Beekeepers Blog

Winter is finally here...so now what? After months of activity caring for your bees, it's finally time to take a deep breath and wait for spring. If you are like me, waiting is the hardest part! Every cold rainy night,...

Keeping Yourself Cool Keeping Your Bees Cool The Heat is On! I don’t have to tell you that, do I? You’d think a person would “acclimate” to the heat, but – me, not so much – probably has a lot to do...

Learning how to fix a weak hive is a critical skill in beekeeping. Every beekeeper will, at some point, have one or many weak hives that need help! One of the most important distinctions to make before fixing a weak...

By Chari Elam We made it! This is the last article in the series of Mastering Hive Inspections. In this final segment I’d like to focus on problem identification and subsequent solutions. Problem solving is probably one of the most...

Hive Inspections! By: Chari Elam Depending on where you are in your beekeeping adventure, you may have completely opposing views from other beekeepers concerning hive inspections. New beekeepers inspect hives to learn AND to manage the hives as they learn....

By: Chari Elam Probably one of the most intimidating aspects of beekeeping is a hive inspection! How often is it done? Do I really have to pull all of the frames? What am I looking at? We’ve ALL asked that...

Every beekeeper was once a newbee, just beginning the learning curve. The initial exposure is one of fun, excitement and fascination leading to intimidation, reluctance and finally the “Ah ha” moment of confidence. How does the new beekeeper get to...

A shook swarm is just that- a "swarm" you create by shaking the bees off of frames to create an artificial Swarm! Shook Swarm TBA from Honking Goose Media on Vimeo. Why use the Shook Swarm Method? Converting Deeps to Mediums If you...

By: James Elam Theory- a set of principles on which the practice of an activity is based. The theory of reversing brood boxes comes from the belief that a colony of honey bees, when necessary, moves upward as winter honey stores...

Bee Yard Shuffle - Sounds like a dance doesn’t it? In reality I guess it kind of is! I write this article today as a suggestion from a beekeeper on our January Monthly Zoom call. So often we see a...

-Overcrowded hives

-Swarm Traps

-February Splits

-Sticky Boards

-February Varroa Mites

-Equalizing Brood, Bees & Honey

This is not a very uplifting topic for sure, but one of the most important skills in beekeeping is to learn from our mistakes, of which we all make many! The average annual hive loss rate is up to 44%....

probably taking one of our classes with Jana row or James and Sheri along and we wanted to make this video because sometimes folks can't always make it out into the be or they don't have a time or doesn't...