Honey bees leave their hive en masse in two ways: absconding and swarming. Each of these phenomena occurs for different reasons and has a different impact on your beehive. Absconding bee colonies abandon a hive leaving little behind, save some very young bees and small amounts of brood and food. Bees abscond if their hive
A swarm trap (or “bait hive”) is a container designed and situated to attract bee swarms. We will tell you how to get “free” bees with swarm traps.
Varroa mite treatments have limitations (temperature, brood, population, and honey flow), and should be varied to avoid resistance. Choosing the best miticide requires a decision tree based on circumstances. Using our tree below, formic and oxalic acids are best for full season coverage.
Hive Tracks, available as a native mobile app and via a web browser, tracks your beekeeping data to help manage your apiary. The developer of Hive Tracks has a version designed for large commercial beekeepers. However, in this review, we will discuss the software aimed at backyard hobbyists and sideliners.
Comparing varroa mite treatments among beekeepers we polled, the most popular and effective treatment against varroa mites is oxalic acid. Another organic substance, formic acid (sold as Mite Away Quick Strips® or Formic Pro®) and Apivar®, a synthetic miticide, were 2nd and 3rd, respectively.
There are 3 major types of hives: Langstroth, Warré and horizontal hives like a Top Bar hive. We describe how they each work including pros and cons and why we think you should start with Langstroth.
A honey house is a sanitary space where beekeepers process their honey harvest. As your apiary becomes larger, you may want to have a dedicated space outside the home.
Treatment-free beekeepers use no chemicals and limit human intervention in an effort to produce genetically strong colonies and avoid adverse side effects.
Honey bees collect nectar, pollen, and water to create three nutritional foods: honey, bee bread, and royal jelly. A beekeeper may feed honey bees protein supplements for pollen or sugar substitutes for nectar.
Honeycomb (or comb honey) is more expensive to buy than liquid honey due to its higher production costs and factors of supply and demand.
I’m Melanie Howard. My husband, Jim, and I want to share with you everything we’ve learned about beekeeping since we started our hobby. Maybe the the ups and downs we’ve experienced can help you along the way.
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