Modern Beekeeping. Kelley Bee News. Issue 24 June 2012

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1 Kelley Bee News Issue 24 June 2012 Modern Beekeeping Photo courtesy of Brian Peters. 2 The Buzz 3 Healthy Bees 3 Interstitial Space: Keeping Bees As Best We Can with What We Know 7 Queenright 8 Drone Comb for Mite Minimization 11 Bee -Havior 11 It s Swarm Season! 13 Bee -Yond & Bee -H ind the H ives 13 Your Honey House Part 2 15 Young Wisdom 17 Healing Honey 18 Walter T. Kelley Summer Field Day HAS Swarms St. Louis, July Show Schedule 21 ABeeCs 21 Brood BeeCause 22 Influencing Future Beekeepers 23 Featured Products 24 FAQs 26 Sweet as Honey 29 Foraging for Fun 29 More Beekeeping Jokes? Really? 30 Dronings from a Queen Bee 30 Working Bees IN the Gulf of Mexico Scan this with your smartphone to go to kelleybees.com. >>

2 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 The Buzz We hope this finds your hives humming, and that you re staying ahead of them on honey supers! One guarantee in beekeeping: honeybees are constantly surprising, in both good and bad ways. This newsletter shares some of the surprises our readers have discovered and their challenges and rewards of beekeeping. Thanks for your ongoing contributions. By the time you get this, we ll be busily preparing for our annual Field Day. Speakers and instructors from all over the nation are gathering to share their insights. Look for a review of Field Day highlights in upcoming newsletter issues. We apologize for a misprint in our last issue; KSBA is no longer affiliated with Kelley s Field Day. This year all proceeds go to our keynote speaker s choice the Alabama Master Beekeeping Program. Summer is the time for honey, and Kelley s carries everything you need to capture and process that golden liquid. It is also the time that parasites thrive. See our drone comb article for one approach to dealing with these detriments to hive health. Also check out what readers have shared on swarming. We hope if you ve had a swarm, you were able to wrangle them back home. We also hope that we re meeting all your needs. If not, please let us know. Thanks, as always, for turning to us to help you take care of the wonderful honeybees. Sincerely, Jane Burgess CEO/Partner The Walter T. Kelley Company 2

3 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company Healthy Bees Interstitial Space: Keeping Bees As Best We Can with What We Know Lots of Questions with Few Real Answers By Dr. James E. Tew, State Specialist, Beekeeping, The Alabama Cooperative Extension System, Auburn University Editor s Note: Dr. Tew is the keynote speaker at the upcoming Field Days. His website is Keeping Bees in the Gap An interstitial space or interstice is an empty space or gap between spaces full of structure. For the past twenty-six years we have been keeping our bees in the interstice formed between mites not in our bees and mites in our bees. Presently, we know mites are in our colonies but we do not yet have conclusive control procedures to rid our bees of them. We know the question How do we effectively control mites? but we don t yet have the final answer. In what will soon be three decades, we have tried a plethora of remedies. None have positively risen to the top of the control procedures pile. Though it has been the goal of scientists worldwide, nothing has been found that will let us routinely keep bees as we did in the 70s. Frequently, today s bees seem lethargic and weak. Replacement queens don t seem great. Why? I don t know. Welcome to bee life in the gap. It s disconcerting. A Frustrated Beekeeper The beekeeper on the phone was upbeat, energetic, and clearly frustrated. He had several hundred hives going into winter of that were strong and heavy. By late January, half were already dead. The fate of the living was uncertain. Sure, he had had winter kills in the past, but not this many this early in the winter. What in the world was causing this high winter mortality and what could he do to stop the remainder of his colonies from dying? Through the years, I have heard many variations on this theme and this guy seemed to know what he was talking about. In just about a decade, he had gone from two colonies to more than 400. In many instances only a few dead bees were still present, not like the old-fashioned starved colony of miteless years past where entire dead clusters remained within the hive. Sometimes honey was there and sometimes the colony was already surprisingly light in stores. What in the world was causing this high winter mortality and what could he do to stop the remainder of his colonies from dying? Was it Nosema? CCD? Old combs? Nectar from GM plant sources? He suddenly said, But if you knew the answers, you would be very popular and very wealthy! Wow! Was he ever right on that score? I m neither. 3

4 Another Frustrated Beekeeper - Me Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 During the second week in January, snow had fallen and was crunching beneath my feet as I returned from my storage barn. It was a bright day so it was easy to see the little black spot on the brilliantly white snow. It was a dead bee that I duly noted. Humph. A few more crunching steps and yet another black spot. Whoa! In fact, there were dead and dying bees everywhere. What in the world is going on? My three beehives were near the storage barn. They were from packages in the spring and had built up nicely. I had given them full frames of capped honey. I provided fully drawn combs on which they could initiate a brood nest. They accepted the new queens without signs of supercedure. They exhibited good flight all spring and summer. Now this. Where were all these dead bees coming from? In fact, they were coming from the middle of my three hives. It was 28 F outside on a bright, still day. Yet the hive was alive with frantic bees at all entrances and a small pile of dead bees accumulating on the ground. They appeared agitated and frantic, as though they were all trying to leave at once. They seemed absolutely eager to die. As I stood there, watching in confused amazement, a few bees departed on suicide flights. What was going on? The same issue plaguing the beekeeper who had called? I don t know. Some Thoughts on Unexplained Die-Offs Both Yours and Mine Figure 1. All seemed quiet, but the middle hive has serious problems. Reusing Old Combs The frustrated beekeeper mentioned his reuse of old combs to establish replacement colonies. That is a common procedure throughout beekeeping. Most beekeepers recycle old combs as they manipulate their colonies. The potential problem with this procedure is a low-key subject that is periodically brought up by various scientists and beekeepers: Beeswax is a chemical blotter. It seems that any chemical that comes near it is partially absorbed by this wax. It has been suggested that, at some levels, harmful levels of residues are reached that negatively affect developing brood. Testing combs is impractical for nearly all of us. How long to use combs, when to replace, and how to replace are some of the common unanswered questions in this area. This is one of those partially answered questions in beekeeping. We know that chemicals accumulate, but when is too much too much? As has been the case with most gap beekeepers, the concerned beekeeper on the phone kept records comparing packages initiated on combs compared to longevity of colonies begun on foundation. He could see no difference so he will continue to recycle combs. This event was not analytical science. It does not speak to all of us, but in his case, it speaks to him. For the present, he will not destroy old combs. 4

