Beekeeper practices

A bee brush is an important tool for a beekeeper. It comes handy while removing the bees, especially when one doesn’t resort to using fume boards or escapes to remove them from the honey. The bee brush also comes in handy while removing honey from the honey-supers and when they are massing.

Beekeeping is a strenuous job and because the beehives need to be cleaned at regular intervals. Beehives will gather propolis, old wax, dirt, debris of the hives and bad honey. Dirty hives invite pests, parasites and diseases. Cleaning their hives make the gloves dirty and sticky with the remains of the beehive and the stings that have been left by bees on them while you were doing your job. Here is a short guide on how to clean the dirty bee gloves.

Honey Bees are known for their efficiency. One can compare the working efficiency of honey bees to that of a man. In a beehive, each bee is assigned with a special task which results in the smooth functioning of the whole system of collecting nectar and making honey and the honeycomb. Honey is prepared by a particular type of bee called Apis mellifera. On an average a beehive consists of 40000 to 50000 bees, most of the bees in a hive are workers who keep on collecting nectar and pollens...

There is nothing more disappointing than the honey bees leaving your hive. This can have a bad impact on your apiculture business. Honey bees may leave all at once (including queen, workers and drones) or they might split. This can happen due to a variety of reasons; this includes uncomfortable hives, strong winds, predators, bad chemical odors, etc.

Honey bees are one of the most environment-friendly as well as human-friendly insects. They have served humans need for centuries, even though we are still unaware of those. For example, honey bees are responsible for pollinating one-third of the total crop cultivation that we consume. Are you surprised? Here are some more such amazing facts about honey bees.

After the winter comes spring, and the most difficult task for all the beekeepers to keep the beehives from swarming. The best way to prevent swarming is by making nucleus honey bee colony. And in this article, we shall learn how to make a nucleus honey bee colony.

There are times when it becomes vital to combine two beehives to convert it into a robust colony. For example, when a beehive is queen-less, it is too weak, or else two hives are weak. Combining two beehives is definitely a simple and easy task. But this should be done gradually. Dumping the hives from one to another will not work at all. It takes time and the whole thing will happen slowly and gradually. Merging two hives through a small piece of newspaper is very popular and this is...

Queen is the most important bee in the overall honey bee colony. And this is why it is vital to ensure that the queen is healthy and productive. The life span of a bee ranges between 4-5 years. But, sadly, a queen remains healthy and highly productive only for 1-2 years. So, the beekeepers need to replace the queen bee once in a year to keep the hives in productive condition. Anyways, there are many other ways when a honey bee hive calls for a new queen. The situations are: ·...

Inspecting beehive every now and often is vital to ensure everything is going well. It is suggested to inspect a hive once in a week. More than this will disrupt their work and they will lag behind by a day. But, this requires a proper plan. If anything goes wrong, you have to be ready for the consequences. However, if you follow the plan and go by some tips, inspecting a beehive will not be as tough as that. So, here are the tips for properly inspecting a beehive.

There has been a lot of buzz in recent years about the importance of bees and their decreasing numbers. We feel all this hype is definitely needed. Bee colonies have been dwindling in numbers every year. Efforts are being put into saving bees, but they are not enough. We need to come up with a more universal approach which involves every citizen of the planet. Here’s how you can do your bit for these pretty pollinators,

Swarming season is usually during spring when the bees have spent the winter in their colony and are ready to split to start afresh and gather enough honey before winter. But trapping a swarm can be a hit and miss. Everything from the equipment to the lure you use can make a difference. So here’s a step-by-step instruction on setting up a swarm trap for honey bees:

Top bar hives allow beekeepers to mimic a more natural environment for honey bees to build their colony. Unlike the Langstroth hives, these are designed with top bars on which the bees can draw out their combs. If you are planning to set up your first bee colony into a top bar hive then here’s how you can do it: