Liking the bees less today....
First, it's all my fault, and it is notable to have being stupid be this painful.
We want to harvest honey this weekend. A dicey prospect in general, since the bees are rather attached to their honey and reluctant to let it go. Let's review the hive in general: It is a stack of boxes lacking floors and tops, so the bees can go straight up between the boxes. Then there are a few horizontal bits. So from the bottom up, we have: two large brood boxes, then the Queen Excluder (a screen to keep the queen out of the top boxes (forcing them to focus on honey storage in those)), then two Medium-sized honey supers, then an inner cover (with a small door) and finally the outer cover (to keep out weather and bees from other hives).
We expect one honey super to be full, the bottom one, and that's the one we plan to harvest Sunday. So it's a box with nine or ten vertical frames full of honey which are somewhat glued into the box with propylis (bee glue, looks and feels like ear wax), and which are all covered with working bees. The whole thing weighs probably at least 30 lbs (honey is heavy), plus it's glued down and coated with stinging insects. Sunday's task would be so much easier if it didn't include the defending team, so that's where one more horizontal bit of hardware comes in: the one-way door. Not sure exactly how it works, something about bees only being able to turn left (?). But put it on under a box, and make sure it's the only opening to that box, and as each bee leaves to go down into the hive, she can't find her way back up. Within about three days, the box should be mostly or completely empty of bees.
So we were supposed to put this thing on Wednesday or Thursday. I realized this morning we hadn't, and that I should hurry up and do this.
First mistake to learn from: Any time your plan about the hive includes the concept of "hurry up," it's a bad plan. Add in details like me being a little sick, Steve being away at work, and an impending storm (leading to more "hurry up" and increasing the staying in the hive bee population), and it was quite the recipe for disaster. These also compounded the situation since in the middle of disaster, I decided not to call any of the Bee School experts for help, because I simply didn't want to try to explain what the hell I was doing getting into this situation in the first place.
I suited up, lit the smoker, went out and started dismantling the hive. The goal was to:
1. remove the lid, place it on the ground upside down.
2. remove the inner cover, lean it against the side of the hive.
3. lift off the top, mostly empty honey super, put it on the bench a few feet away.
4. lift off the full honey super, put it on the lid (to avoid carrying the heavier item farther).
5. put the light super back on the hive.
6. put the inner cover on.
7. put the one-way door on
8. put the full honey super on
9. put the lid on.
10. weigh it down with several stones, as added protection from the storm blowing the hive open.
I got through #3 fairly well. Every item is glued down and requires some delicate prying loose, but this didn't become a serious problem until #4, when the weight of the super and the propylis and the fact that it's right on the queen excluder, so I was trying to not just unstick the circumference where the boxes touch, but across the whole thing, made it much harder. And it was beginning to rain. I quickly put everything back the way it had been (rain falling straight into the open hive would be disastrous -- damp kills bees more than anything else).
I could've stopped then and given up. I should have. The kids told me not to try again. But I was stressed about getting the one-way door on, and it stopped raining. Real storm not due for hours. So I, unfortunately, gave it another try.
Got through #3 again, pried and pried to get the heavy super off. Started killing bees, since I would pry the box up and they'd begin pouring out through the resulting crack, just to be crushed when I let it back down. I so should have take the hint and realized the pouring out behavior was something I hadn't seen before, probably bad (indicating either more bees or more defensive bees than usual), and that them getting crushed would be sending out clouds of Red Alert Phermones. But I was determined. I managed to shift the honey super diagonally. Lots of bees moving now, but the super is no longer glued so much, so I might as well get on with it -- after all, once I lift it down, the rest is just putting things back on, right?
So I lifted the really heavy super down onto the lid, and the bees completely freaked out. They covered the hands holding the box and it took me a while to realize the heat I was feeling wasn't just the presence of the bees, but them stinging me. I hurried away, but they followed me, and again it took me a while to process that my clothes and moving away were not adequate protection, but pretty soon I realized my "stay calm and don't swat at them" rule needed to be replaced with a "get these things off me before I get stung any more!" swat fest.