5 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company Package Bee Costs and Availability My frustrated caller flatly stated that it was presently worth the money for him to replace dead-outs with early spring packages. Last season his package bees built up in time to produce tons of honey. He installed packages during cool weather in March, something he had never done before. He worried and tossed that night, but all went well. He has made some interesting observations. Installing packages during cold weather restricts excessive bee flight. Honestly, I never knew what truly happens to all those randomly flying bees that fill the sky when multiple packages are installed at the same time and installed near to each other. I would like to think that they all find a hive somewhere but I know that some (even many) are lost forever. Installing packages on warm days gives the bees a chance to take cleansing flights and to position themselves on combs, but they do drift toward the end colonies. No big deal equalize the colonies later in the summer and all is back on course. But installing earlier (and colder) would eliminate a colony equalization procedure and would get the bees on the job earlier. As we talked, and as I have talked to others, we lamented the fact that winter-kill percentages are significantly higher than years ago. In the good old days, less than 10% would perish during the winter. Now, 40-50% is not unheard of and the survivors are weak. It seems inconceivable, but will the early spring day come when we find that all colonies have died? Well, we would just have to buy more packages. Figure 2. Dead bees from last spring s packages. How will the package producers keep their bees alive if ours are all dying in significant numbers? Then what will happen to our bee enterprise? Like rotting fruit on a leafless limb, that question just hung out there somewhere in phone land. This discussion was nothing more than a friendly pity party and neither of us was predicting that such winter loss events will come to pass. But once we talked and laughed about it, our light-heartedness left a threatening taste. It was the same feeling I had as a kid when I tossed stones at wasp nests. Started out funny but didn t always end that way. Even So, Too Many Colonies Die During Winter Months So, if we agree that we have plenty of questions and not enough answers, what are we to do here in the gap? Like New Year s Resolutions, each winter/early spring I make a list of things I will do differently this upcoming season. I am now leaving plenty of honey plenty. That is a change from seasons past. In fact, I commonly have honey left on the colony for the splits/packages that I install the following spring. But for six years or so, 5

6 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 some of the most unexpected colonies have died and on occasion, some of the weakest colonies survive. Go figure. Am I just misremembering? Decades ago, did populous colonies sometimes die and I have just forgotten? Regardless, I want to address this abnormal winter flight that some of my colonies have exhibited for many years now. Even if the effects of Nosema are not the only problem, I suspect that it may be part of the problem, and I suspect that Nosema has been some part of my bees problems essentially every year for many years. Fumagilin-B Tends To Be Hard To Feed But here s the truth: I have always found feeding Fumagilin-B to be a hit/miss procedure. Some colonies would take the medicated syrup while others either ignored it or could not figure out to make the feeder work. The powder would clump and the product was a bit pricey. Time and again, I threaten to put it on the following fall or spring. But officially, Nosema treatments are on my to-do list. This is not the first time that Nosema treatments have been on that prestigious list. Somewhere in Maryland, many years ago, I visited a beekeeper who was feeding sugar syrup in plastic bags into which he had cut clean slits with a very sharp knife. I was certain that the syrup would all leak out. It didn t. That idea is now being used by some to supply Fumagilin-B medicated syrup in spring or fall. Individuals using this procedure do not have to store feeders and problems with mold growth are eliminated. While listening to the frustrated beekeeper explain the unfolding mystery, my memory drifted back to one of my earliest academic years in beekeeping: I was at the University of Maryland, working for Dr. Dewey Caron. I had wintering colonies fecal spotting the whole area so I was using a hemocytometer to count Nosema spores to determine if the University bees were suffering from Nosema. At the time, Dr. Basil Furgala, University of Minnesota, was actively promoting Nosema as the unseen illness of the bee world. Though I really can t remember, I feel certain that some level of Nosema apis was present then and that it is still very much present today. Now here I am, 37 years later wondering if I should be looking at Nosema once again for being the current bane of my bee colonies. This time, I will be expecting to see Nosema ceranae rather than Nosema apis but the treatment will still be the same: Fumagilin-B. I realized that gap beekeeping is not restricted to mite problems. We have actually been keeping bees in the gap in regards to issues such as Nosema, American foulbrood, chalk brood and now small hive beetles (SHB). I snapped back to the conversation with the frustrated beekeeper with the refreshed realization that many of these issues are like old, familiar enemies. While we have not defeated a single bee enemy, we and our bees are still here. Our bee industry is much like the plight of Andrew Barton: I am hurt, but I am not slain; I will lay me down and bleed a while, And then I will rise and fight again. Time and again, our industry has been hurt, but after a while would rise to fight again. So whatever is killing my frustrated beekeeper friend s bees is certainly making him and many other beekeepers bleed, but we will continue to find ways to keep our bees. After we rest for a while. Questions or comments about this article? Please go to kelleybees.com/blog. 6

7 Queenright By A Brilliant Writer 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company Editor s Note: I m so so so so sorry! I misplaced the name of the person who wrote and sent us this article. I have no excuses (but I do have 18 really busy hives if that counts for anything?) Please let me know who you are so I may give you a well-deserved salute next issue. Thanks. And again, my humblest apologies. We are coming into the time of year that you ll be doing inspections and finding queens that are failing, missing, or you re not sure what the deal is but you think some hives are queenless. The problem with the situation is you may think they are queenless when actually they have a virgin that isn t laying yet, or you may think they have laying workers, when actually the queen just hasn t hit her stride yet and laid multiple eggs. How can you do the right thing when you are not certain? Panacea There are few solutions as universal in their application and success than adding a frame of open brood every week for three weeks. It is a virtual panacea for any queen issues. It gives the bees the pheromones to suppress laying workers. It gives them more workers coming in during a period where there is no laying queen. It does not interfere if there is a virgin queen. It gives them the resources to rear a queen. It is virtually foolproof and does not require finding a queen or seeing eggs. If you have any issue with queenrightness, no brood, worry that there is no queen, this is the simple solution that requires no worrying, no waiting, and no hoping. You just give them what they need to resolve the situation. If you have any doubts about the queenrightness of a hive, give them some open brood and sleep well. Repeat once a week for two more weeks if you still aren t sure. By then things will be fine. If you are afraid of transferring the queen from the queenright hive because you are not good at finding queens, then shake or brush all the bees off before you give it to them. If you are concerned about taking eggs from another new package or small colony, keep in mind that bees have little invested in eggs and the queen can lay far more eggs than a small colony can warm, feed and raise. Taking a frame of eggs from a small struggling new hive and swapping it for an empty comb or any drawn comb will have little impact on the donor colony and may save the recipient if they are indeed queenless. If the recipient didn t need a queen it will fill in the gap while the new queen gets mated and not interfere with things. Questions or comments about this article? Please go to kelleybees.com/blog. 7

