On the Garden Path at 5~Acre Farm: As Busy As Bees!

Friday, March 16, 2012

As Busy As Bees!

Things have been pretty busy here at 5~Acre Farm. We're only just getting a chance to catch our breath... well, I am. Poor John is still pushing himself at a maniacal pace! His primary concern right now is the bees. With the unseasonably warm weather this week comes the possibility that the bees are ready to swarm.

John, ready to check the bee

Swarming indicates that the honey bee colony is reproducing. The old queen bee will leave the hive with about 60% of the worker bees to form a new hive. That's tens of thousands of bees leaving the old hive box where a new virgin queen will take over and produce tens of thousands of new worker bees.

We're raising Minnesota Hygienic bees, which were developed at the University of Minnesota over several years. "Hygienic" bees are just that, hygienic. They are the Felix Unger of bees, and if you don't get that reference, just think about bees with OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder). They keep their hives absolutely spotless, reducing the chances of mites and diseases, and increasing their chances for strength and survivability.

Our first three hives

John's job right now is to watch for signs that the bees are preparing to swarm and have new hive boxes ready to be inhabited. If the boxes are nearby and ready, at the right time, John will capture the queen and put her in a cage, then put the cage in a new hive box. Other bees will be pulled to go with her. She'll be kept in the cage, in the hive box until the colony is established. If John misses the chance to do this, the bees could swarm and go high up into the trees or even leave the farm. That would be a big loss for us, since we are trying to grow our bee colonies and potential for honey.

Opening the hive

If John is successful, we will go from three hives to six. Our potential for honey will also double. This being our first honey season, we are expecting to harvest 10 quarts per hive. That is what has been suggested to us by other beekeepers. That's 30 quarts total. Next year, with six hives, that will mean 60 quarts of honey. If we have six hives next year, they will potentially double to 12, and will produce 120 quarts of honey the following year.

These are 10-frame hives

That's a lot of honey, and it sounds great doesn't it! But it's not that simple. All kinds of factors will influence the size of the hives, their reproductive abilities, and the amount of honey to be harvested. Bee health is imperative. Right now, we are lucky to have not just strong hives, but super-strong hives. This, I believe, is due to John's absolute attention to detail in their care. He inspects the hives daily, reads everything he can find about bees, does internet research late into the night, and asks zillions of questions of the other beekeepers at our monthly beekeepers' meeting.

Removing an outer frame for inspection

The bees also have to be well fed. In order for the hive to thrive and prosper, you can't rely solely on flowering plants and trees to provide pollen and nectar. When we brought our bees home last June, we started giving them sugar water on a daily basis. Seven pounds of sugar per gallon of cold water was recommended. We kept this up well into fall, until, at one of our monthly beekeepers' meetings, the best beekeeper in the state told us we probably didn't need to give them that much. We stopped the sugar water for a little while, but started giving them a lighter syrup in the new year.

Frame, bees on both sides, filling in the combs with hone

Now, it's Spring, and we're holding off on the sugar water again while nature provides the pollen and nectar the bees need. However, to insure that the bees are getting sufficient nutrients, John is providing Protein Patties to supplement nature's provision. "Pro Patties" are filled with vitamins, anti-oxidants, and trace minerals that contribute to colony strength. As indicated, these pro patties provide needed protein, whereas the sugar water provides carbohydrates. You can see the Pro Patty (halved) on either side of the top of the hive box. Each hive has already consumed three split patties in one month.

Inner frame, fully covered and filled in

The bees also have to have a fresh, available water source. There is a fresh-water pond less than a half-mile away, on our neighbor's property, and we keep fresh water near the hives. John has hung a few hummingbird feeders nearby, and, to the right of the hives (see photo above) there is an old humidifier that John re-purposed as a waterer.

The yellow hive tool is used to separate and remove frames

It is also important to keep the bees in a poison-free environment. Weed poisons, crop dusting poisons, even bug spray can all take their toll on a bee colony if they are exposed. 5~Acre Farm is, for the most part, removed from populated areas, and we do not use any poisonous chemicals on our orchards and crops. The few neighbors we do have must not be using poisons on their lawns and flowers, because we haven't seen any evidence of it in our hives.

The Hygienic bees are great at keeping their hives clean, but John is still diligent to inspect regularly for signs of mites, wax moth larvae, beetles, and other harmful insects which can quickly decimate a colony.

John built this removable rack to hold frames while he works

As strange as it might seem, having a fire ant colony near the hives is a good thing. They keep the surrounding area clean of dead bees, beetles, larvae, and spilled honey and pollen, and anything else that is littering the area.

To sum up, if your goal is a strong, thriving hive, the following points are important issues to pay attention to:

Honey!

