Sting update!

So last weekend I was able to be in 9 of my new nucs! On 4 occasions a bee thought I was being too friendly! I had a bit of swelling from a sting on the bottom of my nec, and my finger got a little sore but the other two stings really did not swell at all!! I am hoping to be stung enough that I do not react much to the venom but I would rather not be stung in the face and have to go to work looking deformed!

Here is a quick view inside of my my new hives. Here you can see how the foundationless frames from kelleybees.com have been working out. Sorry about the audio, I grabbed the camera by the mic :/

More Bees!

Got my 15 nucs on Monday!

Got 7 of them delivered to my first out yard (an apiary not located at your house).

Got a fresh reminder to wear my veil!

150 Foundationless Frames!

I have finished 150 foundationless frames. I had bought an air compressor and nail/staple gun combo from Lowes for $89. I also have a frame assembly jig. I can only imagine putting together all of these frames without those!

Next thing to practice? Wiring the frames. Will have to do that after my weekend trip.

Checked my Russian hive today, looks very busy in the brrod box and honey super. I had added a brood box below a couple of weeks ago, no movement in there. I may swap a couple of frames of brood down to encourage them to move down there.

Will try to get some video and photos of my setup soon. Monday I go pick up my 15 nucs of overwintered survivor stock bees!!!

Foundationless Frames!

So my frames from kelleybees.com came in today. I have 1000 of them to put together now! Well, only 960 left to do :)

Couple of reasons to go foundationless:

1. Natural Cell Size (or small cell size). If you buy foundation you are most likely gong to get somewhere around 5.4mm to 5.9mm cell size. The bees have been artificially enlarged. Thought was that larger bees could carry more and get deeper into flowers. Actuality is that they cannot forage as well and they are now weaker to fight off pests and disease.

2. If you buy foundation chances are very high that the wax you put in your hive has some traces of some nasty chemicals. If you let the bees make it from scratch you are not putting anything foreign into your hive.

This is the first wave of natural cell size foundation these bees will be on so they will still be larger that "normal" but smaller than if they were on foundation. The hope is that they can regress down to their natural size over time. This means that I will continue to give them fresh frames to build comb on, each time hopefully getting closer to their natural size.

Now, weather or not to wire these frames.... Without wire the support will be less. Gravity i guess will streatch and pull at the foundation so it sounds like I should wire them. But will it be enough to justify the extra work? I guess I will wire some and not others and see how they do.

1st outyard.

I had my first meeting with my 1st outyard location. It is about 20 minutes away which is not ideal but it is a great location! Oh, he also grows blackberrys and has someone that will start 2 to 3 acres of garlic!

35 acre nursery with tons of great crops, well over a thousand holly which is a great nectar plant, and a couple of fresh water sources right on his property. There is also some soy, corn, and wheat near by, I know corn is a good pollen source, will have to check on the others.

The owner of the property is very concerned with keeping his water clean and beneficial insects safe. If/when he needs to treat some of the trees in the area for bugs he takes them out of the nursery area and sprays the roots locally. It sounds like an organic beekeeper's ideal location!

I am now trying to decide how many of my 15 new nucs to take over there. I am sure the location could support all 15 but I want to have some diversity with a couple of areas, as well as have a couple of honey flavors produced. This location would really help with expansion of the hives as well i think. What to do!

Update on my knee? It still has some swelling from my Bee Venom Therapy or Apitherapy. One of the few times I have taken a sting below my heart, and only time on my leg, but I can feel pressure build a bit when just standing.

Hello World!

Welcome to the NC Green Bee blog! I will mostly talk about my beekeeping adventures here, sometimes link to sites or stories that are useful, or give you great tips about how to use homeopathic honey treatments, or really, homeopathic treatments from the hive.

Today was my first venture into Bee Venom Therapy (or Apitherapy), I stung myself in my left knee. A little over 5 years ago I tore my ACL, MCL, meniscus, and fractured my tibia plateau. Since then my knee has been very sensitive to the touch where I tore my MCL. It has been about 2 hours and so far I am having a normal reaction to the bee venom with local swelling and a little iching. Two things I hope to accomplish are 1.) to lessen my bodies reaction to bee venom and 2.) to lessen the pain in my knee!

NC Green Bee will be selling local honey (local to the Charlotte metro area) made by bees that are treated to the best way possible. I am not treating my bees with any chemicals or treatments of any kind. I am only feeding them sugar water when I have a new hive and only for as long as those bees need it. I will leave enough honey on the hives so that the bees can use the best thing for them for food, their own honey!

Well I am off to play a game with my neighbors now. Will let you know tomorrow what is up with my knee (I am predicting a bit of swelling into Wednesday).