Free Bees in East Texas

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Free Bees in East Texas

Postby SpinnerMan » Fri Jun 01, 2018 3:20 pm

http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2018/06/01/semi-carrying-millions-of-bees-overturns-on-east-texas-highway/

A semi-trailer truck carrying a reported 15-30 million honey bees overturned on an east Texas highway on Memorial Day.


Betty, they need you in east Texas.
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Re: Free Bees in East Texas

Postby aunt betty » Sat Jun 02, 2018 9:39 am

Texas and Yankees...Yankees in Texas. Right.
We had a huge offer. One of the wife's bosses moved to one of the ginormous rehab centers and wanted us to run the maint. crew.

Katy, Texas...no thank you. Maybe tomorrow.
I've heard that it's incredibly stupid to fuck around with a crazy man's head.
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Re: Free Bees in East Texas

Postby SpinnerMan » Sat Jun 02, 2018 11:53 am

How many bees are in a hive?
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Re: Free Bees in East Texas

Postby aunt betty » Sat Jun 02, 2018 12:53 pm

SpinnerMan wrote:How many bees are in a hive?
It depends on how big it is.
I never name them or give them ID #'s so all I can do is guess.

I've measured some bees to test for varroa mites. A quarter cup of bees is about 300.

If you buy a three-pound package with queen that's around 10,000 so let's say that a pound of bees is 3333.
I've caught swarms that were 10 pounds. Assume that's half of a really strong colony.
Lots of assuming going on so take it with some salt.

I assume there's around 20 pound of bees on one of my beast-hives that make honey.
That'd be 65,000 roughly. I doubt that they get much bigger.
When one is pissed at you and boiling bees over the sides it seems like a million of the mothers.
They roar at you...then it's time to go.
I've heard that it's incredibly stupid to fuck around with a crazy man's head.
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Re: Free Bees in East Texas

Postby aunt betty » Sat Jun 02, 2018 1:02 pm

You can get all mathy an shit about bees and do charts and graphs. I've seen some that commercial beekeepers use.
In general the queen starts laying in late-January when the days start getting a bit longer. The shortest day is Dec. 21...roughly.
The longest is June 21. Somehow queen bees know this in the dark and can tell. Internal calendars?
There are a certain number of cells per frame etc. They build up at an exponential rate...natural logarithm curve.
The decay is the same and starts around July 1. The queen slows down her laying and lets the hive dwindle going into winter. Less mouths to feed.

So the "how many in a hive" question also depends on the when. Have one hive that was only a handful of bees and a queen in early March. They all do different things according to genetics. Russian bees dwindle down to a handful then OMG the growth.
Apparently someone around here has some Russians and my Italian queen got frisky with their drones.
Mostly mine are mutts but the way I do things tends to produce Italian queens. They make more hunny.
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Re: Free Bees in East Texas

Postby SpinnerMan » Sat Jun 02, 2018 4:54 pm

Thanks :thumbsup:

Very interesting.
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Re: Free Bees in East Texas

Postby aunt betty » Mon Jun 04, 2018 10:12 am

Sorry I get caught up in the two angles of every bee question.
On one hand ppl ask "how are they doing?" and sort of expect me to say something quick like "it's bad", "it's good", or "they're buzzing". On the other is where they actually expect a detailed report.
I don't get it won't get it, and you're always going to get the long answer.

Went thru my queen rearing yard today. Out of 12 tries I got 10 mated queens.
Not sure about the other two so I took some combs with eggs in them and sort of smushed them onto the top of the ?? ones.
There is an obscure method of queen rearing where that's what you do. Cut a slice of comb with fresh bee eggs then lay it sideways on top of a strong queenless colony and they'll make queens.

The bees will either attempt to make new queens with them eggs or not. That's how I can tell if I missed them or they were out getting giggitty while I was inspecting. It's something to do besides fish and wish I could go duck huntin'.

SPEAKING OF DUCKS
Last night I was enjoying my new glasses at the lake. Polarized lenses. Nice.
Found that I can actually see ducks way the fuck up there. :mrgreen:
Was watching this teal and it was flying sort of strange.
It was being hunted by a pair of eagles. One high over here and one low over there. The high one was herding that duck towards the lower one. It didn't work but they had that poor teal flying like a mallard in big circles.

The first time I saw an eagle up close at Clinton Lake I was excited and tried telling people that, "hey I see eagles a lot around here". They said I was batshit crazy, sniffing things, and it was turkey buzzards from Indiana.
OH kay so I started taking some pictures of these buzzards. It's not an eagle until it gets a white head. Until then it's a buzzard.
Ask any Champaign native. Finally the news went out and took some video of "the eagles".
I've heard that it's incredibly stupid to fuck around with a crazy man's head.
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Re: Free Bees in East Texas

Postby aunt betty » Tue Jun 05, 2018 2:21 pm

This is what I'm talkin' about. That box has been re-filled a few times since I nailed them frames together in 2016.
Can tell by the lousy joinery that that box is one of the first ones I built. Used a circular saw to carefully cut the dadoes for the frame rests.
Fuck that I traded some bees for a table saw then another bigger one too. I rabbet them all now.

20180605_141855.jpg
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Re: Free Bees in East Texas

Postby aunt betty » Thu Jun 14, 2018 9:17 am

My honeybee adventure re-started about 4 or 5 years ago. Had kept bees in the 70's when it was easy.
Became aware of some sort of bee problem so naturally I got a bit concerned. Started looking for bees outside in the yards and really wasn't seeing any. No bumblebees or anything.
I got upset and decided to be a part of the solution instead of part of the problem not doing shit about it.
Dove in and started collecting swarms and doing removals just to get the bees. There is money involved but I let the guys have the money. All I wanted was some bees. I worked really hard and took quite a few stings to get here.
Have so many that I had to quit chasing swarms and doing removals.

Today I went into the yard to look around and see what all kinds of bees I see.
Holy shit there were 5 species on one flower/plant. (Black-eyed Susans)
Teeny tiny bees smaller than sweat bees. Some that looked like tiny black honeybees, another larger version, bumblebees and a carpenter bee gathering some pollen. All on one plant. Amazing.

So I went from "I can't find bees where are they?" to "they're all in my yard".
Marigolds and Black-eyed Susans attract them. There are others that they can not resist.
Bees satisfy some sort of carnal urge I have to connect with the earth. I think we all have "it" and fulfill our needs in different ways.
Hunting, gathering, gardening, fishing, keeping bees...it's what we were designed for.
I've heard that it's incredibly stupid to fuck around with a crazy man's head.
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Re: Free Bees in East Texas

Postby aunt betty » Fri Jun 15, 2018 8:38 am

My bees at the old farm found their way into the machine shed. Stored honey in there attracted them. They're robbing it as I type.
Stuck as much as I could in a freezer but there are still four boxes from last year that are brood frames filled with honey.
Talking 400 pounds of liquid gold. Have 400 more protected for later.
Was kind of hoping they'd find it but not until another month. Ill set it out and let them have it for winter. Them taking it now is going to cause issues with crowding.

My shed is buzzing!
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