A nutrient rich diet
A clean, intruder-free hive
A fresh water source
Avoidance of chemical poisons
Frequent hive inspection

Larger bees are drones

I'll post a lot more about the bees as the season progresses. It is exciting to be involved in this process. Mother Nature does some incredible things, and we not only get to watch, we get to participate! John has dived into the deep end of beekeeping, and he is doing a fantastic job. I have every confidence that he will be considered an expert within a couple of years. I'm glad that John has taken the lead in beekeeping. He is teaching me a lot, but I find my time primarily needed elsewhere on the farm. But I am blessed to know that these bees are in the loving, capable hands of my husband.

John likes to tell folks that we have acquired a half million new employees. They always look stunned. Then he jokes about how difficult it is to fill out all those tiny little W-9 forms. Folks don't always get it right away, but they always have a good laugh when they do!

2 comments:

happytatorcater2March 17, 2012 at 12:57 AM
stopped by for a 1st time visit...hope u guys like teaching & explaining in detail,taking pics cause i certainly am new with bees & everything else it must require to run a lovely farm such as your's!
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John and Michelle, and 5 Acre Farm

How We Came To Be

John was born and raised in Georgia by parents who lived incredible lives of their own, and passed on to John a rich family history from both sides. He was a die hard Boy Scout, and later, spent 17 years as a Troop Leader. He earned a dual Agriculture/Agricultural Engineering degree at ABAC in Tipton, where he also started the college's radio station. After college, John served on nuclear submarines in the Navy, where he once saved the lives of his shipmates, and, rumor has it, did many incredible things in the service of our country. He married and had a family, and after the Navy, worked briefly with the EPA before opening his own HVAC-Refrigeration company. John was inventive as a child, and that carried over into everything in his life. He is a fixer of severe mechanical problems, and an inventor of all kinds of things that improve on or simplify existing machinery, equipment, and ideas. His inventions are unique, and some of them may some day aide humanity, save lives, and save our planet if we can get the right people to listen.

My dad was career Army. I was born in France, and introduced, at a very young age, to the Virginia countryside, where we raised rabbits and chickens. After dad retired, we moved to North Carolina, his home state, where we spent many years on the coast, near Wilmington. Here, we had a garden, raised cows, pigs, chickens, and ducks, and fished commercially. Our freezer was always full of fresh Spot and shrimp, and oyster roasts were a weekly event! As a young adult I lived with my family in the mountains south of Asheville. Here too we had a garden, raised cows, pigs, chickens, and ducks, as well as geese and peacocks. I worked for many years with an arts council, Christian organizations, and other non-profits. I helped train missionaries, researched/wrote grants, produced professional documents, edited newsletters, and wrote a lot of publicity materials. I already had two Associate degrees, but in my late 30s I finally completed an undergraduate degree in English/Art History. For 20 years I was active in community theater, sang solos with a community choir, and danced with a show choir. Treasured memories! I moved to Georgia in late 1998, and married my first husband in 2002. I was 45. Eighteen months later, I was widowed.

John and I first met in 2000. After I was widowed, and John was divorced, we found each other again. Of like minds, spirits, and goals, our hearts came together quickly, and we married in 2005. Each of us has undergone Elijah House training, and we were both ordained into ministry in 2006. I have been a Christian counselor and prayer warrior for probably 30 years. John and I live to put God first in our lives, and in our dreams for this small piece of earth of which we are the caretakers.

We call our place "5 Acre Farm." John's father took this barren, overworked field from a larger parcel of farmland in the mid-70s. He fenced off about three-quarters of an acre for the house, and added plants, flowers, and trees. Elsewhere, he transformed the property through years of hard work, adding an apple orchard, peach trees, pears, two fig orchards, grape vines, and a greenhouse. John and I have been trying to continue his father's work on this land, adding to it with our own hopes and dreams, and our late-in-life efforts. Not a day goes by that I don't feel great respect for John's father, for the man he was, for the work he did here, and gratitude for the bounty we reap because of his hard work.

John and I are in our 50s, just starting life together, but with age and health trying to work against us. We aren't ready to sit down and take it easy. We have a goal to become self-sufficient by growing our own food (meat and vegetables), and getting off the grid. The challenges we face in doing this are age, health, and finances. John's inventiveness is being strongly applied, as is my gift for budget stretching and frugality. Our strength? The love we have for each other, and the trust that we are working inside the will of God.

One of the things we ask ourselves now and then is this: "Is it worth it?" I never had children. John's son has set his own path with family and career. There does not seem to be anyone we can leave this property to who will continue the work and the dream; one of John's grandchildren, perhaps, but they are very young right now, and do not yet notice or care.

So, is it worth it (all the work and expense) if there is every chance this land will end up in the hands of developers after we're gone? Well, our answer to that question so far is always "Yes, it's worth it." It's worth it to us, because of what we are accomplishing here in our lifetime. It's worth it because what we grow here we share with family, with friends, and with our community. And not just what we grow, but our faith and philosophy, our hopes and dreams, and our very desire to leave at least our little part of the world better than it was when we found it. We are living - consciously, and deliberately - a lifestyle that expresses who we are and what we believe. Does anybody care? Why don't read our blog, leave a comment, and let us know.