Found the criminals, (I believe)

We have a local radio station in town, WYSH.

As a matter of fact, its just about 1/2 of a mile from my house. They have a program that runs in the morning called "Trading Time" This is where any one who has anything to buy, sell, trade, or give away, can call in and advertise for free.

As I stated in a previous post, I won't be getting my package in until May 3rd. And, I believe that is when they will be shipped, not when I get them. Any way, I told you about "Trading Time" for a reason. I called in Monday morning on my way to work and advertised that I was looking for open swarms, If anyone knew where any were to give me a shout. I had no sooner set the phone down in my lap and it rang.

Dang, I thought, that was quick. I answered and they man stated that he didn't have a swarm, but had a bee tree that been on his property for over 6 years.  He would like for someone to have them that would take care of them.  I went through the usual questions, making sure they were honeybees, no chemicals had been sprayed on them, etc., etc.  All questions were answered the way I'd hoped they would be.  I asked him where abouts he lived at.  He lived only about 400-500 yards away from me.  Since he was so close, I believe that these wear the bees that had robbed out the dead nuc I had.  After the conversation was over, I told him I would be by to take a look after work. 

Wow, a bee tree.  Could I handle it?  Should I take on the task of a bee tree just starting out?  Would it be worth it?  After pondering for a while I decided to go for it.  I talked with my beekeeping buddy, Carl, and he said he would come down to help.

I stopped by this mans house to look at the tree.  It was down in a little valley that was kept mowed.  There was one little apple tree at the end of the little grassy field.  Where was the tree, I wondered.  As he led the way, we started to vear off into a thicket.  Walking about 50 feet into the brush there was a split trunk cedar tree, with one of the trunks dead and rotting to some degree.  "This is it", he said.   I looked around in amazement, because I had never seen a hive in the wild like this.  Nor did I think that there were any around.  I felt like I could do this and didn't think it would be that much work for some free bees.  I called Carl to tell him what everything looked like.  He said, "lets do it".  He was just as excited for me as I was. 

Today was the day.  I got Carl and we went to the bee tree.  To make an even longer story short, we ended up doing a cutout on the tree instead of cutting a log section where the hive was.  This was because we couldn't get the tree to fall because the top was entangled in some of the overgrowth in the thicket.

We cut a big section out of the side of the tree to gain access to the comb.  And boy, was there a lot of bees.

We began gently pulling comb and tying it into frames.  All the while looking for her highness.  That is a very time consuming task.

The hive had some big black ants that had taken up residence just above it.  I only saw one small hive beetle during the whole cutout. 

The queen, who never graced us with her presence, seemed to have a good brood pattern.  The above picture doesn't seem like it, but there was brood in the open spots.

After getting most of the comb and bees in the new hive,  we set it at the base of the tree and smoked the bees down so they would hopefully start to go in. 

I tried to get some good pics of them going in but wasn't too successful.  It is very hard to remember to take pictures every once in a while and do the cutout.   I was very pleased to see them marching in with the others fanning away at the entrance.  We are not for sure that the queen went in.  I had added a lemongrass lure in the hive to draw them into the hive.  Prior to adding it, the bees were staying in the hive and not trying to fly back out.  So I can only hope that she is in there.  Carl said that he believed that she was or they wouldn't have stayed in there so easily.

The hive was left at the base of the tree they were originally cut out of so the extra stragglers will be able to find there new home over the next day or two.  These were very gently bees, and apparently are excellent survivor stock.  I can only hope that all will continue to go good with them.

I said these were free bees but in the end, it looks like they will cost me the price of a new chain saw, as the one I used was borrowed and it locked up on me halfway through the whole ordeal.  Ugh.  I keep telling myself that I will never borrow again, for that reason.  And, I got popped four times during the three and a half hours we were there.  Once on the neck before I was decked out with a jacket (not sure why that happened and they were so gentle two days prior.  I was able to stand right at the entrance without any problems) and three times on my fingers through the glove. 

Here is a short video of them fanning and marching in.  Its viewing from the top of the hive down to the landing board.  The tree they are clumped on is the bottom of the cedar they were in.

This was a very welcomed site at the end of the job.


Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed it.

James

White Man's Foot

I learned something pretty neat today.  I was reading back through The Complete Idiot's Guide to Beekeeping and noticed something that I had missed.  It talked about a bee sting remedy that I had never heard about before.

The remedy was to apply a poultice of crushed or chewed plantain leaves on the sting to relieve pain and itching.  Now I had no clue what a poultice was, or what a plantain leaf looked like.  The only plantain I knew of was the fruit that looked like a banana.  So, I did what any person does now when they don't know what something is, I Googled it.

A poultice is a soft warm mass, hence the chewing of the leaf part.  The book said that the plantain growed wild in most of the United States, (I am a very outdoorsy kinda guy and consider myself to know more about nature than the average bear) but I had never heard of or seen it (to my knowledge).  Well it turns out that the plantain plant does grow everywhere, I have it all in my yard and have seen it everywhere.

 

I used to pick this weed out of my yard with a tool that I bought several years ago that was awesome at removing dandelions, root and all.  I guess I won't be doing that anymore, the dandelions either, having bees now I probably will not mind them growing in my yard as much.

I found out that the plantain wasn't just good for bee stings, but a number of things including:  mosquito bites, poison ivy rash, sunburn, eczema, burns, cuts, and toothaches.  Seems that this is more of an ointment than a weed.  It is also known as jewelweed, plantain major, and white man's foot.  The term white man's foot was phrased by Native American's who said the plant seemed to grow where ever the white man settled.