So, go check each beehive. You can heft each one to see if the beehive is the proper weight. If you think a beehive is too light, then you will want to give them something to eat.

If you are overwintering Warre Hives, each hive should weigh at least 26 pounds (12 kg). If you hive is lighter than that, you probably need to feed your beehives.

I don’t heft. I just feed all my beehives. I am a lazy smart beekeeper.

Here is what you should feed your bees:

• Feed your bees honey, if you have some. Just put it out in a dish, or bucket. Maybe add some sticks for the honeybees to stand on. When feeding honey, never use store bought honey! Store bought honey can contain contaminants and is often heat treated. Use your own honey or honey from a local beekeeper.
• If the weather has changed in your area, you can feed your honeybees some sugar water. Just mix about 1/3 sugar to 2/3 water. You can also feed about 1/2 water and 1/2 sugar if you want a stronger feed mix. Only feed sugar if spring has really sprung.

Just keep in mind that sugar water is not very healthy for your bees compared to honey. Also, do not feed sugar if it is still cold and wintery in your area. Doing so could cause dysentery.

I put out some of my own honey for my bees. They are really enjoying the tasty winter treat. You can see them buzzing their thanks in the video above.

P.S. Thanks to my friend Robin for some extra tips I used in this post!

First, I removed the roof and the quilt. This exposed the cloth that covers the top hive box. Then, I carefully peeled back the cloth on the top box, and took a look at the bees. They were happily attending to the honeycomb. I used my smoker to blow some smoke into the beehive to move the bees into the lower boxes. Then, I slowly twisted the top box in a circle to break the propolis bond the bees had put into place to seal the hive boxes together.

As I worked, I made sure I was gentle and calm around the honeybees, and I also tried to make my movements smooth and efficient. This goes far to help the bees to remain calm.

As I took off the top box, a cluster of honeybees gathered on the top bars of the next box to gather some of the honey which dripped from the honeycomb in the top hive box. You can see these bees at work in the photo below.

I needed to put the cloth back onto the hive, so I took my smoker and gently smoked the bees back into their hive. Unlike those misrepresentations of beekeepers in “The Bee Movie,” I do not routinely smoke my beehives to the point of annihilation. I prefer to use either no smoke at all, or a gentle spray of sugar water. Actually, this was the first time I used the smoker on this beehive all summer!

I gently replaced the cloth, and laid the quilt back on top of the hive. Then I replaced the hive roof. Now I could focus on how to get the bees out of the hive box and back into the main beehive. Even though I had used the smoker, there were still plenty of bees in the hive box.

Go on to the next page to continue the adventure!

One of my beehives was going crazy

Talk about unsettling! Two days ago I looked out of the window and saw one of my beehives going crazy.  I instinctively thought, “Oh no, they are going to swarm!”  Then I remembered I had just added another hive box, so there was plenty of room for them to build more comb.  What was going on?

I ran out to the hive and looked at the bees buzzing around the entrance.  I could see that some of the bees were fanning, which means only one thing…The Hive Is Being Disturbed!  Sure enough, at that moment I saw something yellow streak into the mass of bees at the hive entrance and grab a bee.  It was a yellow jacket.  There were yellow jackets attacking the beehive and eating honeybees!

A Yellow Jacket (Genus Vespula) - Source: Wikipedia

The honeybees fought back bravely. I saw two or three bees attacking one yellow jacket.  They rolled around on the ground in a ball, trying to sting each other…a battle to the death.  Then, another yellow jacket joined the fight and started to sting the honeybees.  Sadly, it was all over for the honeybees in that skirmish.  Two yellow jackets against two honeybees is certain death for the bees.   But, in this case it was also curtains for the yellow jackets.  I squished them with my boots. For the next five minutes, I stomped on yellow jackets.   I must have killed twenty or more.  The dying yellow jackets emit a scent which draws other yellow jackets to the fray.  I had a regular stompfest there in front of my beehive.

After a while, the beehive settled down, and peace once again reigned in the kingdom of Apis.  The bees returned to gathering nectar and pollen and I returned to my other tasks of the day.   Since then, I have been watching my hives more closely than before…still wary of the lurking yellow predators who want to eat my bees.

He was astonished to see a lot of bees flying

The owner informed me that he had let his RV sit for over two years.  He was just now getting ready to sell it.  The owner had not noticed anything out of the ordinary when he was inside the RV, but when he went to the back to check on something…he was astonished to see a lot of bees flying in and out through a keyhole in a cubbyhole door.  So, he gave me a call.  When I got there, I went around back of the RV and opened the door to the cubbyhole. (I put on my bee suit first!)  Sure enough, they had built a nest right inside the cupboard.

The honeybees had only built 7 or 8 combs, and the combs were only about 8 inches from top to bottom, so I knew that the bees had not been in the cubbyhole very long…most likely less than a couple of weeks.  From the looks of the nest, I could tell it was probably a small swarm to begin with.