Within a few seconds I was fairly bee-free, and not surrounded. But the hive was now completely open, surrounded by a veritable cloud of bees, and there's a major storm coming. It has to get put back together, or the hive will die.
I came back closer and saw that the top of the open hive was completely covered in bees, right where I need to stack everything back on. Brushing them off the circumference would probably just piss them off more, so I gave up on the "minimize squishing" goal. I also decided to have both honey supers above the one-way door, since I was not going to be able to check the second one to decide if there was honey enough in it to harvest as well. This way, they might both be bee-free and grabable Sunday. So, I quickly and fairly smoothly put the inner cover, the one-way door, and the light super back on. They didn't sit as fully flat as we'd like since there was a solid layer of squished bees in the way, but not bad. Then I went to put the heavy super on and discovered a number of things. 1. something almost too heavy to lift down is impossible to lift up, esp when it needs to go up to a point about eight inches higher than it was before (from switching supers); 2, the bees were still really, really pissed. They surrounded me again, and I ran screaming (literally, I'm afraid) across the yard again, getting stung.
It was at this point that the children started helping save me from myself. They fed me Motrin to reduce the swelling from the stings, had Benadryl on standby, and advised me to quit. Problem is, we still have the hive open, because the lid is under the heavy, pissed-off-bee-encrusted honey super. I looked around for options. I carefully put cinder blocks next to the hive so I might step up on them to be able to lift the super without having to hoist it so high. I put a box there, so I might just move the super onto that, freeing up the lid. I looked in the shed for a replacement for the lid (though things more than large enough would undoubtably catch the wind more and blow off in the storm), and found a piece of metal about the right size and put it on.
But I couldn't really do anything. The super was too heavy for me to lift high enough, was covered in angry bees, and the air all around was filled with bees, quite possibly robbers from other hives, since the hive was now wide open and vulnerable. And there was the fact that I was shaking like a leaf, swelling from about a dozen stings, and experiencing a curious psychological phenomenon in which directions to my muscles are promptly overridden, such that I physically could not move closer than about ten feet away. One bee buzzing on my veil sent me frantically walking away, wondering who is it telling my legs to move since I'd had no intention of walking away just then. Very freaky.
At which point Wolf took over and brought me inside to chill out. I went in the shower to cool off, removed a few more stingers, tried to get a count on stings, sobbed for a while, and otherwise recovered. The hive wasn't in immediate danger with the thin metal makeshift lid. If the storm came, I'd have to find a way to get my feet to carry me close enough to put rocks on top. The honey super might be a total loss, or maybe the rain would drive the bees away and we could collect it, with the honey hopefully not ruined. I even toyed with the idea of starting the storm early by hosing them down.
Then Wolf called Steve, and he was able to come home briefly just to close the hive. By the time he arrived, The cloud had reduced too a level of only slightly increased activity, and the blanket of defensive bees on the super had vanished. But he believed me when I said they'd been there, and the super was still too heavy for me to lift, so it wasn't a wasted trip for him, and only moderately embarrassing to see him simply and easily lift the super into place the put the lid on -- he didn't even suit up other than the veil, despite wearing black jeans.
So, the hive is intact and hopefully sufficiently storm-proof. The one-way door is in place, so hopefully we'll be able to remove the super Sunday with less difficulty. The need for the one-way door was beautifully proven, since if was this hard just moving the bee-filled super, you know stealing it would be impossible. I never got a full count of stings, but it's clear I (so far) don't have my mom's severe allergy -- stings on my back (at least one) and legs (at least six) just look like mosquito bites and don't even hurt. More painful are heel (one) and forearm (three or four), and really swelling and aching are the three or four on my left hand. I just had a nice Benadryl nap, and we're going to relax and watch TV now.
Anyone coming Sunday for honey, don't worry -- the worst is over, you'll be inside. I am curious to see how hard it will be for me to approach the hive Sunday. And the honey better be good.
