Bee School - Day 2

     Mmmmm...Elaine brought donuts today! I meant to pick up a raspberry filled - ended up with a lemon filled - hate it when that happens!  We beekeepers are all about the food! 
     Anyways, today Buddy went over more on bee anatomy, bee castes (worker, drone, queen...) and brood nest inspection. 
     I brought my Jr. Beekeeper, Alex with me today.  Beekeeping is a good way to stay connected with my teen.  He and I ran a station on when/how and why to do hive inspections.  He helped me get everything together last night down at the honey house, again really good bonding time.  I like helping with bee school - it is nice to meet so many interesting people, plus I get a little refresher course each year right before spring beekeeping starts.  We aren't meeting next Saturday for school, but there will be a FCBA meeting.  I'm looking forward to bee school in 2 weeks.

First Day of Bee School

     Wow, what a turn-out!  We had about 85 people come to learn about bees today.  I'm so happy to see that so many people are signing on to take care of our precious little honey bees.  It is such a gratifying thing to do.  You might feel like you are being a good environmentalist when you recycle and conserve, but nothing makes me feel more like a steward of the earth like keeping bees.
     I always wonder when I look out over the class of new, "recruits", what on earth put the, "bug" (haha, I made a joke) in their head to keep bees.  Maybe some are gardeners and want the pollination services of the bees.  Maybe some just love science.  Maybe some need something therapeutic to do.  Maybe some inherited bees and/or equipment from a relative and figured they might as well put them to use.  Or maybe, some just really love honey.  But I will issue this caveat to any of you who are hoping to strike it rich with all the honey you are gonna make and sell.  It ain't gonna happen!  Now if you plan on maintaining 75 or more hives, then you might make some money, but let me tell you, you will earn every penny of it.  It is hard work!
     So, what did we talk about today at Bee School?  Let's see, mostly bee biology - and how to assemble hives.  Christopher and I had a station on types of foundations and how to assemble frames.  I hate to bombard students with so much information but on the other hand, I don't want to leave anything out. I remember how I felt when I took the class - information overload!  I wasn't even sure what to buy to get started.  I guess the best advice that I can give to new beekeepers is - just dive in and do it.  You'll make mistakes, but whoop-dee-doo!

Bee School

So, tomorrow is the start of "Bee School" and yes, you gotta go to school to become a beekeeper.  This is my, hmmmm, 5th year? Or 4th? as a beekeeper ...I dunno.  Anyways, I'm off to Bee School tomorrow to help teach the next generation of beekeepers.  I still don't really know what to do when I open a hive.  I wish I was like George, my precious mentor (I miss him), he could get outta the truck and know pretty much from the way the beeyard smelled, what was going on.  He showed me some pretty amazing stuff my first few years and I was simply wowed by his strong connection to the bees.  One time he told me I could help him with a hive that was fixin' to swarm.  It was about 4 or 5 boxes high (brood chambers, heretoafter) of brood (that's fancy talk for eggs and larva) and had oohhhh, maybe 30 queen cells drawn out.  He said he was gonna create a "false swarm" and I was just glad to be invited.  Being a fairly new beekeeper (and still not too fond of getting stung) I suited up.  George laughed at me and said I looked like an astronaut as he stood there in short sleeves, no veil and no gloves.  I actually think he liked getting stung.  The task was to cut out all the queen cells, then shake about 60- 70 thousand bees onto the ground so that they could crawl back into the hive.  When you shake those bees out, they just pile up on the ground, then you take a stick and make a sort of ramp for them to crawl up to get back into the hive.  You have to search for the queen to make sure she gets back in and if she isn't marked, it's like playing to hardest game of "Where's Waldo" you've ever played.  The strangest thing is they don't fly back into the hive - it's like they have forgotten they can fly.
     I was kidding when I said you have to go to Bee School to become a beekeeper - don't get me wrong, it helps, but the real education comes from actually doing it (kinda like parenting, except this time you have 60,000 kids -mostly girls) Oh, and having a mentor is a MUST!  Just don't ask me - talk about the blind leading the blind!
    So, this new blog is for my new beekeeper friends and my old ones too (who can sit back and laugh at me "pretend" to know more than I do) and for anyone else who just thinks what I have to say is interesting.  And, that's about it for today - check back tomorrow and I'll let you know how the first day of Bee School went.