8 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 Drone Comb for Mite Minimization By Camilla Bee, Editor A senior beekeeper at Field Days last year told me all colonies have mites in this beekeeping era. The problem is when the mite population gets out of control. I scoffed. Convinced I couldn t possibly have mites in my hives, last summer I randomly did a check to prove myself right. I was wrong. Not only were there mites, but they were having a party with every mite from a twenty-state area. It was quite depressing almost as depressing as finding those hives dead this spring because they never did recover last fall (I suspect) from a summer of mites. This year I m proactive, using plastic drone comb. The Theory Behind Drone Comb Drone brood removal is based on three aspects of the mite s biology: 1. Mites spend most of their time in capped brood cells. Deformed wing virus (DWV) is symptomatic of mites. Photo courtesy of Sean Burgess. 2. Mites can be found 5 12 times as often in cells with drone brood as in those with worker brood. 3. Mites using worker brood as a host average offspring, while those using drone brood average offspring. So, by removing capped drone brood from an infected colony, you remove a disproportionately large number of mites without affecting the worker population, and you remove those mites with the highest fecundity. 1 Using Drone Comb This non-chemical method has its advantages, a primary one being that you can use it throughout honey production season. Being new to this, here s how I went about it. Obtain Drone Comb Drone comb, which has a larger cell size, comes in a plastic frame (available from Kelley s); you may also obtain drone foundation for insertion into a standard frame. Another option is to encourage bees to make drone comb. Place a medium or shallow frame in a deep box; chances are they ll draw out the remaining space in drone-sized comb. How Many? Generally, two per established colony. I ve got two in the upper deeps of each of my established hives. 1 Drone Brood Removal for the Management of Varroa destructor, Nicholas W. Calderone, Cornell University Master Beekeeper Program 8

9 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company When to Add Early in the season when bees are busy drawing comb, not focused on filling it. You can add it later (like when you know you have a problem), but this is about prevention. It is easier to never let the mite population build up than work to knock it down. Where to Add Like everything in beekeeping, there are varying opinions on this. Cornell University s Master Beekeeping Program recommends adding it one or two frames from the edge; many other have had success adding them in the middle of the brood nest. Find a method that works for you. When to Remove Once the frame is predominantly capped, remove and replace with either another frame of drone comb or another frame to keep bees from filling in the space with their own creative comb. The bright green drone comb / frame is easy to spot. Kill the brood and any hitchhiking mites, typically by freezing it 1-2 days. If you used the medium / shallow frame method, you can break off the drone comb and reinsert the frame into the hive. Capped drone brood is uneven, bumpy and protrudes further than flat worker brood. 9

10 Dealing with Dead Brood Again, there are a couple schools of thought on this. One recommended method requires four frames per colony; two on the hive at any given time, and the other two in the freezer. When the two in the hive have been mainly capped, thaw the two in the freezer and swap them with the hive comb. House bees will clean up the recently thawed drone comb, getting a protein meal which helps recoup the energy investment they made in the drones. Freeze the just-removed capped frames until the two frames in the hive are ready to be swapped out again. To minimize my investment in drone comb (and save freezer space), I instead only freeze the capped brood for a few days. I then slice off the caps and gently smack the edge of the frame on a rock in my backyard pond. (Sending the larva into the mouths of happily awaiting fish.) Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 I then rinsed off debris and insert it back into another hive where the brood comb is ready for removal. This method means I m often rotating drone comb in and out of hives, but I don t mind working different hives of bees every few days. Slicing the cap off for ease of extraction. If you don t have anxiously awaiting fish, or your stomach doesn t like the eeewww factor of the method I used, you can remove the cap to make it easier for birds and bugs to clean up the comb. If you re blessed with a lot of extra time and a strong stomach, you can pick out the dead larva with a toothpick before reinserting it back into a hive. A lot of beekeepers I talked with think we should remove the dead larva, as that allows the bees to spend their energy doing things they do best (like making honey). How Long to Use Drone Comb Until the queen quits filling it. As nights cool down, the queen will slow down and stick towards the inner frames with brood. Remove it then for use next season, again replacing it with a standard frame. Questions or comments about this article? Please go to kelleybees.com/blog. 10

11 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company Bee -Havior It s Swarm Season! Tis the season for swarming, and it is going on, even in apiaries where folks have worked hard to try and prevent it. We appreciate your pictures and capture stories. We had an from Bill, who said he d like to send pictures and information, but he s capturing 3-4 a day and is too busy to do anything else. (Bill, we re all envious.) Here are photos of recently captured swarms. Folks, we LOVE sharing your bee photos. Please send them to KelleyBeesEditor@gmail.com, thank you. Miracle Camp & Retreat Center, near Lawton, MI (miraclecamp.com) is a wonderful place. Just ask these bees. Photo courtesy of D. Miller, Outdoor Program Director. I made some swarm traps over the winter and had this one hanging in an apple tree. The swarm the day before didn t use it but this swarm did. I started out the season with 3 hives. With them swarming and some queens I bought and installed in nuc hives, I now have 7 hives. They are keeping me busy. R. Wright Tony K. (right) suffered about 100 wasp stings years ago and is totally scared of stinging insects, but knew having someone capture the swarm was the right thing to do. He got a couple jars of honey from appreciative beekeeper Marshall, left. Both swarms are doing well with queens busily laying lovely brood patterns. 11 The swarm call came on a Saturday and we were out of town until Tuesday, but the bees nicely decided to wait until we could get there that evening. There were actually two swarms; one a gallonbucket-sized ball, the other about the size of an apple. Not only did we appreciate them hanging around, we also appreciated that they swarmed to a low-hanging, easily accessible branch.

12 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 Jim Dunn, of Georgia, has more than doubled the size of his beeyard this year because of swarms. Jim caught five in three days over Easter weekend alone! Jim happened upon this swarm when they were buzzing about, and beat on a drum lid for about five minutes to settle them, a trick he d heard from an old beekeeper nearly 50 years ago. Jim can t swear by the technique, but said that swirling cloud of bees settled on a low-hanging branch shortly after he started doing it. It looks like a disorganized mess at this point, but it wasn t long until Jim had a new swarm to which he s already had to add a honey super. The white sheet helped him better see the bees that didn t go into the box when he first lowered the swarm. Because the queen was in the box, Jim said all the workers lined up and marched right in. Questions or comments about this article? Please go to kelleybees.com/blog. 12

