Honey Bees Coming in for a Landing

Inspect the brood pattern at the beginning of dandelion bloom.

Check the queen’s performance, symptoms of brood disease and Varroa.

Reverse brood chambers if bees are in the upper box only.

Apply mite treatments and requeen failing queens if necessary.

Divide and requeen colonies at fruit bloom via multiple frame splits or colony divides to recoup winter loss, increase apiary size and swarm control.

Treat for mites if detected on workers or in drone brood.

Inspect package bee colonies for health and queen condition.

Manipulate frames if necessary to aid in comb construction.

Manage hives for population buildup and swarm prevention.

Continue feeding nucs and package bees until they have drawn out the comb in their brood chambers.

Urban and suburban beekeepers should put out swarm traps prior to May 15th.

This monthly post is adapted from “The Beekeepers Calendar, A Year In The Apiary-Central Maine” by Tony Jadczak, Maine State Apiarist

Sacopee Valley Tri-County Club Forming

No member will be required to host meetings – all are welcome to join, whether they want to host meetings or not.

Contact is Barbi Ives, bgives@roadrunner.com or 482-3745.

Spraying a Package of Bees with Sugar Water

Monitor food reserves.

Feed medicated (Fumagilin-B) light syrup (1:1) to hives low on stores. Scrape bottom boards and check the brood pattern on a mild day.

Install package bees April 15th or later and feed light syrup.  Some people medicate with Fumagillin.

Apply mite treatments to wintered colonies if Varroa are detected (mid-late April) in the drone brood.

Installing a Package of Bees in Maine

If you medicate hives with Terramycin, dust according to label instructions.

Make plans for attending EAS this Summer in Burlington, Vermont

Continue feeding nucs and package bees until they have drawn out the comb in their brood chambers.

This monthly post is adapted from “The Beekeepers Calendar, A Year In The Apiary-Central Maine” by Tony Jadczak, Maine State Apiarist

How to Make Summer Nucs - Hands-on Workshop

Cumberland County Beekeepers Association will be presenting two hands-on workshops this Spring.

Don’t miss the chance to take your beekeeping to the next level with these workshops run by an EAS Master Beekeeper, and the President of the Maine State Beekeepers Association.

Swarm Prevention, Management, and Capture
Wednesday April 25th, 2012
6:30 pm – 8:30 pm
Location: Mabel I. Wilson School, North Yarmouth Maine
Presenter: Erin MacGregor-Forbes, Master Beekeeper
More information and registration »

How to Make Summer Nucs – Hands-on Workshop
Saturday, June 16, 2012
1pm –4pm
Location: Cumberland County Beekeepers Club Hives in Windham ME
Presenter: Master Beekeeper Erin MacGregor-Forbes
More information and registration »

American Apitherapy Society Logo

The American Apitherapy Society, Inc. & the York County Beekeepers Association present
“Honey Bees for Health,” An Apitherapy Symposium & Workshop
April 28-29, 2012
York Harbor Inn, York Harbor, ME
480 York Street York Harbor, ME 03911

Please join us in York Harbor, just one hour north of Boston, MA for this event. You will be able to learn from three experienced Apitherapists, and intereact with them and other people interested in Apitherapy. This ancient form of medicine with products of the beehive (honey, pollen, propolis, bee venom, and royal jelly) is used for health and healing throughout the world. The use of these products to maintain health is currently becoming well recognized in mainstream as well as scientific publications, and their power to heal when illness or accident occurs is also documented. Conditions such as arthritis, MS, pain, and wounds are known to respond well to Apitherapy. Come learn more at this Symposium in Southern Maine.

Honey Bees for Health Conference Registration Form (PDF)

Preliminary Program

Saturday April 28, 2012
7:30-­8:30 am: registration and continental breakfast
8:30-­9:30 am: Intro. To Apitherapy (TC)
9:30-­10:30 am: Legal Issues & Informed Consent (TC)
10:30-10:45 am: Break
10:45 – 11:45 am: Treatment of Scars (FK)
11:45: -­ 12:45: pm: Honey for Healing (AD)
12:45 – 2:00 pm: Lunch
2:00 – 3:00 pm: Veterinary Apitherapy (FK, TC)
3:00 – 3:15 pm: Break
3:15 – 4:15 pm: Adverse Reactions to Bee Venom (TC)
4:15 – 5:15 pm: Pain: Arthritis & Accidents (FK, TC)
5:30     End of Day 1 Symposium
5:30 – 6:30: Cocktail Reception, Open Bar
6:30 – 8:30: Dinner (optional, additional cost)

