Gutted

[whatisbiscuits]

I've just had the most awful beekeeping day. I share a hive with a partner, and on Tuesday we put a bee escape on our super, with the plan to get the bees out of the super before extracting yummy honey today. We first got a hive last August, so we've spent a long time waiting for this day

Comments

smoke the bees out

[roberrific]

Hi guys roberrific here, the original son of a beekeeper. I live up in Canada and my family runs over a thousand hives in Southern Ontario. You can all read how we havest the honey crop in my Dad's beekeeping blog, but suffice to say we have no time for silly little bee escapes or any of that nonsense. We come and we smoke em out with our smokers, and then use a leaf blower to get the remaining few in the box. Have a look there's pictures and everything.

[incendiary_ave]

oh, I am so sorry! That had to be so disappointing. :(

With the bee escape / bee-quick (saw your conversation with squid_ink) - we used both on our first harvest this summer and still needed to brush off many bees. We used neither on the second harvest (same hive) and still brushed off about as many bees - but - didn't see any bees dying from getting caught in the escape or the bee quick. (Found a few on the fume pad, dead, very odd.) We brushed them lightly into the garden plants - giving them a safe place to land and making sure we didn't step on them. Oh - and we use garden herbs for brushes - saw a video on youtube that talked about how bees don't sting vegetation, and that's all it took to convince us to switch to "natural" brushes. ;)

Everyone needs to find their own methods, but I doubt we'll use bee quick or the escape in the future.

[whatisbiscuits]

Thanks for the advice, the herbs idea sounds interesting. What herbs do you use? I can imagine thyme would have the right rigidity.

[incendiary_ave]

it usually starts with what needs pruning but sometimes goes to whatever is in reach. ;) Just in case the herb might get some of the herb in it, we stick to culinary (food safe) herbs. Mostly we use marjoram, oregano, tarragon, and rosemary. We've also found that the bolted tops of lettuce plants work great too.

I found the video that gave us the idea in the first place, and the youtube link is here. He talks about plants at about 4:40.

Thank you for posting what you did, too. It's awful that it happened to you, but it's an excellent learning opportunity for everyone.