13 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company Bee-Yond & Bee-Hind the Hives Your Honey House Part 2 By Kim Flottum, Editor of Bee Culture magazine and author of The BackYard Beekeeper, The Honey Handbook, and Better Beekeeping. All are available from Kelley s. Editor s Note: Last month, Kim covered considerations for planning and setting up your honey house. This month, he looks at handling, warm rooms, and extracting. While most of our readers will never get to this stage, it is fun to dream! And if you re beyond the dreaming stage, consult with Kelley s for all the equipment you ll need. Moving There s an old rule about manufacturing that applies to honey management: Plan your space so that the product (in this case honey in supers) begins at point A, travels through all the appropriate steps (warming, uncapping, extracting, settling or filtering, storing, bottling or packaging), and ends up on the truck heading to the customer. Way too often, because we don t plan ahead, we end up having to move everything supers, pails, bottles far too many times. There s an old saw that says on average we beekeepers lift a pound of honey at least seven times from hive to customer. Let s see: 1. Lift the super off the hive onto the truck (tough to mechanize this step). When moving supers, use every device known to man to avoid lifting. Two wheel carts, fork lifts, or like here, a roller. They all help. 2. Lift the super off the truck and into the honey house, preferably directly into the warming area. A two-wheeler or forklift can do this, but you may just skip it and move on to step Move the honey out of the warming area (or directly from the truck) into the uncapping area. Immediate processing makes avoiding the heating room possible. 4. Remove frames and uncap, either by hand (ugh) or one at a time into a machine. If by hand, figure you lifted it twice because you have to do each side; if by machine, figure twice because you have to take it out of the uncapper and onto some sort of holder/waiting area to get to the extractor, or directly into the extractor, so that makes five or maybe six times, and then drain extractor into a pail, then pump through a filter or directly to a holding tank. 5. Carry pail to truck, or move it with two-wheeler or forklift. 6. Move it off truck and into warehouse, store, farm market stand. Then move it back. That makes seven. 13

14 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 So it might be seven or as many as eleven if you are really unorganized. The goal of your honey house plan is to make sure it s no more than seven, fewer if possible. If it s more you ll wear it out before you even sell it. So you ve figured out your loading ramp or truck bay situation and now have to look at the next step. That s either directly to the uncapping area or a quick stop in the warming room. Warm Room If you want a warm room, figure drip trays for every stack so the bottom super is sealed and isn t sitting on the floor and drips are caught in the, yes, drip tray. Air circulation makes this work because warm air should enter at the bottom and naturally move up, to be either expelled especially if you are also drying the air or re-warmed and recirculated. You ll need fans and vents and dehumidifiers for all of this, so get an HVAC expert in to advise on cubic feet of air to move per minute, venting outside (some places require an inspection and permit for this, so don t forget to check), and of course some way to warm that air before it gets to your honey. A small, simple space heater may solve all your problems, but it won t for long, so think furnace or other heat source. But small hive beetles have changed how we look at warm rooms. You just can t leave honey supers without bees sitting around any more; any beetles hiding inside will have a field day and ruin your crop. You have a short window of time to get supers in, warmed if needed, and out to the uncapping area and moved along. If you harvest on the warm side of summer you should be fine, but many don t take honey off until it begins to cool. Warm rooms may have to change from slow and easy heat to flash hot say 90 degrees in a hurry with good insulation so the honey warms fast. If you don t have a warm room, and even if you don t have beetles, consider the humidity of the area the honey is in. A closed garage can be a tad humid and honey will take up that moisture, which could be enough to set it over the fermenting edge. That means trouble later. 14 Make sure you ll have room for one of these (left) when you get one of these (right). A heated floor and exhaust fans make warming fast and easy. Frames on the same level as the top of the extractor makes loading easy. Just keep the super they came from on the same level as the uncapping tank.

15 Uncapping 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company Here s where you can really waste a lot of time, or speed things along. If you remove caps by hand with a knife, I recommend having two or three knives on hand so you can always have a hot one ready placing them on a hot plate works well. Make sure the knife is warm enough but not so hot that it boils the honey on the leading edge of the blade. Keep it below 100 degrees, all the time. When you are uncapping, keep everything at a comfortable height to avoid unnecessary bending, twisting, and reaching. This means your supers should be at the same level as the surface you are uncapping on, and your catch tank should be From uncapper to extractor: close and no lifting. below that surface. To unglue the frames, place a board beneath the super in your uncapping area so when the super is in place, the board pushes all the frames up. If you plan your uncapping space for efficiency and ergonomic comfort, you ll work faster and your back and shoulders will appreciate it. Now you ve harvested, moved and uncapped. Next time we ll focus on extracting and more. Questions or comments about this article? Please go to kelleybees.com/blog. Young Wisdom By Camilla Bee, Editor When Eddison was 10 years old, an older guy came to his Vacation Bible School to talk about beekeeping. Eddison was spellbound. When you re 10, most every guy you encounter is an older guy. But, with 51 being the average age of an American beekeeper, to a wideeyed 10-year-old boy, that beekeeper must ve appeared ancient. Thank goodness that older guy took the time to talk to a group of young pups it caused the American beekeeper average age to come down a bit. A passion was sparked that day, and three years later, Eddison, now age 13, is in his fourth year as a beekeeper. I meet plenty of kids who are interested in bees, who hope to someday keep bees, who help their parents with bees. Photo courtesy of Brian Peters. Eddison isn t one of those. He s actually keeping bees, with goals and plans for apiary expansion and product marketing. His knowledge about bees, and his ability to articulate it, is impressive. I m one of those older folks who keeps bees; I ve been doing it about as long as Eddison. However, shortly into our interview, I found myself asking questions not as an interviewer, but because I have some things going on in my hives and needed Eddison s insight. There must be an older guy or two trapped inside of young Eddison, 15

