Mice seem so innocent and so small. What could they possibly do to hurt your bee hive during the winter? Now is the time to take precautions to keep mice out of your hives. Hi, we are David and Sheri Burns from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms located in central Illinois. Thank you for following our beekeeping lessons online.

Now that it is fall, I’d like to share several fall management tips for your hive to have a better chance at surviving our upcoming winter. Yes, I know. No one wants to think about winter yet, but you have to so that you can make sure your colony is strong and healthy.

Before we begin our lesson, I want to share some things going on around Long Lane Honey Bee Farms. I had a great time speaking in Chicago at the Lake County Beekeepers Club. Ann Miller Did a great job hosting the meeting. I spoke on how to raise queens and I did it in 45 minutes!

We’ve also been hosting groups at the honey bee farm. This week we had a group of homeschoolers who came out to learn more about honey bees. They asked some good questions. I think a few families are going to start keeping bees next spring.

Then we had all the local FFA chapters from surrounding schools visit our place. They were fascinated by our large bee tree and how we make queens and woodenware. But I think what really got their attention is when I opened a hive and found the queen on a full frame of bees. I carried it around so that each one could see the queen. The future of honey bees can be greatly increased as the importance of the honey bee is impressed upon these Future Farmers of America!

Be sure and LIKE US on facebook.  

As many of you know Long Lane Honey Bee Farms is a family business and our family is doing great. We have three sons and three daughters between the ages of 31 and 6 years old. And we have seven grandchildren and another one on the way. Many of you have talked to Karee or Jesse on the phone or in person here. They recently had a baby, Jesse David. He is our newest grandson and he was born premature, spending 103 days in the NICU. The good news is he finally came home on Wednesday! Thank you for your prayers.

New to the beekeeping community is our new beekeeping internet and radio program called Hive Talk. My good friend and bee expert Jon Zawislak and I will be hosting this weekly call in beekeeping radio program. Our debut will be this Tuesday night, October 1st at 7pm central time. The success of this program depends largely upon you, callers who will call in and ask beekeeping questions. If you don’t call in with questions, Jon and I will be left to ramble on and make a miserable attempt to be entertaining. Here’s what you do. Around 6:50 p.m. central time on Tuesday, Dial 1-724-7444. A voice recording will ask you to enter you “CALL ID” for our show which is: 129777, then press the # sign. When asked to enter your pin, enter 1 followed by the # sign.  At that point our engineer will chat with you and get you ready to ask us a question. We recommend that you log in to our show 10 minutes prior to 7:00 p.m. central time. Signing in again is simple:

1. Dial: (724) 444-7444
2. Enter: 129777 # (Call ID)
3. Enter: 1 # or your PIN

If you want to just listen from your computer, go to: http://www.talkshoe.com/tc/129777

WINTER-BEE-KIND UPDATE

We are heavy into production of our Winter-Bee-Kinds! Years ago, Zach Watts worked for our family mowing and keeping our place cleaned up when he was younger. Over they years, we keep moving him up and now he’s one of our best shop guys. He’s the main builder of our Winter-Bee-Kinds. He’s working for us while going to college. He’s a huge blessing to our business. You should start seeing your Winter-Bee-Kind arrive in a few weeks. If don’t know about our Winter-Bee-Kinds, check out our website at: http://www.honeybeesonline.com

Finally before our lesson today, here are three of our featured products:

Our traditional Langstroth Hive (Above). Completely assembled and painted with frames. Click here for more information.

Our new Langstroth Hive made from Cedar! (Above)  Spruce up your garden or yard with this majestic hive! Click here for more information.

Our popular Winter-Bee-Kind winter feed, ventilation and upper exit candy board. Click here for more information.

When you order from us, we are able to make a living doing what we love. Thank you!

LESSON 140: Protect Your Hives Against Mice & Should You Combine Your Hives For Winter

Mice seem so innocent and so small. Who would think they could be such a pest to the bee hive? In my early days as a new beekeeper I really didn't do much to prevent mice from entering my hives during the fall and winter. I just assumed the mice would stay out. I thought if they did make it in, they would be well behaved on the bottom board and not bother my bees. Nothing could be further from the truth! Mice will destroy a hive during the winter. When the weather turns cooler mice leave the outdoors and find your hive the perfect place for warmth and yes, food---your bees.

It seems like the colony would kill the mice, but during the winter the colony is clustered to stay warm. In the spring and summer the bees are able to move about the hive and chase out or kill mice. But in the winter the mice have free reign since the bees are clustered to stay warm. This is a great place for mice to raise their young. In the spring you can find a whole nest of pink baby mice and a few adults on your bottom board. When you see that, you’ll probably notice your hive is dead. The mice have slowly eaten away at bees and comb for food.

Do something now! First, understand that mice can fit through a hole the size of a ballpoint pen, or about 1/4 inch. So the challenge is to leave an opening large enough for bees but small enough so that mice cannot fit through. Not to mention mice can enter through a damaged corner or ventilation holes in hives. While it is nearly impossible to find the perfect sized mouse guard, most entrance reducers and mouse guards discourage mice from entering. A wide open bottom board is like hanging out a vacancy sign.We sell different types of mouse guards but an entrance reduce is our suggested defense.