Using my Owens Bee Vac, I gently vacuumed the bees off the combs.  By the way, I highly recommend the Owens Bee Vac.  You can get one from the good folks at Brushy Mountain Bee Farms.  After vacuuming off the bees, I detached the combs from the top of the cupboard and laid them aside.  I wanted to keep them since they were full of larvae and baby bees.

After a bit, all the comb was laid out, and the bees were in my bee vac.  I scraped the inside of the cupboard with my hive tool to remove any beeswax that was left.  Then I packed up my tools, put the comb in a bucket, and drove home.

At home, I took a Warre hive box and removed some of the top bars.  I have them tacked down with very small nails so they are easy to remove.  I took some rubber bands and attached the comb to the top bars by stretching the bands around the comb and the top bars.  The bees will affix the honeycomb to the top bars with wax.  Then they will chew the rubber bands apart and throw them out the hive entrance.

A river of bees ran into the hive

After I set up the Warre hive, I layed a board onto the hive entrance.  Then I dumped all the bees from the bee vac onto the board.  It was amazing.  The bees literally ran up the board into the hive.  They smelled their own wax and baby bees and ran towards the smell.  They formed what looked like a river of bees flowing up into the hive.  It was pretty neat.

I will probably need to feed this new hive with some honey to get them through the winter.  Their stores need to be around 20-25 pounds of honey and pollen in order to survive the Colorado winters.  I checked them just today, and they are happily pulling in pollen and nectar…a good sign that the queen is alive and well.  It looks like the honeybees are happily adjusting to their new home.

Mid 90′s in the shade

Talk about hot!  It has been hot here in this last week,  The weather is cooler now…but last week we had several days of mid 90′s F in the shade. Regardless of how we humans feel, the bees seem to cope with the heat rather well.  My bees have been very busy gathering the last of the blackberry nectar flow and carrying it home to ripen into honey.   They are also gathering another liquid in large quantities…water.

This spring I installed a flower area in our family garden.  In this mini-garden I built a bird bath with a rock in the middle for aesthetic purposes.   I did not realize that my bees would use this rock as a perch.  The rock has a rough texture that the bees are able to grip easily.  They land at the water’s edge and drink their fill.  Then they fly off to deliver their load to the hive.

Back at the hive, the bees evaporate the water to cool the hive. When it is very hot, you can see the bees sitting on the front porch of the hive fanning their wings to increase the evaporation of the water within the hive. (You can see a video here.)  This helps the bees to maintain a constant temperature inside the hive in order to preserve the safety of the developing bees.

As you can see in some of the pictures, our birdbath is quite the local watering hole.  Wasps, yellow jackets and mud daubers as well as honey bees all visit the birdbath to obtain their quota of water.  Taking these pictures was quite fun with all those hornets flying around!

Overall, I have been pleased with my Warre Hives.  Earlier this spring I populated seven hives with feral swarms.  Two of the swarms were queenless, so l ended up combining them with two other hives which were queenright.   Most of my hives are now two boxes tall.  One is three boxes and my largest hive is almost four boxes tall, which is not bad considering the late spring this year.   We had so much rain and cold weather in April and May that all spring time growth (including beehives) was delayed for weeks.

But now the nectar is flowing, the bees are flying, the sun is shining and the honey is ripening.  I will be able to harvest at least the top box of beeswax and honey from the large hive above.  I have peeked into the hive and the boxes are full of beautiful white beeswax and golden honey.  I can’t wait to taste the harvest.  Summer is a good time to be a beekeeper!

On Tuesday, April 22, 2008, I installed a package of bees in the first Warre Hive here in Northern Colorado, USA. It has been one week since then, and the bees are happily living in their new home. They have been bringing in a good bit of pollen and and nectar. There is a creek in the gully near the hive, so I do not need put out any water for them.

I checked last night and they have already drawn out one bar of comb to the floor and are working diligently on the other comb. I will add another hive box within two weeks…possibly sooner depending on how good the nectar flow is, how good the weather is and how strong the bee package will turn out to be. There are so many variables in a honeybee’s world!

In 2007, I discovered a new hive design

This spring (2008) I am experimenting with a new beehive design.  Since I started beekeeping, I have always used the standard ten frame Langstroth hive which is predominant here in America.  In the fall of 2007, I learned of a new hive design through the Organicbeekeepers Group on Yahoo.  This new hive design was named after its developer, Emile Warre.

Emile Warre was a Frenchman who used over 350 different hives in his effort to develop a hive which was simple, low in cost and of benefit to both the honeybees and the beekeeper.  Warre wrote a book which outlines his experiences and demonstrates his hive system, which he called The People’s Hive.  It has been translated into English by Mr. David Heaf of Wales and is available for free download.  Mr. Heaf is also the moderator for the Warrebeekeepers Group on Yahoo. I joined and learned much from the knowledgeable beekeepers on that group.

I began my adventure…

I read Warre’s book and my curiosity was piqued by his take on beekeeping.  I decided to take the plunge.  I downloaded the free plans for the Warre Hive, purchased some wood and nails and built a couple of hives for less than $65 dollars apiece.  I am pleased by how they turned out.  I will post some photos of them soon. I still need to paint them, and will put some bees in them in the very near future.