Feral Bees in a Tree

At times honey bees and people conflict when living close together. Ron has a colony of feral honey bees living in a cavity in a tree along his driveway. The bees are alerted when he works in the area, and he would like to remove the bees. Recognizing the importance of honey bees, Ron would like to remove the bees without killing the colony. Some have told him that the only way to remove the bees is to cut down the tree. Ron asks if the method of removing bees from a structure using a funnel is effective. I have removed bees from trees in this manner on a number of occasions. The funnel method allows a beekeeper to transfer the bees into a modern bee hive without killing the colony. Other bee removal techniques often require cutting the tree or using chemicals to drive the bees from their cavity.

I prefer to attempt a colony transfer in the spring when queen bees are available in newly established hives. A tree suitable for a funnel transfer has an entrance close to the ground. Easy access to the opening in the tree is important. The beekeeper must fashion a stand for the hive to receive the bees. It needs to be near the point where the bees enter the tree. The hive stand must be substantial, because the expanding hive can easily weigh several hundred pounds. The beekeeper places a queen-right hive with a small population of bees near the tree’s opening. Next, he closes all tree openings except one which he covers with a screen funnel. This allows the bees to exit, but not reenter the tree. Foraging bees returning to the tree overpower the guard bees of the close-by hive. The receiving hive’s population expands rapidly. The transfer requires six to 12 weeks to complete. Today’s picture shows feral bees fighting with guard bees moments after I placed a funnel over the opening to their tree.

--Richard

To Treat as a Precaution?

A person considering becoming a beekeeper wrote me and asked, “Are mites, moths, and Nosema common, and is it necessary to treat as a precaution?” I replied that each of these pests and pathogens is quite common, but we can keep bees in their presence. I recommend always trying to find a solution that limits the use of chemicals in the hive. One may want to develop an integrated pest management approach that doesn't rely on regular use of chemicals, as they often result in chemical-resistant pests. Using chemical treatments as a precaution can lead to problems. For example, the American foulbrood recently detected in Tennessee proved to be resistant to Terramycin, the approved treatment. Chemicals can be a part of an integrated pest management plan; they just need to be at the end of the list of management tools.

Mites are a major killer of honey bees, and mites exist in all colonies. One should approach them from several integrated pest management angles: Install screened bottom boards on hives; purchase queen bees bred for resistance to mites; dust the bees with powdered sugar; and learn techniques for measuring the hive's mite population. At the end of the honey producing season, apply one of the softer mite treatments if necessary. Wax moths, though plentiful, are not a problem in the hive. Wax moths are hive scavengers that eat the honeycomb and hive residue after the bee colony dies. As long as one keeps the colony queen-right and populated with bees, the workers will remove the wax moth eggs and larvae from the hive. Nosema exists in almost all colonies. Fumagillin is an approved treatment for Nosema that can be added to the bees’ feed. It appears that some of the viruses and Nosema combine to contribute to colony collapses and losses. As we learn more about pests and pathogens, we are able to keep our colonies strong, healthy, and productive.” Today’s picture: fireweed, a great honey plant of the American North-West.

--Richard

The Brood Nest

The honey bee makes a permanent nest. In nature, honey bees build a nest in a cavity of a hollow tree or a hole in a rock wall. Honey bees also find many man-made objects to be suitable cavities: mail boxes, barbecue grills, and the walls of houses. Man long ago learned to house honey bees in hives made of fired clay resembling drain pipes. Woven straw hives, called skeps, having the appearance of inverted baskets, were used by the Europeans who brought honey bee colonies to America. They packed two skeps inside a wooden barrel with ice and sawdust added to lower the temperature of the hives to reduce flying during the three month ocean crossing. The modern bee hive was invented by a Philadelphia pastor, Reverend Lorenzo L. Langstroth in 1851. The Langstroth hive is an open wooden box, structurally similar to a hollow tree. The observant pastor built his hive after carefully measuring the distances between sheets of honeycomb built by bees in the wild. The Langstroth hive contains removable frames holding the fragile beeswax combs. The ability to remove the combs allows beekeepers to inspect the hive for bee diseases and to harvest honey in a non-destructive manner.