16 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 because he seems to have years of expertise and the ability to explain it to me without making me feel silly. And he s right; getting my beetle traps in before I see beetles everywhere would be smart. Eddison tends five thriving hives in southern Indiana. Two are original packages from Kelley s; the other three are swarms he s captured. He talked me through a typical swarm capture, noting there s no such thing as typical. The first thing you have to do, he shared, is assess the situation. He described some of the challenges he s faced, and noted that it is helpful to have a second person to help, usually his Dad. Part of Eddison s plan for this year includes capturing more swarms. He s found that the hives from swarms, while a bit more feisty, seem more resilient. He has a few swarm traps out and his fingers crossed because he wants to build up to eight or nine hives. Eddison also hopes to get enough honey this year to sell at a roadside stand so he can purchase a bee suit. You see, Eddison has been doing all of this with just a veil, and he suspects a proper bee suit will mean fewer stings. It sounds like he s already had more than his fair share, but he adds only because he wasn t being as careful as he should have been. That you can manage honeybees raise them and control them like other animals that was the realization that initially sparked 10-year-old Eddison s interest. His motivation for keeping bees now has grown beyond that fascination. He also does it for honey to help his allergies, and because bees help his Mom s garden. He s shared his interest with some friends, who agree with him that beekeeping is totally cool, but many others don t know about this side of the seventh grader. Eddison is proud that his beekeeping has inspired others, noting that the world needs more bees and beekeepers. Because of his efforts, there are some neighbors who ordered bees from Kelley s this year. (Thanks Eddison!) Why Kelley s? Initially, location. When he decided to become a beekeeper, Eddison researched what was needed. Kelley s was a reasonable drive away for an annual outing, where he could stock up on everything he needed and save shipping costs. On what was undoubtedly a red-letter day in this young man s life, he watched a package installation at bee pick-up day then went home and did the same. He said he really liked the friendliness and helpfulness of the folks at Kelley s. He added that he also really, really appreciated the free doughnuts. Kelley s works hard at customer service; we want to keep customers for life. When one of your most loyal customers has been keeping bees going on four years, and is only 13, we ll work extra-hard to earn his loyalty and trust. There s a life of fun and fascination ahead for Eddison, and excitement for us due to his enthusiasm and patronage. Here s to the start of a great relationship, Eddison we ll make sure to continue producing quality equipment for you and your bees, and keep the doughnuts coming. Questions or comments about this article? Please go to kelleybees.com/blog. 16 Photo courtesy of Brian Peters.

17 Healing Honey By Lady Spirit Moon 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company Honey is hygroscopic, meaning it draws. This drawing power is why it is excellent for open wounds. My grandson had a deep scratch on his ankle where he had poison ivy, with white bumps on the edge of the wound. The white bumps meant infection was ready to set in. I put raw honey on the wound then placed a Band-Aid on top. Because of honeybees putting hydrogen peroxide in the honey and the honey being hygroscopic, all bacteria were killed on the edges and any infection in the wound was drawn out. This Band-Aid was put on at 5 p.m. The next morning around 11 a.m. I asked to see the Band-Aid and was told it was gone. Looking at the wound, the ugly red was replaced with a healthy pale pink color, the wound had closed, and all signs of infection were gone. Honey s density will not allow air to get to the wound. The wound not having to deal with bacteria in the air allows the body to heal the wound from within; thereby, healing faster. Editor s Note: Lady Spirit Moon is an ambassador for the Center for Honeybee Research, We featured the Center in an article in last month s issue, and are making it easier for our readers to help the Center help honeybees. Go to where you ll see the Click Here to visit the Center for Honeybee Research s home page link. The Walter T. Kelley Company will donate a dollar for every contribution our readers make. Thank you! Questions or comments about this article? Please go to kelleybees.com/blog. 17

18 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 Walter T. Kelley Summer Field Day 2012 Register now to join us for Field Day on June 2nd, 2012 for a day of beekeeping classes and fun. This annual event is held at the Walter T. Kelley facility in Clarkson, KY. Field day is an activity-packed day with guest speakers, hive inspections, demonstrations, and even a catered lunch. To date this event has been a huge success with over 400 in attendance and we anticipate this year will be even better. We will allow limited registration at the gate from 7am-8:30am. The cost will be $ To Pre-Register: Visit: Kelley Field Days Cost: $25 Featured speaker Cleo Hogan. When you pre-register, please list the names of everyone attending. Ask about special pricing for seniors and children under 12. This is a tentative schedule--please check the web for updates as it evolves! CEO Jane Burgess leading a tour. Location A1 Tent B2 Behind Office Time 7A 8:30A 8:30A 8:45A 8:45A 9:30A 9:45A 10:30A 10:45A Lunch Handling a HOT Hive Dr. Jim Tew DCA Drone Congregation Area Dr. Tom Webster C3 Wax Building D4 Kitchen E5 Old Office Apiary (see map) Inspection Apiaries Registration Introduction Key Speaker Dr Jim Tew Making Hard Decisions About Your Honey Bee Queens What's new Apimondia 2011 Overview Bee Swarm Cappings to Inspections Wintering Nucs Issues Pulling Supers Harvestor Candles 1. Burgess Michael Bush Worldwide Joe Taylor Cleo Hogan Tamara Rahm 2. Qualls Charlotte Hubbard Pollen Lip Balms & Non Grafting Hive Mgt. Making Splits Collection Lotions Kathy Queen Rearing 1. M Bush Lunch Cleo Hogan Joe Taylor Sherrard John Pace 2. Rahm 11:35A Lunch 11:30A Lunch 11:40A Lunch 11:50A Lunch 12P Lunch Other Kelley Tour & History Earl or Jane 11:35A Lunch 12:45P 1:35P Lunch Four Simple Steps Michael Bush Lunch Queen Rearing Dr. Tom Webster Small Hive Beetle Trevor Qualls 12:40 Lunch Handling a HOT Hive Dr. Jim Tew Extracting Tamara Raham 12:30 Lunch Cooking with Kelsey Kelsey Salmon Making Splits & Nucs John Pace 12:20 Lunch Natural Treatments for Bees John Seaborn Top Bar Hive Michael Bush 12:15 Lunch Pollen Pollen Collection Joe Taylor Inspections 1. Taylor 12P Lunch Hive Mgt. 1. Burgess 2. Hogan Kelley Tour & History Earl or Jane Kelley Tour & History Earl or Jane 1:45P 2:30P Swarm Prevention & Splits Michael Bush Handling A HOT Hive Dr Jim Tew FAQ New Bee Mistakes Learning from Oopsies Charlotte Hubbard Natural Beekeeping Trevor Qualls Making a Split Cleo Hogan Inspections 1. Taylor 2. Burgess 2:45P 3:15P Door Prizes & Adjournment 18

19 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company HAS Swarms St. Louis, July By Jane Sueme, Isabee s Equipment and Supplies, St. Louis, MO The 2012 Heartland Apicultural Society (HAS) Conference will be held July on the University of Missouri (UMSL) campus in St. Louis, Missouri. The three-day conference will be swarming with beekeepers old and new, instructional programs in the classrooms, hands-on classes in the apiary, vendor displays and on-campus accommodations. Virtually all of the conference activities will take place under one roof at the UMSL JC Penny Conference Center with labs and an apiary 200 yards from the main auditorium. Speakers attending HAS this year include: Dr. Greg Hunt, Purdue University; Dr. Tom Webster, Kentucky State University; Dr. Jim Tew, Ohio State University; Kim Flottum, Bee Culture Magazine; Jerry Hayes, Monsanto Corporation and the American Bee Journal; Dr. Zachary Huang, Michigan State University; Michael Bush, Bush Farm; Phil Craft and others. Sessions are designed for beekeepers at all skill levels in a flexible track format with most classes offered in several time slots over the three days. Classes offered include a special beginner s track for those with no beekeeping experience, as well as advanced topics for beekeepers with many years experience and those in-between. A three-day queen-rearing course will be offered in half-day sessions conducted in the apiary and lab. In additional to the education programming, there will be a large vendor show, evening social events, and sightseeing tours in the St. Louis area during the day. The evening social gathering on campus is a great time to meet fellow beekeepers from Alabama, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, Missouri, Tennessee, West Virginia and beyond! Accommodations include University of Missouri dormitory housing and meals available at an economical cost for participants, as well as special rates at nearby hotels. For the non-beekeepers joining us in St. Louis, there will be guided tours to some of the favorite points of interest in the area. 19