Sunday April 29, 2012
7:30 – 8:30: Continental Breakfast
8:30 – 10:00: Workshop 1: Preparations for healing with products of the hive
10:00 – 11:30 Workshop 2: Demonstration of Treatments of Scars & Wounds
11:30-­ 11:45: Break
11:45 – 1:00 pm: Workshop 3: BVT demonstrations
(Workshops are conducted by all faculty & will have participation by registrants)
1:00 – END

Pollen Patty; image from beavercreekbees.blogspot.com

Check colony conditions. If honey reserves are low, feed candy or dry sugar.

Colonies that consume feed should be monitored and fed as needed.

Feed protein supplements (pollen substitute) for brood production to hives colonies that you are planning to split. Make sure they have sufficient honey stores, they will go through stores much more rapidly as they engage in brood rearing.

If you are new to beekeeping, go ask questions at your local bee club meeting.   If you know a thing or two, go to the same meeting and give words of wisdom to the “NewBees”.

Don’t bludgeon yourself eternally if you find or suspect your bees to be dead; take a deep breath, read Tony’s Feb/Mar 2011 Bee Line article, “When Disaster Strikes,” determine the (possible) cause, and learn for next season.

Have you renewed you Maine State Beekeepers Membership for the year?

This monthly post is adapted from “The Beekeepers Calendar, A Year In The Apiary-Central Maine” by Tony Jadczak, Maine State Apiarist, from a few years ago.

Membership dues can be paid online with a Credit Card or a PayPal account, or by mailing a check to our membership director using the form on the back of The Bee Line Publication (also found on the website).

Your membership dues support our website, pay for publishing and mailing  The Bee Line, and help MSBA promote beekeeping education at a number of events around our state every year.

Our membership exceeded 500 people in 2011, we had three new local chapters form, and at least 5 additional bee schools have been educating new beekeepers around our state.

The MSBA created a “swarm hotline” this past year to connect beekeepers with homeowners. And while 2011 was a fairly light year for swarming due to rain May and then dry weather through the summer, we still fielded over 50 calls on the swarm line, promoting honey bees to the public and avoiding neighbor-beekeeper problems.

MSBA has big plans for 2012: Improved education and bee school programs, promoting beekeeping legislation at the state level, and of course hosting a great annual meeting this fall.

Please join us in renewing your membership today.

Hives in Maine Winter 2012. Photo Carol Cottrill

• Renew your MSBA membership.  You don’t want to miss a single issue of The Bee Line, our printed journal, do you?

• Order bees in package or nuc’s for late April-early May arrival.

• Check wintering colonies for honey reserves by hefting the hive.
  Note that the “heft the hive” method works as long as the bees haven’t chimneyed up the center leaving a bunch of (heavy) honey frames on the sides. With the crazy weather so far this fall/winter it might be a good idea to take a peak under the outer cover to see if the bees are looking up at you through the hole in the inner cover even though the hive is “heavy”.

• Brush off the entrances to assure good ventilation

• Feed sugar candy or dry sugar if needed.

This monthly post is adapted from “The Beekeepers Calendar, A Year In The Apiary-Central Maine” by Tony Jadczak, Maine State Apiarist

Brood Comb in a (Kenya) Top Bar Hive in Maine

I too have communicated with Tony Jadczak and other Master Beekeepers from Maine for ideas and concerns. Honeybees will conduct their natural activities according to instinct and not from what we humans provide them. As an applied Biologist for some 52 years and a beekeeper for 48 years (in Maine), I realize the insect is forever wild and not domesticated as cattle, poultry, horses, dogs and cats have been and which we humans have genetically manipulated for years. Yes, the honeybee genome has been developed, but we have not controlled or changed the natural swarming and feral instinct of the animal. We learn by observation and experimentation and some of that becomes applied through technology. The TBH is a methodology and technology from Greece and tropical Africa. Does this fact make Maine or any other state in the Northeast conducive to TBH management? In my opinion as well, the answer is no. Now, if we were to go to Wyatt Mangum’s climate in Virginia where he does successfully mange TBHs, it would be an acceptable practice and a challenge to become a profitable beekeeper practicing the art of TBH management. Wyatt has come to Maine and spoken to the MSBA in the past decade and he recently published his new piece on TBH history and his views in ABJ; vol. 151, #11, pp 1067-1069. His second piece appeared in ABJ, vol. 151, #12, pp 1165-1167. He discusses the importance of entrance location and the subtleties of comb-building behavior. He does stress the fact that combs must be straight for the management and control of parasites and diseases, and he uses a strip of foundation as a starter for straight, even foundation to make his frames more interchangeable for good hive management.

