Becoming Bee Keepers — THE NELSON FARMETTE

Our goals have always been to enjoy our land but to also be good stewards of the land. I feel a deep need to protect the nature that surrounds us. It really is a gift. We never dreamed of having bee’s but slowly have become fascinated with the honey bee. A few of our friends have embarked upon the journey of owning bees. One is in a urban setting and one in a rural setting. Both have had their own adventures with the bee keeping process, but what really hooked us was some honey they gifted us from their hives. There is something magical about fresh honey from a local hive. Honestly, it tasted so much better than our standard honey we purchase. We have big dreams of having our own honey to share with others but know it could take a while and we have a lot to learn.

We knew we had a lot to learn and were starting from ground zero. Between gathering information from our bee keeping friends, online resources and through local bee organizations we are slowly feeling equipped for this process and our very own apiary! I hope to share our experiences in this process and hope it can inspire or help others.

Information Gathering-

Here is some bee history I enjoyed learning!

-European’s brought bee’s over to North American in the early 1600’s. Honey bees have been present in human history for over 6,000 years and were integral to Egyptian society.

-It is estimated that over 75% of the honey American’s consume is from overseas. Only 25% is produced in the USA.

-To make a single pound of honey, bees fly more than 55,000 miles—equivalent to more than two trips around the Earth—and visit 2 million flowers. In fact, a pound of honey represents the life’s work of more than 750 bees.

-Often honey you buy at the stores has been heated to a high temp to keep it liquid. But when it’s heated at too high of a temperature it looses some of its nutritional value. At temperatures of 104 ºF (40 ºC ) and above, the beneficial invertase enzyme found in honey is lost.

-Honey can and has been used for medicinal purposes. For wound care with antibacterial properties, help for sore throats, digestive issues, for allergies, has antifungal properties and is a good source of antioxidants.

-Honey can be labeled ‘Local’ and only be around 40% local honey so check the label if you are seeking 100% local honey.

-One out of every three bites of food you eat on average depends on honey bees pollination.

Buying Supplies-

We chose to do a bee keeping class through a local store in Littleton called “To Bee or Not To Bee.” They too are where we ordered our bee packages from and bought our supplies. The class we took ended up being a ZOOM class due to COVID 19 so that was unexpected but worked out well and was extremely informative. Bee keeping has a lot more pieces and parts than we expected and honestly involves a lot of intuition and strategy. Both of which we hope to gain through this process.

Placing Our Bee Boxes-

We did some research on where to place the bee boxes. In the end many people put their bee hives where necessary for their space they have and the bees adjust fine. We have some space so we wanted to find a part of our land that had a good wind block protection and still good sun exposure. We have bears that seasonally can pass through our area and needed to make sure they do not destroy the bee hives. We did some research on an electric bear fence and ended up choosing to do a live horse tape type fence that is solar powered. We do not have power to the location our bees are at so the solar electric charger was a good option for us. Our local Murdoch’s employees walked us through installing the fence and we have it “hot” or charged thus far and hope it works for the bees! We made the fenced area large enough for 3-4 bee boxes in case we decide to add more in the future.

We’ve Got Bees ..Our Bee’s Arrival!-

We picked up our bee’s in early May after their long journey from California. The bees are from an almond orchard/bee farm in Ord Bend, California called Koehnen and Son’s. The orchard has been around for over a 100 years. The bees come in a package full of 30,000+ bees and are in a briefcase like cage. Our bees are mutts they are Italian/Carniolan most likely and when they almond trees blossom every spring the bee population explodes. The farm sells packages of honey bees to large and small outfits around the country. Thankfully the store To Be Or Not to Bee picks up bees every spring from this farm and brings them back to their new Colorado homes!

We purchased 2 packages of bees. The bees come with some syrup to eat and a queen who is protected in a small box with nets. The goal is that the bees are around the queen to get to know her but that they don’t kill her. Once the bees arrive you let the queen out a few days later after you have installed them into their hive.

The installation of the bees into their hives went pretty well. The bee’s had been traveling and packaged for about a week so we were eager to get them in their box. My husband was tied up with a major project that day at our barn so my daughter suited up and was my assistant! She was so brave and a great helper for the installation.

We are using Langstroth hives which are bee boxes with frames. We started them out in one box until they fill the frames with pollen, honey and brood (eggs). So far, the bees have been pretty docile despite us wearing our bee suits. I have found that the evening is one of the calmer times of the day to go and visit/check on the bees. They are less active.