20 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 St. Louis, like other urban areas across the country, has experienced an explosion of interest in honeybee beekeeping in the past 5 years. The Three Rivers Beekeepers, formed in 2009, as well as popular beginning workshops hosted by the Eastern Missouri Beekeepers Association and other local bee clubs, together draw over 300 members to area meetings every month. The St. Louis beekeeping community is abuzz with excitement to be hosting this important regional event! According to Phil Craft, HAS Program Director, the Heartland Apiculture Society was established in 2001 to fill a void in the Midwest for beekeeping education and to provide an economical beekeeping conference every summer, with hands-on training. We always hold the conference at a university to have easy access to economical accommodations. Membership by beekeepers is established by attending a conference; there are no dues. Member states are established by participation in the HAS organization leadership. This annual conference is our only activity, hence low overhead. Pre-registration forms and program details are available at Forms will need to be returned by mail only (no online submission) by June 28th for pre-registration. Questions or comments about this article? Please go to kelleybees.com/blog. This dramatic honeybee photo, courtesy of Jonathan Dy, will be featured in a summer story on his work with honeybees. Watch for it in a future issue. 20

21 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company ABeeCs Brood 101 This section of our newsletter shares beekeeping basics. We ve received a lot of questions about brood; hopefully these photographs will help clarify. A great brood pattern practically every cell contains an egg. Questions or comments about this article? Please go to kelleybees.com/blog. You can get a sense of the age of brood by the color. The lightly colored cap on this brood shows suggests that these larvae were recently capped. Contrast it with the darker, more amber color in the other photos. Another suggested indication that this brood is younger is that it is next to open (still to be capped) larva. This is drone brood or dude brood. Note the irregular topography and extrusion of the cap, as compared to the smoothness of worker bee brood. 21

22 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 BeeCause Influencing Future Beekeepers Shannon Tieken has combined a few of her passions kids, learning and teaching, honeybees, and taking care of the planet and is helping her corner of the world better understand the importance of bees, as shown in this photo of her eagerly observed observation hive at Karen s Kids, a day care facility. The observation hive, donated by the Walter T. Kelley Company, will have many miles on it as Shannon shares with interested audiences the benefits of this essential insect. She has plans to use it at some county fair booths this summer, and it is slotted for use in upcoming Master Gardener and Master Naturalist programs, which Shannon instructs. Photo courtesy of Shannon Tieken. The young woman beaming in this photo is Madeline, Shannon s daughter. If her smile is any indication, she ll follow in her mother s footsteps of loving honeybees. Shannon shared the observation hive with a couple different groups, and noted that the three- and fouryear-olds were, that particular day, more attentive than the five-yearolds. Their teacher, raised by beekeeper parents, had already talked with her students about bees and pupae, larvae, etc. Photo courtesy of Shannon Tieken. We re delighted to be able to further beekeeping through charitable efforts such as the donation of this observation hive. Questions or comments about this article? Please go to kelleybees.com/blog. 22

23 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company Featured Products There are thousands of excellent bee books, and this new publication Bee-sentials, A Field Guide is one deserving of a place on your shelf. Because a picture is worth a thousand words, practically every page has one or several clear, color photographs to reinforce the text, making this book helpful for rookies who perhaps don t understand what they re seeing, as well as a visual treat for those who simply love honeybees. Interspersed throughout the book are questions from beekeepers (and answers) that allow for very readable bee information to be dispensed on a practical I saw this happening and what do I do? level. This time of year, you re probably ready to stock up on honey labels and containers. Our skep labels are a great way to get started selling your honey. All honey that is sold is required to have a label with the producer s name and the weight of the honey. Our labels come in various sizes and shapes, and some can be delivered with custom printing. Cat # 678 Cat # 412 Cat # PW5 Cat # 225 As for the containers, we carry everything you need for storage and display, from jars to jugs to tanks! Cat # 218 Cat # 135 Cat #

24 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 FAQs Please note: Correspondence submitted to the Kelley Bee News Modern Beekeeping newsletter (or subsequent publications) becomes the property of the Walter T. Kelley Company. We reserve the right to print or not print any correspondence and it may be edited for length and/or clarity. It may be published or republished in any format or medium and/or licensed to others for publication. If we publish your correspondence, we may attribute it to you and may include your name and city, unless you expressly request that you remain anonymous. Last month we ran this photo. Brian wondered where the red pollen might be from, and suspected the purple flower sticking to the pollen sac may be a good clue. We asked for reader input, and readers, you re awesome! We received some answers via (noted below), and some via the interactive blog (kelleybees.com/blog/). While we won t routinely include blog comments here, there were such enthusiastic responses that we wanted to share them. Of course, I m also using all these replies as an excuse to feature another one of the awesome photos Brian provided, because like most of the readers of this publication, we love looking at bee pictures! My vote is for Red Deadnettle: Ash I believe the red pollen is from Storks bill. Here in the Shenandoah Valley of VA I have seen it blooming as early as January, and have watched the bees working the flowers collecting the Photo courtesy of Brian Peters. red pollen. See this website: K Fisher Red pollen is Henbit? Great letter! Jose A. Hi. In response to the reader s question about the bright red pollen, I referred to my trusty pollen chart that can be found here: and it looks like the very common garden weed Henbit, sometimes called Dead Nettle, genus Lamium, may be the source. The flower part that was in the photo looks like a dead nettle blossom, too. Thanks for the informative newsletter, K. Arnett Cincinnati Is the red pollen, pictured in the May newsletter, from lilac flower? The purple piece almost resembles a lilac flower piece. Mike & Rhonda C. Taylorsville, KY I believe the red pollen is from a maple tree. D. Hill Germantown, OH Photo courtesy of Brian Peters. 24