This spring I conducted a study on mice and bees. I was startled at the results of my experiment. In 12 colonies I placed a component which had mouse urine, droppings or nest debris on it. I then installed packages into those 12 colonies on drawn comb. All 12 packages absconded within 7 days. I’ve been studying what makes packages abscond. I found that bees installed from packages can still abscond in new hives on new foundation, but the chances are less likely in new equipment. Drawn comb can help reduce absconding but the older the drawn comb is the more likely bees are to abscond. But any sign of mice urine, droppings or debris can cause a new package to abscond. The best thing is to destroy boxes, bottom board and frames that are soiled from mice droppings.

COMBINING HIVES

There is an old beekeeping saying that we should take our winter losses in the fall. This means that small and weak colonies, which will not survive the winter, should be combined with a larger colony that has higher populations and more food in the hive. The most common way to combine hives is to destroy the queen in the weaker colony and wait a few days. Then place newspapers on top of the top deep box in the strong colony. Then, move all the frames in the weak colony into one deep and place it above the newspaper on the strong hive. Cut a few slits in the newspaper so the bees can begin to destroy the newspaper. The theory is that by the time the newspaper is cleaned out, both colonies will be friends and become one.

Another option is to use a double screen board and place the weak colony on top of the strong colony. Both colonies have queens and the double screen keeps the bees and queens from fighting. The heat from the larger hive drifts up through the screen and keeps the smaller colony warmer on top. Keep in mind that cold is not the colony’s worst enemy. The number one concern is the varroa mite. If the colony has a severe infestation of varroa, they are unlikely to survive the winter. Other concerns are viruses and diseases which can cause the hive to die in the winter.

So you may want to take your winter losses now and combine some hives. If the combined hives overwinters well, you can split it in the spring and you’re back to two.

That’s all for now and thank you for joining us for another beekeeping lesson! Please let others know about these lessons and our business. We appreciate you spreading the word! Your donations help us continue our work and research on the honey bee, such as our recent development of our Winter-Bee-Kind. These lessons are free and will provide you with as much if not more information than you would find in a $30 book. So consider making a $30 donation so that we might continue these lessons, CLICK HERE TO DONATE $30 or go to:
http://www.honeybeesonline.com/servlet/Detail?no=144

Thank you in advance.
David and Sheri Burns
Long Lane Honey Bee Farms
217-427-2678 Website: www.honeybeesonline.com

Thanks for joining us for another beekeeping lesson!

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Today, I want to offer another lesson in beekeeping focusing on how to prepare our hives to make it through the winter. Before I get into today’s lesson, let me remind you that we do have our beekeeping class coming up October 11th here at our apiary. If you are interested, we might be able to squeeze in a couple more people, so give us a call at the number at the bottom of this lesson. Also, we are still producing queens, though it is getting late in the year, now is still a good time to requeen.
By the way, here at Long Lane Honey Bee Farms, we are a family business working hard to help more people discover and enjoy keeping honey bees. We manufacture beehives and sell everything related to beekeeping. Our busiest season is from November-July. So if you are planning on purchasing hives from us, and you don’t mind getting them early before next year, then now would help relieve the spring demand and we always raise our prices the first of January.

We have a reputation, a particular way of keeping bees. Here are a few fundamentals about beekeeping that we have settled on and have become known for:
1. No harsh chemicals. (We do not use any chemicals in our hives)
2. Use locally produced queens. (We raise and sell from our own survival stock).
3. Screen bottom board.
4. Hive inspection every 2 weeks, especially for monitoring the queen.
5. Yearly requeening is a must!
I was not very fond of requeening yearly until this summer. I did a little test. I requeened about half of my hives and the other half I allowed the 2-3 year old queens to carry on. Each half consisted of approximately 25 hives. By far, hands down the requeened hives way out performed the hives with the older queens. It was not even close. The hives with the older queens had lower population of bees, weaker foraging power, less honey, less everything.

I immediately became a firm believer of requeening a hive every year. September proves to be the most strategic month so that the queen is laying strong going into and coming out of winter, and the new queen can lay well in the fall to produce lots of young bees who should overwinter better than older bees.

Okay, so those are a handful of our particular philosophy of beekeeping.

Now, let’s talk about getting your hives ready for another winter. What should you do? Winter is a nervous time for beekeepers. With every snow, and blast of cold, north wind, we wonder and worry how our bees are doing. Months of cold, winds, snow, rain, fog and clouds causes us to fret over our bees well-being.

In December, most of us place our ear against the outside of the hive and give a gentle tap to see if they are still buzzing, and usually they are. It is rare for a hive to die in December or even in January. The fact is, most hives that die do not even die in February. They die in March, when they have exhausted their food supply and have few to forage the early nectar on the occasional warm days.