He even discusses the use of Greek basket hives with interchangeable combs.

Finally Wyatt emphasizes the mild winters in Eastern Virginia as being a positive factor for TBH management. Virginia has a much more temperate climate than Maine; in mid-Maine we find ourselves at the 45th parallel.

The biology of the honeybee should be much better understood by “new-bees” in this art and science of beekeeping that many of us like so well — especially the new TBH enthusiast. The honeybee is an invasive species to North America, and like any invasive, it takes advantage and use of available habitat as quickly as possible to survive. The insect means no harm (however some native bees have not done well, due to competition). So the honeybee had to become well established to survive and it has done very well. The insect is a hoarder and gathers all possible sources of food (nectar and pollen) for storing to survive.

The insect also must thermoregulate at high and very low temperatures in the northeast, especially in Maine. The winter cluster becomes smaller as the ambient temperature decreases. Here are some numbers from Dewey Caron’s work: at +50°F the cluster is 14″ to 16″, rather large and about what it should be in mid-November.

Comb from a (Kenya) Top Bar Hive in Maine

When the ambient temperature is near 0°F, with lots of summer bees dying, the cluster is 12″ or less. At -14°F the cluster is about 10″, a major reduction in size. And at -20°F the cluster is only 6″. Then even down to 4″. Clusters this small in Maine are subject to winterkill. TBH managers in particular should think about this, because the insect has to thermoregulate and move to available food at the same time. It is not normal for the winter cluster to move horizontally (as is necessary in a TBH), whereas it is natural to move vertically (as in a tree, wall of a building, chimney and, yes, in a Langstroth hive). So the TBH does not provide for or allow natural movement.

To my way of thinking and from what I have learned through decades of work, the TBH in my part of Maine is not conducive to the insect’s thermoregulation behavior for survival, and we cannot change this.

Perhaps if one stood a long TBH on end, the bees could then move vertically and survive? ( Just joking.) The kind of space that is available is important for the insect’s survival. Storing adequate food for long Maine winters and expelling excess moisture with proper draft and ventilation does require more space or volume. I also want to emphasize that volume is very important to the honeybee, especially when swarming season arrives and TBH management becomes conducive to a chronic swarming problem. As we all know, we want to prevent or discourage swarming even though the instinct is there. We cannot eliminate the instinct, so why make the swarming issue even more difficult by crowding bees into TBHs. It takes the joy out of keeping bees and makes producing honey (if that is a goal) more difficult.

I would like to see more data on winter survival, but for sure the NH experiment was worth telling, and thanks again to Anne for doing that. And yes, mite control is difficult with natural miticides due to the necessity of air movement from a vertical direction vs. horizontal. This makes TBHs non-conducive to mite control and therefore a major challenge to all beginners.

In 1983 when EAS was held at the University of Maine at Orono, I was the President and Roger Morse was one of our key speakers on the program. At that time, he said, “beekeeping as we now know it will change forever when Varroa destructor arrives.” Roger was well ahead of the curve. And if today we have a proliferation of TBHs in Maine, we will see more Varroa cases with increased winter mortality.

My conclusion, based on the current knowledge of TBHs in Maine, is this: If you want to keep bees for pollination and not manage them, just make sure you also understand that you are probably going to set yourself up for losses and big disappointment.

Interior of a (Kenya) Top Bar Hive in Maine

However, as Past President of EAS and MSBA, it is further my responsibility to share my thought that advocating through lectures the purchase and use of TBHs in Maine through various entrepreneurs is very irresponsible and is on the verge of a shame. I do many lectures on honeybees in Maine from York to Penobscot to Washington County on a pro bono basis to provide the basic facts of science for this art and hobby and I do not advocate the use of TBHs. Especially if you want to keep bees, sell honey and pollinate crops. A scientist with several degrees, I was trained to be objective and open-minded; if there comes an established experiment to evaluate TBHs in Maine, then I stand ready to change my mind, but currently I cannot support the model being tried with constant failure.