25 Q: 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company Why, when you re making a split, don t you instead take the existing queen to the nuc box? In other words, why not add the (new) queen in the parent hive and move the existing queen to a new hive? Wouldn t that better satisfy her possible urge to swarm? Beekeeping expert Cleo Hogan fielded this question for us. (By the way, Cleo is again a speaker at June s Field Days.) A: Most often that is what I do. You will be taking a smaller number of bees, in the nuc. Keep in mind that while you are making the split there may be thousands of bees in the field and buzzing around the hive. I think it is better to take the queen who is already laying and familiar with the bees who are going with her to the nuc and the new location. If you make the split and put the new queen in the nuc, it may be a few days before she starts laying valuable time. The area is new to her, and the bees are new to her; an increased chance of rejection of the new queen. Q: Q: And yes it will reduce her urge to swarm since she is in a smaller container with fewer bees, at a new location. I contacted you (in May) and asked about the shell that might have been for a queen. I hope everything looks okay. I would appreciate any help. My queen isn t being very productive. Should I requeen? JT, KY A: Because this question came from someone quite close to our Kentucky location, we went on a site visit. Turns out the queen had a beautiful brood pattern, but she was perhaps working a bit too hard as this new-bee beekeeper was: opening the hive a lot to check on things and continually mixing untouched foundation amongst foundation the bees had started to draw or had drawn out. The queen is the life and future of the hive the star. Anything that can be done to keep her focused on laying and not distracted by other things will help the hive. In this case, we advised our customer to not continually intersperse new comb with drawn comb, and to let the queen be, slowing down hive checks to once a week or so, instead of every few days. Great newsletter, do you have any pictures of hives that had the SHB, and what the mess looks like? M. Chlipala A: Readers, can you help us out here? (And if you can, sorry for your loss!) Questions or comments about this article? Please go to kelleybees.com/blog. Beek Hint I find mowing around the hives easier when there is a strong flow going on. Busy bees have one thing in mind; carrying in nectar. When no flow is coming in, I don the hat and veil and proceed with the weed eater. DON T TARRY! P. Cornell 25

26 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 Sweet as Honey Please note: Correspondence submitted to the Kelley Bee News Modern Beekeeping newsletter (or subsequent publications) becomes the property of the Walter T. Kelley Company. We reserve the right to print or not print any correspondence and it may be edited for length and/or clarity. It may be published or republished in any format or medium and/ or licensed to others for publication. If we publish your correspondence, we may attribute it to you and may include your name and city, unless you expressly request that you remain anonymous. We LOVE this! We provide this newsletter to help bees by helping their caretakers with key information. As beekeepers, we know too well how daunting it is to get all the knowledge you need to sustain thriving hives. A few issues ago we incorporated the blog feature so you could read an article and post a comment or question to it. That s happening, and better yet, readers are responding to help clarify and enlighten others. For example, look at this recent exchange: As a novice beekeeper, I would like to know what signs (in the hive and out) show that the spring nectar flow has started. I need to know when to stop feeding. Thanks. I am a bee lover but have had hives for 2 years but still consider myself a novice especially when reading some of these articles don t know which way to go sometimes. My observation is that when you see lots of activity bees coming and going and you see a lot of them landing heavy I mean really landing hard and kind of clumsy you are close to the honey flow. I have added a larger sloped landing strip in front of my hives and it seems to help give some of these heavy bees (full of nectar) a place to land and crawl up to the hive entrance. Before, they landed on the ground lots of times and seemed to rest a while before taking off and flying up to the entrance. Readers, THANKS SO MUCH! Meanwhile, here are some other comments we received that are sweet as honey. I forgot to mention when I picked up my bees how much I enjoy and appreciate your monthly newsletter. It is unfailingly interesting, informative and relevant, and I love that you include pictures of people and bees and things. I think it s the single best thing that Kelley Bees has done in the last couple of years. I particularly feel a kindred spirit in Charlotte Hubbard and her various challenges with smokers, overwintering colonies and protective clothing. I am also always learning! Ever a fan and loyal customer, J. Parent, KY I ve been a beekeeper since 1982, and I have never seen a newsletter better than yours. You do an excellent job and I hope to continue receiving them. P. Glosick, NY We have no intention of stopping this newsletter you may have noticed that it s grown and grown and grown. Please encourage your beekeeping friends and club members to subscribe; after all it s free. And, like a hive, our collective knowledge (when shared through communications like this newsletter and the blog) helps us all. 26

27 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company A lovely, capped queen cell. Excellent newsletter. It is all very helpful; I especially like the pictures where I need to find the queen, drones, and worker bees. R. Wantz Father, daughter and I visited your business this morning. This was the first time for my daughter and me. My father is 82 years old and is teaching us about bees. The reason I am writing is to thank all of you for your friendliness. But a big thanks to Jane Burgess. She waited on my father and daughter. She gave him a hug before we left. He was so impressed by this that he commented on it several times on our drive home. Thanks again for making our trip so enjoyable. R. Huxford As long as we re sharing readers singing Jane s praises: I placed an online order. I went online to check the status and it gave me a cart amount but everything else was blank. I called your company and Jane took the call. She was very helpful and I appreciated her assistance. The lady deserves a raise. Thank you! J. Miller, OH 27

28 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 By the way, that Jane is Kelley s CEO. And in praise of bees in general but specifically Russians: I picked up my bees in Kentucky on a beautiful summer day. By the time I crossed the Indiana state line, you could feel the cold. I followed the guidelines for installing bees in a top bar hive, and left a jar (1 pint) of raw honey for them to eat. Checked on them before dark to see if the rest of the bees had climbed out of the box, and into the hive, and they had NOT. It was so cold out, the rest had huddled together to stay warm. So fearing losing about a third of them, I put the whole box into the hive. We had a terrible week weather-wise, and before you knew it, here it is Saturday and I had done nothing to check on and care for my bees! Got the box out...easy. The jar of honey: gone. Went to pull out the queen box, and the top bar slats were stuck together. A few raps, and they broke free. Opened it up, and the queen was free! And those bees had been busy! There were two combs, one in front of her little box and one behind! And a little one attached to her box (about an inch square). The comb behind was about 8 x 8 and maybe deep. And the one in front was very close to the same size! Go Russia! I ve had a swarm before, one that I had retrieved from the outer wall of my house. Don t know what type they were. Unfortunately, they perished over a winter that saw well below zero degrees, and negative twenty-five wind chills. I was so sad, I didn t want to do it again for years. But I m happy now! And these Russian bees are by far more docile than the last ones. Thank you so much! Beekeeping is soooo COOL. Go Russia! P.S. I m packin a whole lot more straw around the hive this winter. Just in case. Paul R. Hi, I just wanted to thank you for the prompt delivery of three exceptional queens (2 Italian, 1 Russian). All the girls were healthy and strong and my hives readily accepted them and in one case ate through the candy in less than two days to release her. They are all now laying beautiful concentric circles of brood. I just thought I would you to thank you since you were able to accommodate my rather last minute order. Thanks and keep up the great work! S. Long In reference to May s beekeeper hint, which was Duh! Don t wear jeans with holes in the leg! from Kirt in ID, we received the following: Unfortunately this reminded me of my experience last week. When my daughter goes with me to check our three hives she gets the real suit and I cover up piecemeal, which includes tucking my jacket in my pants. Not real attractive I know, but the bees don t seem to mind. Partially through the hive I discovered I forgot to close my fly after tucking my jacket and it was standing wide open. Won t do that again! B & R Kreider 28