We want to harvest honey this weekend. A dicey prospect in general, since the bees are rather attached to their honey and reluctant to let it go. Let's review the hive in general: It is a stack of boxes lacking floors and tops, so the bees can go straight up between the boxes. Then there are a few horizontal bits. So from the bottom up, we have: two large brood boxes, then the Queen Excluder (a screen to keep the queen out of the top boxes (forcing them to focus on honey storage in those)), then two Medium-sized honey supers, then an inner cover (with a small door) and finally the outer cover (to keep out weather and bees from other hives).
We expect one honey super to be full, the bottom one, and that's the one we plan to harvest Sunday. So it's a box with nine or ten vertical frames full of honey which are somewhat glued into the box with propylis (bee glue, looks and feels like ear wax), and which are all covered with working bees. The whole thing weighs probably at least 30 lbs (honey is heavy), plus it's glued down and coated with stinging insects. Sunday's task would be so much easier if it didn't include the defending team, so that's where one more horizontal bit of hardware comes in: the one-way door. Not sure exactly how it works, something about bees only being able to turn left (?). But put it on under a box, and make sure it's the only opening to that box, and as each bee leaves to go down into the hive, she can't find her way back up. Within about three days, the box should be mostly or completely empty of bees.
So we were supposed to put this thing on Wednesday or Thursday. I realized this morning we hadn't, and that I should hurry up and do this.
First mistake to learn from: Any time your plan about the hive includes the concept of "hurry up," it's a bad plan. Add in details like me being a little sick, Steve being away at work, and an impending storm (leading to more "hurry up" and increasing the staying in the hive bee population), and it was quite the recipe for disaster. These also compounded the situation since in the middle of disaster, I decided not to call any of the Bee School experts for help, because I simply didn't want to try to explain what the hell I was doing getting into this situation in the first place.
I suited up, lit the smoker, went out and started dismantling the hive. The goal was to:
1. remove the lid, place it on the ground upside down.
2. remove the inner cover, lean it against the side of the hive.
3. lift off the top, mostly empty honey super, put it on the bench a few feet away.
4. lift off the full honey super, put it on the lid (to avoid carrying the heavier item farther).
5. put the light super back on the hive.
6. put the inner cover on.
7. put the one-way door on
8. put the full honey super on
9. put the lid on.
10. weigh it down with several stones, as added protection from the storm blowing the hive open.
I got through #3 fairly well. Every item is glued down and requires some delicate prying loose, but this didn't become a serious problem until #4, when the weight of the super and the propylis and the fact that it's right on the queen excluder, so I was trying to not just unstick the circumference where the boxes touch, but across the whole thing, made it much harder. And it was beginning to rain. I quickly put everything back the way it had been (rain falling straight into the open hive would be disastrous -- damp kills bees more than anything else).
I could've stopped then and given up. I should have. The kids told me not to try again. But I was stressed about getting the one-way door on, and it stopped raining. Real storm not due for hours. So I, unfortunately, gave it another try.
Got through #3 again, pried and pried to get the heavy super off. Started killing bees, since I would pry the box up and they'd begin pouring out through the resulting crack, just to be crushed when I let it back down. I so should have take the hint and realized the pouring out behavior was something I hadn't seen before, probably bad (indicating either more bees or more defensive bees than usual), and that them getting crushed would be sending out clouds of Red Alert Phermones. But I was determined. I managed to shift the honey super diagonally. Lots of bees moving now, but the super is no longer glued so much, so I might as well get on with it -- after all, once I lift it down, the rest is just putting things back on, right?
So I lifted the really heavy super down onto the lid, and the bees completely freaked out. They covered the hands holding the box and it took me a while to realize the heat I was feeling wasn't just the presence of the bees, but them stinging me. I hurried away, but they followed me, and again it took me a while to process that my clothes and moving away were not adequate protection, but pretty soon I realized my "stay calm and don't swat at them" rule needed to be replaced with a "get these things off me before I get stung any more!" swat fest.