Having “new-bees” utilizing a methodology not fully tested beyond trial and error is a disservice to the MSBA membership and all other backyard beekeepers of which we are the majority. We should not be setting “new-bees” up for certain failure. The Langstroth hive has been around for over 150 years and is proven technology.

There are as many differing opinions regarding beekeeping as there are beekeepers, but we cannot ignore the research and facts that have been developed over the last 150 years regarding this science and art. If TBHs can withstand the null hypothesis through experiment and testing, then “so mote it be.” – Very highest regards to all, Matt Scott

"Queenline" Jar for Honey Show Entry

For the classes of honey, presentation is key. It’s kind of ironic that the honey itself is not judged, except in the black jar class. Why? The judges are grading you, not the bees. You are the one who bottled the honey or cut the comb. You took care to protect it during the drive to EAS, and you brought extra lids to make sure the entries had absolutely clean lids later. For the honey categories, set aside some of your darker honey now. We almost certainly will extract before August next year, but it won’t be dark honey, so save some for that class. Of course, bottle your entries at least a week ahead of the show, so all bubbles have a chance to rise to the top of the jar. When you buy a case of jars, check them all out before filling them and set aside the ones that have no bubbles or imperfections in the glass. Use these for show entries.

A great book to consult while preparing entries is Honey Shows by Penny McCaig.

If you enter the honey frame class, you can use this winter to build a carrying case for your frame. These cases are sometimes fancy, sometimes plain, but the important thing is for the case to protect your frame while allowing it to be seen.

If you want to enter the wax or candle classes, winter is the time to render, pour, mold and dip. Make all the examples of blocks and candles you can, so you are proficient and have lots to choose from later. Gadgets that you may have built or imagined can be fine-tuned, tested and shown to beekeeper fiends for comments in the months before EAS. Look over your photos from this past season, and think about pictures you can take this spring and summer for the photo classes. For the mead classes, enter some bottles you already created in years past. The art category is very openended.

Do you have something you made already, or can you sew, build or create something beautiful by August? There is that all-encompassing miscellaneous class, open to your imagination. Practice on your family with your baked goods recipes.
Practice makes perfect, and they’ll thank you! Generally, the show classes and rules from EAS 2010 will be used (easternapiculture.org/addons/confarchive/2010/2010Honey ShowRules.pdf ), but watch the EAS 2012 website for changes (easternapiculture.org/ conferences/eas-2012.html). Be sure to read the rules carefully. I didn’t before my first EAS show, and only brought one jar of honey for each class (you need three).

Honey Show

All entries must be the product of the entrant’s apiary and have been produced since the previous EAS Honey Show.

Classes: extracted honey (white, light, light amber, amber, dark), comb honey [section boxes, cut-comb (4" square), circular sections], creamed honey, chunk honey.

Here’s another great class: honey frame (wooden or plastic, in a case). Note that the case is not judged, only the frame of honey. Construct your case so two sides are clear, but all six sides of the frame are still visible. These frames in their wood and glass (or plexi) cases are lovely.

Brought back this year is the black jar class in which only the consistency and flavor of the extracted honey is judged.

Mead & Honey Beer Show

Classes: dry mead, sweet mead, mead made with fruit juices (Melomel, Cyser or Pyment), sparkling mead (made with or without fruit juices), honey beer (a light-to-medium bodied ale or lager using honey as 15-30% of fermentables), Braggot (a medium-to-strong ale using honey as 35-65% of fermentables).

Gadgets Show

Gadgets include new devices or improvements you have created. Have you ever made something for your beeyard or harvest set-up that nobody else uses? That’s a gadget! Classes: large devices (honey extractors, wax equipment, etc.) and small devices.

Photography Show (Prints)

Classes: close-up, scenic, portrait, essay (a set of 4 to 7 prints depicting a beekeeping story).

Beeswax and Candles Show

Classes: single piece of pure beeswax (2 lbs or more), one pair of pure beeswax candles (dipped or molded tapers), novelty (single or coordinated set, containing beeswax).

Honey Cookery Show

Classes: cookies, bars or brownies, cake (unfrosted or frosted), yeast bread, yeast bread (fancy), yeast rolls, quick bread, muffins, candy.

Art and Craft Show

Classes: gift arrangement, sewing or needlework, novelty beeswax (additives permitted), miscellaneous.

Above all, have fun