It’s been a long cold snowy spell here in central Minnesota.  Beekeepers have not had a chance to crack open their hives and check on their bees because of record cold temperatures.  Temps should be at least in the high 30’s or in the 40’s, and little or no wind, before attempting to check on the your bees.  Hopefully by mid-March, we will see those temps.  And even at those temps, make inspection times as short as possible.  You don’t want to expose the bees too long and chill them.  Before you open a hive on the next warmer day, have a plan and know why you are checking (disturbing) the bees.  There are two main reasons for checking your hives this time of year.  1) Checking for dead-outs or weak hives.  2) Checking if bees have enough stored honey to make it to spring.  It’s not a time to spend finding the queen, or even pulling frames.  Bees are in a clustering mode, like a ball shape of bees, this time of year and t...

  Hands down, a NUC is much easier to install with fewer steps and less issues.  With a NUC it is simple.  Transfer the frames, dump in the extra bees, put the cover on and walk away.  With a NUC, at least 5 frames will have drawn out comb, the queen has not only been excepted by the bees, she has also been laying eggs for weeks nonstop.  The bees have been storing honey and pollen for raising more brood.  The colony has been established and  will grow instantly with a laying queen.  The chance of the bees superseding the queen is much less. For installing a package there are more steps, which means more to go wrong.  Package bees don’t come with frames.  So, there is no drawn out comb and normally a new beekeeper does not have drawn out comb on hand.  The queen is caged which means she has NOT been laying for days and will take a few days to start up again.  Most new beekeepers don’t feel comfortable of knowing when ...

Sunday afternoon – time to blow some steam off..  Actually, I need a break from cleaning out the garage.  There is a lot of honeybee information up-loaded to the Internet daily.  A lot of it is good, most of it is true.  But I’m amazed at the amount of “self proclaimed experts” that post videos and blogs that tell you the only way to keep bees is their way.  A good  percentage of these “self-proclaimed experts” have only been keeping bees one year which, in my estimation, is not enough time under their belt to be proclaiming anything besides they owned bees for a year! This false information makes it that much harder for new beekeepers to prepare for their first bees by researching and become knowledgeable about beekeeping.   I know too well.  I put on the new beekeeper’s hat 6 years ago.  Before we ordered our first colony, I searched the internet for hours and hours, bound and determined I would learn all there was to know before the b...

  New beekeepers have many questions and often wonder what to do with the bees once getting them home.  The box the bees come in is not meant for long time use. Its purpose and design is for transporting bees only.  You will need to have a permanent hive all set up and ready to go before the bees arrive. I was all geared up to write this long informative post on how to transfer bees from a 5 frame NUC to a 10 frame hive body.  Then I remembered seeing a YouTube video on this.  After some research I believe there is plenty of  good YouTube videos out there on this subject. So, I decided to just post some here and maybe add my two cents and comments. It’s always challenging for new beekeepers to see eggs in the bottom of cell. But that is a good way to tell if the queen is doing her job without finding the queen. Feeding a new colony is always good, especially with just foundation with no drawn comb. The feeding stimulates the bees to draw out the comb f...

  NUC is short for “nucleus colony of bees.” It has everything  a large full spring-time colony has, only less of everything.  Larger established colonies have 20-30 or more frames which are in multiple boxes stacked on top of each other to make up one hive containing 40,000 or more bees.  In contrast, NUCs are generally sold as 4 or 5 frame NUCs and come in a single small box containing about 10,000 bees. A good NUC should have a young (a few months old) local queen, which has been laying in the frame cells for several weeks.  You should see at least two or three frames of eggs, larvae, and capped brood.  There should be some pollen and honey stored on the frames. It is better if all frames have drawn comb, but some producers sell 5 frame NUCs with 4 drawn frames and 1 new frame, which should really be considered a 4 frame NUC.  The NUC should be full of bees crawling on all frames.  Think of crowded, as you’ll need to transfer to a large hive bo...