Within a few seconds I was fairly bee-free, and not surrounded. But the hive was now completely open, surrounded by a veritable cloud of bees, and there's a major storm coming. It has to get put back together, or the hive will die.
I came back closer and saw that the top of the open hive was completely covered in bees, right where I need to stack everything back on. Brushing them off the circumference would probably just piss them off more, so I gave up on the "minimize squishing" goal. I also decided to have both honey supers above the one-way door, since I was not going to be able to check the second one to decide if there was honey enough in it to harvest as well. This way, they might both be bee-free and grabable Sunday. So, I quickly and fairly smoothly put the inner cover, the one-way door, and the light super back on. They didn't sit as fully flat as we'd like since there was a solid layer of squished bees in the way, but not bad. Then I went to put the heavy super on and discovered a number of things. 1. something almost too heavy to lift down is impossible to lift up, esp when it needs to go up to a point about eight inches higher than it was before (from switching supers); 2, the bees were still really, really pissed. They surrounded me again, and I ran screaming (literally, I'm afraid) across the yard again, getting stung.
It was at this point that the children started helping save me from myself. They fed me Motrin to reduce the swelling from the stings, had Benadryl on standby, and advised me to quit. Problem is, we still have the hive open, because the lid is under the heavy, pissed-off-bee-encrusted honey super. I looked around for options. I carefully put cinder blocks next to the hive so I might step up on them to be able to lift the super without having to hoist it so high. I put a box there, so I might just move the super onto that, freeing up the lid. I looked in the shed for a replacement for the lid (though things more than large enough would undoubtably catch the wind more and blow off in the storm), and found a piece of metal about the right size and put it on.
But I couldn't really do anything. The super was too heavy for me to lift high enough, was covered in angry bees, and the air all around was filled with bees, quite possibly robbers from other hives, since the hive was now wide open and vulnerable. And there was the fact that I was shaking like a leaf, swelling from about a dozen stings, and experiencing a curious psychological phenomenon in which directions to my muscles are promptly overridden, such that I physically could not move closer than about ten feet away. One bee buzzing on my veil sent me frantically walking away, wondering who is it telling my legs to move since I'd had no intention of walking away just then. Very freaky.
At which point Wolf took over and brought me inside to chill out. I went in the shower to cool off, removed a few more stingers, tried to get a count on stings, sobbed for a while, and otherwise recovered. The hive wasn't in immediate danger with the thin metal makeshift lid. If the storm came, I'd have to find a way to get my feet to carry me close enough to put rocks on top. The honey super might be a total loss, or maybe the rain would drive the bees away and we could collect it, with the honey hopefully not ruined. I even toyed with the idea of starting the storm early by hosing them down.
Then Wolf called Steve, and he was able to come home briefly just to close the hive. By the time he arrived, The cloud had reduced too a level of only slightly increased activity, and the blanket of defensive bees on the super had vanished. But he believed me when I said they'd been there, and the super was still too heavy for me to lift, so it wasn't a wasted trip for him, and only moderately embarrassing to see him simply and easily lift the super into place the put the lid on -- he didn't even suit up other than the veil, despite wearing black jeans.
So, the hive is intact and hopefully sufficiently storm-proof. The one-way door is in place, so hopefully we'll be able to remove the super Sunday with less difficulty. The need for the one-way door was beautifully proven, since if was this hard just moving the bee-filled super, you know stealing it would be impossible. I never got a full count of stings, but it's clear I (so far) don't have my mom's severe allergy -- stings on my back (at least one) and legs (at least six) just look like mosquito bites and don't even hurt. More painful are heel (one) and forearm (three or four), and really swelling and aching are the three or four on my left hand. I just had a nice Benadryl nap, and we're going to relax and watch TV now.
Anyone coming Sunday for honey, don't worry -- the worst is over, you'll be inside. I am curious to see how hard it will be for me to approach the hive Sunday. And the honey better be good.