29 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company Foraging for Fun More Beekeeping Jokes? Really? By Camilla Bee, Editor Our thanks again to Stuart Ching, editor of The Eke (UK), for these beekeeping funnies. We d like to share other laughs, so please send your beekeeping / bee jokes and funnies to KelleyBeesEditor@gmail.com. An elderly beekeeper sent for some sheets of foundation. They arrived on his doorstep this morning but it says on the package DO NOT BEND. He s still wondering how the heck he s going to pick it up. A young novice beekeeper with one colony was talking to a bee farmer with a hundred colonies. Sir, what is the secret of your success? The farmer said Two words. And, Sir, what are they? Right decisions. But how do you make right decisions? One word, he responded. And, Sir, what is that? Experience. And how do you get experience? Two words And, Sir, what are they? Wrong decisions! A computer nerd took up beekeeping and attended his first apiary meeting. Unfortunately a bee got inside his beesuit and went down his back. A fellow beekeeper tried to catch the bee but could not locate it. The novice gave directions, No, not there. Scroll down a bit! There were two people walking down the street. One was a beekeeper. The other didn t have any money either. In the olden days this bee wanted to send a telegram so she rang the telegraph office. What is your message? asked the operator. Buzz, buzz, buzz, buzz replied the bee. The operator advised the bee that, for the same price, she could add another word. Don t be silly, replied the bee. That would sound ridiculous! 29

30 Kelley Bees News: Modern Beekeeping Issue 24, June 2012 Dronings from a Queen Bee Working Bees IN the Gulf of Mexico By Charlotte Hubbard My children, who are all grown-up and have flown the hive, are encouraging me to travel more. Are you just going to hang out around home and let old age catch you? they ask. (As opposed to meeting it in an airport?) The kids insist I travel more to see them; their schedules and careers don t allow them to take off much time. I guess I could travel more; it is certainly easier to nag them face-to-face about eating their vegetables. Other than the challenge of sitting in an airline seat the size of a nuc box, I have no real issue with travelling. What keeps me from doing more of it is that, quite frankly, I need to work my bees. Two of my three children don t understand this need to work bees. (The third is busy working bees with the Peace Corps she gets it.) Having bees, whether it is two hives or 200, means you can t just dash off for weeks on end. Bees need to occasionally be worked, and when you have bee disease, you not only want to work them, you need to do so. Not for their sake, but for yours. The kids pleas for me to visit fell on deaf ears in February and March because, as a Michigan beekeeper, I couldn t really get away. Those months are when, weather permitting, bees might emerge and need some supplemental feeding or at least a hug and a kiss for surviving. I have such lousy overwintering rates that any living hives in February and March are invited in for hot chocolate and to browse the Kelley s catalog with me. When you re a beekeeper, you really can t get away in April either. That s when (because of lousy overwintering rates) I have new packages to install and feed, and existing bees to pamper. But getting away did have its appeal. While mild, this winter did seem rather long. As the only person in Michigan who hadn t yet gone south for the season, I checked the calendar and the balance in my checking account, and at the end of April went on a long weekend to Sanibel-Captiva Island, in Florida. Before throwing clothes in my suitcase, I threw extra feeders on my new hives and extra honey supers on the winter survivors. I reminded everyone not to swarm until I was home and able to easily capture them, and directed them to lowhanging branches to which they should swarm. It s pointless, but maybe some year they ll listen. For a few seconds, I thought about throwing my veil in my suitcase. It s swarm season. What if we were on the tarmac and the plane couldn t take off because a swarm had landed on the jetway 30 Here s a photo of me working bees in the Gulf of Mexico. Beachwalkers thought I was waving to them, but really I was just elevating my hand to reduce swelling.

31 2012 Walter T. Kelley Company door? What if someone s suitcase was stuck on the conveyor belt because a swarm landed on it? Or worse yet, landed on one of those pet carriers with a cute little Fido inside? You never know when you re going to need a beekeeper hero. Then reality set in. What if I did heroically collect a swarm off the jetway door? Were they then going to let me carry it on? It s not like they d give me an extra bag of peanuts. I left the veil at home. In April, going from Michigan to south Florida is a visual buffet. There was green everywhere, a balmy warm breeze, and lush, large, tropical flowers. Something was busy pollinating them, but I never saw any of my winged, stinging friends until the day before heading home. I was splashing about in the Gulf of Mexico when I saw a honeybee frantically doing the same. I ve rescued many honeybees from the drink before, so I didn t think twice about scooping up this one in my hand so she could dry off and fly to safety. I should ve thought twice. This potentially Africanized honeybee had been bashed about and probably couldn t readily distinguish between me and the relentless waves, or perhaps she was enjoying her swim and didn t want it to end. Whatever the reason, she stung my finger with every bit of venom she could provide. So on one hand, I did sort of get to work bees while on vacation. And on the other hand, well, there were a couple fingers quickly becoming the size of those plump Florida oranges. I knew how this was going to go. There d be increased swelling until my fingers were about to explode, and then the hand and soon my wrist would be swollen and then itchy. Typing would be impossible for the next few days. I would not be able to play the harp, tie a fishing fly, or perform open heart surgery but I couldn t do those things before the sting. Hoping to minimize the swelling, I zipped to the beachside bar and ordered a margarita so I could wrap my burning fingers around the icy glass. I know how my body reacts to stings from Midwest bees, and wondered if a (likely) Africanized bee s venom was different. Thus, in addition to my usual anecdotes (an anti-inflammatory down the hatch and topical Benadryl on the sting), I ordered a second margarita. Mind you, strictly for medicinal purposes. Maybe it was because I was on vacation. Maybe it was the margaritas. Maybe it was the type of bee that stung me. Whatever, the swollen hand was substantially better by the next day, allowing me to return home to a pile of laundry, critters that needing petting, and my job. And blessedly, to bees that needed working! Questions or comments about this article? Please go to kelleybees.com/blog. 31 Let s give me a big hand for saving that bee! Oh wait, that bee already gave me a big hand!