm Prevention
When I began studying for the master beekeeping certification, I learned about the Demaree method to prevent swarming. It frequently shows up on the
tests and I’m glad I studied it, because it showed up on last years test. George Demaree was a beekeeper from Kentucky who came up with an effective method of swarm control in 1892 which separates the queen from the brood. It requires more colony manipulation, but the method is effective.
For demonstration, our hive under consideration will have two deep hive bodies and let's assume the queen is laying well and there is capped and uncapped brood throughout the two deep hive bodies.

1) Examine the frames and cage the queen so that you do not injure her while moving frames.

2) Move frames of capped and uncapped brood into the upper deep hive body. If both deep hive bodies have brood that will not fit into the upper deep hive body, use a third deep hive body. Replace the brood frames that you moved up with empty drawn combs.

3) Place the queen (release her if she is in a cage) into the bottom deep hive body and place a queen excluder to hold her down into this bottom deep hive box.

4) Now, place drawn comb into a new deep hive body and place it on top of the bottom deep that has the queen excluder on it (in the middle of the two deeps).

5) In 7 to 10 days go through the upper hive body and destroy all queen cells. Since the queen is held down to the bottom of the hive, this upper box could start raising their own queen. But once you destroy any cells, they cannot raise another one because the brood is too old to raise a queen. Now you can remove the queen excluder. The bees have been given more room, the queen has been given more room and no bees have been lost due to swarming. And the bees will begin to fill the upper hive body once the brood has emerged.
...in our next article The Details of Reversing Hive Bodies

Thanks for joining us today! Here at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms we appreciate you business. Contact us to order all your woodenware (hive equipment), beekeeping equipment and supplies. We appreciate your support. We are still selling 3 lb packages. We ship throughout the US, and we sell nucs and queens. 217-427-2678 or visit our website at: www.honeybeesonline.com
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See you next time,
David & Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
14556 N. 1020 E. Rd
Fairmount, IL 61841