  There are many very interesting parts to beekeeping. You may have googled things like comb honey, rearing and selling queens, making wax candles, making colony splits, how much honey per hive to expect, etc. Oh and all the ads from equipment dealers for extractors, wax melters, and honey bottling tanks. Of course, don’t ever stop learning about all aspects of these fascinating creatures, but if you are new to beekeeping and starting with your first hive(s), I strongly recommend you focus on one goal your first season. Goal: keep your bees healthy and you’ll especially want healthy bees going into winter in northern states such as Minnesota. Minnesota winters are tough on honey bees. Learn all you can about honey bee diseases and pests. Become knowledgeable, learn how to prevent diseases, and know how and when control is needed. American Foulbrood, European Foulbrood, Chalkbrood, and Nosema are some of the diseases. Deformed Wing, Black Queen Cell, Acute Bee Paralysis, and Sacbroo...

  If you have the budget for it, we recommend you start with two hives.  If not, then one is just fine.  But with two hives, you will be able to compare the two.  Is one doing better than the other?   Maybe one hive has sick bees and your bees are telling you something?  Or one hive has calmer bees than the other?  One hive produced more honey than the other.?  Those are good questions and observations to share with your mentor or fellow beekeepers. With more than one hive, you will have more management options than you would if you just had one hive.  If a hive becomes weak, you can transfer a frame of brood, honey or pollen from the stronger hive to the weaker one.  Or if you happen to smash the queen by accident, you can take a frame of brood from the other hive and the bees will rear their own new queen.  Yes, even highly experienced beekeepers occasionally smash queens when remo...

  As we are taking orders for spring NUCs we are getting many questions from first time beekeepers – “Newbees”.  We too were newbees once, full of questions, so we fully understand.  I’m going to try to answer some of the most common questions in the following posts. Before getting into questions, I want to highlight a couple of things.  First is finding a mentor.  Someone in your area that has kept bees for a while and is willing to work with you or at least answer some basic questions for you about beekeeping.  The best way to find a mentor is to join a bee club in your area. We belong to Tri-County Beekeepers Association which meets in St Cloud once a month where meetings include presentations/demonstrations on topics related to beekeeping and pollinators.  The club meets at 7 p.m. the first Tuesday of every month at Holy Cross Lutheran Church located at 2555 Clearwater Road, St Cloud, MN.  The club draws members from Stearns, Be...

  Beekeeping – Working your hives. Watching the worker bees bring in nectar and pollen on a warm sunny day.  Extracting honey in the fall.  The excitement of finding the queen.  The buzzing of bees in a flower patch.  All of these and more may come to mind when you think about beekeeping. As our business grows we are realizing the not-so-glamorous part of beekeeping is taking more and more time to address–the part that we never had to do or worry about when we only had a few hives.  For example, early on we had enough friends and neighbors to sell or give away our honey to. Now we must give needed attention to marketing to expand our customer base. Please don’t get me wrong.  It’s a blessing and a top-of-the-world feeling to see our bee business reach this point in just five short years.  I’m just saying there is more to beekeeping than spending time with bees – the nuts and bolts of a successful b...

  We know it is hard to think about bees buzzing, flowers in bloom, and nice sunny weather when more snow is predicted and our backs are already aching from shoveling.  However, now is the time to order bees, especially in 2019. Commercial suppliers say there will be a shortage of bees, and they will be sold out early.  Even small suppliers are indicating on their websites that they are sold out.  From our personal experience, one spring we waited too long.  To our dismay, we were not able to order quality bees that we desired that year. If you currently over winter bee hives in Minnesota or other northern states, on the next warmer day, it would be wise to check the health of your bees.  If you have weak hive (few live bees) or dead-outs (no live bees), you may want to get your order in soon for replacement bees.  If your bees are alive and healthy, congratulations! New beekeepers need to get their orders in also, as well as start getting their e...

  Welcome to Beau’s Bee Yards Blog.  As we freeze in Minnesota with what seems to be a never-ending avalanche of snow, it is time to start thinking about this summer’s bees.  An important decision to make at this time of year is where the beehives will flourish in the summer.  It is amazing how landowners are so gracious with allowing us space for our bees.  It never ceases to amaze us how simply asking if someone is willing to have bees on their property often yields an excellent bee yard.  Of course, we fully understand the many reasons why some people are not willing to have bees.  But more often than not, families have lent us a spot on their land for our beehives – and for that, we are truly thankful.  So, for our very first blog entry, we would like to express our gratitude to our wonderful current landowners.