Tod and I agreed to assist a new beekeeper set up his hive for the winter. The active colony of bees was housed in a traditional Langstroth hive with two deep hive bodies for the brood nest. These were topped with one shallow honey super. The super and the upper hive body were each filled frames of capped honey. The frames of the upper hive body were stuck firmly in the hive, so we lifted the box as a unit. The honeycomb in the lower box, containing the brood, was not held in frames. Combs collapsed like a house of cards. Beekeepers should never leave empty boxes in a hive for bees to fill with honeycomb. We will repair the hive next spring if the queen survived the implosion.

--Richard

Nectar and Pollen Sources

An observant Central Virginia beekeeper is identifying flowering plants in his area that are useful for producing nectar and pollen. There is a great diversity of flowering plants in a temperate region like Virginia, and a number of these are important bee plants. Virginia honey bees forage prolific nectar sources: clover, black locust, basswood or linden, and tuliptree. The Appalachian Mountains support the sourwood tree, which produces nectar in the higher altitudes. From the nectar of this flowering tree, bees make the famous sourwood honey. Many of the flowering plants produce both nectar and pollen to attract honey bees. There are seven families of flowering plants that can be considered exceptionally important to the honey bees. The rose family contains almonds, apples, pears, plums, cherries, blackberries, and hawthorns. The mustard family includes spinach, turnips, kale, collards, Brussels sprouts, and rape or canola. The legume family has peanuts, soybeans, peas, beans, indigo, alfalfa, kudzu vine, and the most prolific honey plant, clover. Some legumes are trees: mimosa, redbud, Kentucky coffeetree, and black locust. The snapdragon family includes mullein and the empress tree. The composite family includes the sunflowers, dandelion, goldenrod, and many garden flowers, like the coneflower and daisy. The mint family includes spearmint, peppermint, catnip, bee balm, lemon balm, and coleus. Finally, the magnolia family includes one important tree for the honey bees, the tuliptree, also known as yellow poplar. Almost any plant in these families can be expected to provide considerable amounts of nectar and pollen.

Beekeepers can identify obscure wildflowers that they observe attracting honey bees by following local guides like Weeds of the Northeast, by Uva, Neal, and DiTomaso. One person’s weed may be a beekeeper’s important wildflower. The Hive and the Honey Bee, edited by Joe M. Graham, lists a number of bee plants according to family and identifies them as nectar or pollen sources. Today’s photo is a bumblebee collecting pollen from native wildflowers at the seven thousand foot elevation on Pike’s Peak in Colorado.

--Richard

The Taste of Honey

Honey is concentrated flower nectar. To get a taste of flowers, simply eat some honey. Honey may variety greatly from location to location, from year to year, and even from month to month within a particular year. Honey made from different nectar sources varies in color, flavor, and aroma. Honey harvested from one bee yard may change from year to year depending upon weather, wildflowers in bloom, and agricultural crops planted in the area. There are certain regions that produce honeys that are well known and sought after. Many people seek out the subtle and mild flavors of orange blossom, tupelo, sourwood, fireweed, alfalfa, star thistle, and cotton honeys. A select few are dedicated fans of the strong-flavored buckwheat honey with its lasting aftertaste.

By removing supers of honey after particular nectar flows, beekeepers can separate individual varieties of honey. The National Honey Board describes some of the varietal honeys at http://www.honey.com/nhb/about-honey/honey-varietals/. From the Peace Bee Farm hives at the Memphis Botanic Garden, with its great diversity of flowers, we have collected four distinct honeys in the same year: honey with the aroma of muscadine grapes, honey with a mild taste of flowers, peppery honey, and chocolate-flavored honey. The flavor of honey doesn’t always reflect the aroma of the flower. Lavender and citrus honeys don’t taste like the flowers. Today’s picture shows some of the many entries in the recent Tennessee Beekeepers Association’s honey show. Honey shows allow beekeepers the opportunity to hone their skills at producing a jar of honey as fine as the honey inside the cells of the bee hive. Competition among beekeepers is keen. For breakfast today, I had some mildly flavored East Tennessee sourwood honey with steel-cut oatmeal and coffee with chicory. From sourwood trees at altitude, honey bees produce a famous honey in the Southern Appalachian Mountains. Sourwood trees are not consistent producers of nectar; but in years when there is a good nectar flow, Appalachian beekeepers sell rich sourwood honey to loyal customers.