My biggest surprise of bee keeping thus far is how much syrup (sugar water) and water they drink. We have to supplement them because our area does not have enough pollen and food for them until they start making honey and increasing their pollen stores. I had to find a solution to get them more water. It is a delicate balance. We have a bird bath in our front yard but the bees are located on the back side of our land. I provided them a large bowl with water and rocks in it but that tends to dry out. You have to provide something for them to stand on and drink like rocks or they can drown. I found them on a spicket/hydrant in our pasture that has a small drip. I could not believe they would wait for the hydrant to drip! So I put a chicken waterer on the ground near it with rocks in it to give them another option for water. We are also supplementing them by giving them pollen patties to eat.

Today we did our 2 week check on the bees. Our goal was to see if they seem to be properly collecting pollen, starting their honey stores and laying eggs. Oh and to check to make sure our queens were still there. The good news is both boxes of bees had their queens! They had nearly filled half of their frames with brood (eggs) and pollen stores! We were very happy with the results and chose to add their second boxes so they have room to grow!

Bee update….2020

Our bees ended off the year well. Despite our dryer than normal summer and lack of rain the bees built strong stores of pollen and made lots of honey for themselves. By mid summer we put a honey super on the top which is a small box specifically for us humans to obtain honey. You add this super box once the bottom box is 3/4 full of bees and built out with brood and honey. You are not guaranteed honey the first year you have the bees. Our bees did not put honey up in the top box for us this year. But our goal is for the to survive the winter and have enough of their own food.

Our sweet bee enjoying our zucchini bloom.

Some of our flowers we planted in the garden in full bloom…snap peas, holly hocks and calendula to name a few.

We ended up with one stronger box of bees than the other. Which we hear is normal. That means one queen bee is stronger overall. The stronger hive is nearly twice the size in volume of bees and has faired much better.

Throughout the year we had to test for and treat for mites. Bees suffer from mites that cause them to die if not treated. There are many theories to mite treatments but the goal is to vary the type of treatment throughout the year. Choosing which mite treatment depends on the time of year and average temperature outside. We have treated our bees with Oxalic Acid, Formic Acid and Thymol. If a hive goes into the winter without being treated they often die. So far our stronger hive is still strong and our weaker hive seems to be barely holding on.

During the fall and winter we have supplemented the bees feed with sugar syrup water and some winter food paste.

Our bee storing their pollen in their back legs! So full.

Bee Update….2021

We attending an online class called bee keeping 2! We needed to make sure we were prepared for the spring when the bee’s started re-producing and would potentially swarm.

We lost 1 of our 2 hives in late spring of 2021. The bees froze because the hive was not strong enough and they did not have enough food and volume of bees. We were very sad. Despite our loss we had the opportunity to increase our bees.

Each spring bees multiply to the point that they often leave the hive to swarm. They can swarm due to too many bees for the space or they can swarm due to a swarm cell or “new queen” being born. When a queen leaves the hive the bees follow. Our goals by closely watching the bees was to watch for swarm cells which are larger than normal. When we found the swarm cell we knew a new queen would be born. We chose to remove the current queen into a new bee box with other boards of bees and frames of pollen. This is done to save her from being killed or to save them from leaving the hive to swarm.

So we created a new hive from our one hive! So even though we lost one hive we ended up with two! Both hives ended up being successful and thrived. We ended up having an extraordinary spring with tons of moisture. We had way more supply of pollen and flowers for the bees than usual. This allowed the bees to really grow. We added honey supers for the first time in June. The honey super is the honey that we are able to keep for our consumption. When the hive is 3/4 full you add a honey super to give them room to grow and make honey.

It was so exciting to finally get honey for ourselves. We had over 5 boxes of honey supers which ended up giving us above 4 gallons of honey! We harvested the honey in July and October. It was magic each time. The honey that we harvested in October was a bit darker than the summer honey.

Bee Update….2022

Our bees survived the winter and we were eager to split the hives in the spring. Our two hives by mid April were super full. We usually try to split a hive when we see a swarm cell but we chose to split them before the swarm cell appeared. We found our original queens from our two boxes and moved them to two new hives. We moved over a few frames of brood and a few frames of honey and pollen. The original hives we took the queens from then had to grow a new queen for themselves. We left them for 3-4 weeks to see if a queen cell would form and hatch. We ended up with no queen on both of the boxes after the first few weeks.

Our next option was to buy a replacement queen or we could try to take more brood from the exisiting hives and provide them baby larvea to convert to a queen. So the second time we added brood to the hives they did make a queen on both!

So this year we have 4 hives! Unfortunately, our spring and summer has been drier than normal so our flow of available nectar for the bees has been lower. This lack of moisture has caused them to be slower in honey production. We ended the summer with no honey for us to keep but the hives appear strong enough to survive the winter. They also required more mite treatment this year than the prior year. Heres to better honey production next year!

We are thankful for the online beekeeping support groups and our fellow bee keeping friends for their continued insight. We have so much to learn and are amazed by the bee’s never ending work and masterpieces they create.

to be continued…..