Winter buzzing of the bees

Honey bees are insects. They do not hibernate in the winter but, they do go dormant in the cold weather. When our temps begin to lower the bees' internal metabolism slows down. When the temps go lower than 45'F their flight muscles move so slowly they cannot fly. The bees spend all their time and energy staying warm. They form a small ball about the size of a melon and use their kinetic energy to keep the center of the ball at or about 93'F. The outer layer of bees will expend their heat and move toward the center while those toward the center work their way to the outside.

During this time they must eat very small amounts of honey to stay alive and produce heat. Honey bees are VERY fastidious, for this reason they do not defecate inside their hive. During the cold days they will hold their waste and wait for a warmer sunny day to fly away from the colony and clean their gullets. In Northern climes beekeepers are concerned with the possibility of their colonies contracting dysentery due to the long periods of time with below freezing temps.

Our weather here in North Carolina brings us periodic relief to cold temperatures during the winter months. Christmas weekend we had 6'+ inches of snow fall here in Granville County but, today the temps at 53'F+ and the forecast is for temps above 65'F for tomorrow.

The video was taken this morning as the temp was reading 51'F. The bees are flying away from the hive, clearing their gullets, exercising their muscles and removing any trash from the hive. In January, they might even venture out and find a wee-bit of the black pollen from the red oak.

We all learned together...

On Monday I was invited to spend the morning at the St. James Day School in Raleigh.
I spent part of my morning teaching 48 young students about honey bee, the food cycle and caring for God's creation. By the feedback, we all learned together.

Interesting facts about the honey bee

*Bees have a body temperature of 92-93 degrees Fahrenheit in their nest, no matter what the outside temperature is.

*A honeybee would have to fly about 55,000 miles to bring in enough nectar to make one pound of honey.

*It would take a honeybee approximately 1,600 round trips (hive to flower and back to hive again) in order to produce one ounce of honey.

*Honeybees will fly as far as 8 miles from their nest in search of food, at speeds of up to 15 miles per hour.

*The brain of a worker honeybee is about one cubic millimeter, approximately the size of the head of a pin.

*Honeybees’ wings stroke 11,400 times per minute and cause a buzzing noise.

*A honeybee would have to visit 2 million flowers to make one pound of honey.

*A honeybee worker visits more than 2,000 flowers on a busy day.

*The average honeybee worker makes 1/12 teaspoon of honey in her lifetime.

*Honeybees are the only insects that produce food for humans.

*Queen bees will lay as many as 2,000 eggs on a good day, an average of one every 45 seconds.

*Honey has been used for thousand of years as a dressing to help heal wounds.

*In ancient Egypt, people valued honey so highly that it was often used to pay debts.

*In ancient Greece, people offered honey as a tribute to the gods and to spirits of the dead.

*When the first European settlers arrived in North America, they used honey to make cement and furniture polish and to preserve fruits.

*On a hot summer day, the worker bees keep the hive cool inside by fanning their wings.

*The cells of a honeycomb tilt slightly upward so the honey won't spill out.

*At the turn on the 20th century there were more than 5 million bee hives in the USA, by 2006 that number had fallen to less than 2.5 million.

*Almond pollination creates an almond crop that adds over 1.5 billion dollars of revenue to California. It takes 2 million hives of honey bees to pollinate this crop annually.

*There can be as many as 60,000 bees in a colony during the nectar harvest.

*Flower nectar is 80% water, while cured honey must have a water content of less than 18.6% water to stop fermentation.

*Honey bees have over 60 scent receptors in the antennae and more in their feet.

More little buzzers...

My assistant/associate/friend Kevin is holding a cage full of bees removed from the ceiling. He is holding about eight lbs of honey bees. How did the bees get in the cage? Bee removal secret.
This is honey comb in its natural state. The bees tend to draw comb about this long and this deep. In a wall it can look more like sheets of comb flowing down the wall. In the hollow of a tree, it can take on a more rounded shape.

This is a ceiling cavity after we have removed the bees and the comb. It is almost the same size as a man made wooden bee hive. The outside edge extends out into the soffit or roof edge of the building. We scrape away all the wax and paint the interior to cover the smell of bees wax. The cavity is then filled with insulation. Later, we will work on the outside trim board to discourage bees coming inside in the future.

October Skies

The weather here has been wonderful this weekend. The Wake Forest Farmer's Market is winding down for the fall, but yesterday was so beautiful, the amount of honey sold was not important. Educating folks about honey bees and seeing my market friends are big reasons I am involved with the local micro-producers. Even with October upon us a few of the produce farmers are still able to coax get fresh food out of the ground. Next Saturday, Wake Forest will hold its annual street arts festival. Artists and craftsmen from all over the region will be in town and many of the market vendors will spend the day selling wares and swapping stories. Come spend the day in Wake Forest, NC on October the 11th.

Second colony of little buzzers

We removed the bees from colony number one this morning and moved on to locate the next. This photo shows the second colony in the ceiling of the same room. The darker comb is actually left over from a colony that did not survive. This colony is probably a swarm colony from the "mother" colony in the building. We will probably locate it very soon.

I found the little buzzers...

My company has been hired by a church in Franklin County to remove several colonies of bees living in the building.
After several hours of checking walls and ceilings, we found one of the colonies. We opened a small hole in the ceiling to begin removal. Tomorrow, we will take the ceiling down in this room and remove the bees and the comb.

Oh, the sweet, sticky, gooey mess of honey

Most of the week has been cloudy and rainy. From Tuesday night until early this morning we have had three inches of rain. My construction project for this week was outside, so I decided to rob a few bees. One of my hives sits on my front porch and is out of the rain. I took three supers and extracted honey this morning. The photo is a great look at raw honey. Just out of the comb and still full of wax, pollen, bee wings, sand and grit. After filtering through a mesh screen it will be bottled and ready for the Wake Forest Farmer's Market on Saturday. Come out and join us in Wake Forest from 8am til noon!