--Richard

Goldenrod in Bloom

Goldenrod is one of the most important flowering plants for the honey bee. It is a prolific producer of nectar and pollen late in the year. Blooming in the late summer and fall, this bright yellow-flowered composite provides nectar for the bees to build up stores of honey for winter. Goldenrod also provides pollen to help stimulate the colony to produce brood late into the fall. The pollen adds considerable amounts of protein, fats, vitamins, and minerals to the diet of the late-season bees, helping ensure that they will be capable of producing the food for the next year’s early brood. Goldenrod is a consistent producer of nectar and pollen in most years. The open flowers attract a number of insect species. It is not unusual to see honey bees, bumblebees, and solitary native bees sharing goldenrod blooms with soldier beetles and yellow jacket wasps. Today’s photo shows one honey bee foraging goldenrod for pollen while another collects nectar.

Peace Bee Farm’s hives at the Children’s Museum of Memphis were active today with bees bringing in large amounts of bright yellow pollen, likely from goldenrod. The bees were foraging heavily even though the early morning temperatures were quite cool. The bees were also removing some drones from the hive as well as pupae. The drones, male reproductive bees, are not needed in the winter. They are pushed out the hive entrance to perish the first frosty night of the fall. Honey bee pupae are removed by hygienic bees that have a genetic trait that allows them to detect parasitic Varroa mites living and reproducing in the brood cells with the developing bees. The Varroa puncture the surface of the bee and expose it to a number of pathogens, including viruses. Varroa can be found in all honey bee hives. The mite population in the museum observation hives increased in late summer. I applied a thymol-based treatment to reduce the parasitic mites as part of our integrated pest management plan.

--Richard

Tennessee Beekeepers Meet

Mankind has long known that honey bees produce honey, a delicious and nutritious food, and beeswax, a valuable item with many uses. To get to these items, people first learned to rob wild colonies and later to manage housed colonies of bees. Beekeepers, throughout history, have relied upon a sharing of skills to exploit and manage honey bees. Beekeepers from across Tennessee and from a number of neighboring states converged upon Cookeville, Tennessee for the annual conference of the Tennessee Beekeepers Association. The audience for Tennessee’s state-wide association included beekeepers from each of the state’s 30 affiliated local associations. Local, state, and regional beekeeping associations provide training and mentoring of new beekeepers. These associations are the foundation for the sharing of beekeeping skills. To effectively manage honey bee colonies, one must be exposed to both the modern scientific understanding of honey bee biology and the traditional beekeeping skills passed down from experienced bee handlers.

The annual conference is first a social event where beekeepers meet old friends and make new ones. It is most importantly an educational event where experienced beekeepers, researchers, and industry experts share information and tips on managing hives, maintaining healthy bees, and marketing honey and bee hive products. Beekeeping equipment manufacturers display and sell bee hives and equipment. One of the ways that beekeepers hone their skills in producing products from the bee hive is through honey shows. Here, beekeepers compete to present the most perfect jars of honey in extracted liquid form, or in chunk or cut comb form. Chunk honey includes a piece of honeycomb in a jar filled with liquid honey. Beekeepers also compete by exhibiting beeswax candles, blocks of beeswax, and products made from beeswax. Competition exists between producers of frames of capped honey, taken from the hive and displayed in boxes behind glass or plastic. Bee-related photography is a popular event at the honey show. I was greeted at the conference hall by larger-than-life and charming honey bees.

--Richard