So what can we do to help our bees make it through winter? There is no plan that ensure 100% survival. Bees are livestock. Things can just go bad. But a few things can help.

Typically, most consider winter preparations consists of the following:
1) Put on a mouse guard at the entrance.
2) Lift the hive and see if it has enough stored honey by how heavy it is.
3) Wrap the hive with some sort of insulation or roofing paper.
4) We build a wind break.
5) We treat for mites and nosema.

These might be good measures to take. However, they are not fail proof. In fact, here are three concerns that probably cause our hives to die during the winter that many overlook:

1) Queenlessness. Your hive is most certain to die if your queen is weak or gone going into winter.
2) Winter Condensation. If you seal up your hive too tight, you might increase the overall condensation within the hive and cause this cold water to constantly drip onto the cluster and eventually kill your hive.
3) Keeping stored honey next to the winter cluster. How many times do we hear that a hive died even though there was plenty of honey.

So, here’s my checklist for what you should be doing to your hives now to prepare for a great hive in the spring:

1) Remove queen excluders.
2) Remove honey supers.
3) Examine the amount of stored honey and be sure your bees have plenty. Most beekeepers in the north lift the back of the hive and hope it feels like there is 70 pounds of stored honey. 70 pounds is the approximate equivalent of 1 medium super full of honey.
4) If your hive is short on stored honey, FEED! Feed 2:1 sugar water. Use an internal or top feeder if robbing is a problem. Robbing is more of a problem during the fall dearth.
5) Make sure that your hive has some sort of upper ventilation. It does not have to be much but something. We now make our inner covers with ventilation slots. And we leave our screen bottom boards open all winter.
6) Use good mouse guards, either metal or wooden entrance cleats to keep mice out.
7) Treat the hives 3 weeks in a row with powdered sugar for mite control. This is best started in August.
8) If wrapping hives, be sure to allow upper ventilation.
9) Combine weak hives with strong ones. Most of the small swarms you caught are not going to winter well unless you caught them in May. Do not feel like a failure if you’ve worked hard to build up your numbers, but now you have to slice your hive count in half by combining hives. Combining ten hives into 5 which survive the winter is better than having 8 out of 10 die out.

Much can be said about preparing a hive for winter, but the hive that has the best chance of surviving the winter will be the hive that was very strong all year and has a young queen. Remember, a strong hive is more apt to be pest and disease free, thus overwintering much better because it does not have viruses caused by mites.

No matter how much you wrap your hive, medicate your bees and build a wind break, nothing will do much to improve a weak hive overwintering well. Only strong hives overwinter well enough to explode in the spring. Weak hives that do survive the winter usually are not impressive the following year, unless requeened soon in the spring.

This year, I will expand my overwintering experiments. I will be overwintering a variety of configurations to see which hive does best. I will be overwintering 5 frame nucs, single hive bodies and a hive that is made up of 1 deep hive body and 3 medium super boxes.

We also have one hive going into winter that we are now feeding pollen and heavy nectar to stimulate the queen to keep laying deep into fall to see if this is better or worse of winter survival.

Please put it on your calendar to peak in your hive in January on a decent day when the temperature rises to atleast 40 degrees. Then, make a plan to quickly open your hive on a calm day and in 1 minute or less, pull up a frame of honey, scratch it open and place it next to the cluster. If they have no honey left, then feed!

I have a lesson that explains several feeding methods. The lesson can be found at:http://basicbeekeeping.blogspot.com/2008/03/lesson-28-spring-management-of.html

I hope this lesson will motivate you to take advantage of the last few weeks of decent weather and tighten up your hives, feed them and make sure they are ready for winter. We are excited about the 2009 beekeeping year. The crises of the decline in honey bees is still with us. Last year, we helped so many jump into beekeeping for the first time. This is exciting to us because bees play such an important role in our food supply.

2009 = 1,000

For 2009 we have set a goal of encouraging 1,000 people to become first time beekeepers. We will be putting up a special web page with a goal chart anonymously reflecting each new beekeeper.

We only want to count those who we have directly inspired to keep bees for the first time. So here's the criteria for you to be counted as one of the 1,000:

1) Educated by us through our online lessons or you attended one of our on site classes as a new beekeeper.

2) Bought wooden ware or package bees from us as a new beekeeper.

3) Our website introduced you and encouraged you to start keeping bees.

Our website with our goal chart will be a frame from a hive showing 1,000 cells. Every time another person becomes a 1st time beekeeper we will seal off that cell. Eventually we hope to see all 1,000 cells completely sealed off, as all beekeepers know the joy of seeing a complete frame of sealed brood! So, get the word out. Our next blog post will reveal more of the details and the website to watch the goal expand. So get the word out, and help us reach this very lofty goal.

Sheri and I would like to thank you again for being a part of our lives, and enjoying the great experience of keeping bees. Have a great day and we'll see you soon!

Remember, BEE-have yourselves!

David & Sheri Burns

Long Lane Honey Bee Farms

217-427-2678

www.honeybeesonline.com

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