bees – Planet B Gardens

missing the bees

Seeing first-hand the difference in the garden between having honeybees and not. My hives didn’t make it through the winter, and the backup plan to capture a swarm didn’t work out this spring. Last year with honeybees on site, virtually all of my vegetables got pollinated and yields were high. This year I’m seeing about a third of my vegetables withering on the vine unfertilized. I did get a number of visiting honeybees while the cover crop of crimson clover was in bloom. During that time, the garden was looking full of healthy veggies. This winter I’ll order new local bees for the spring. In addition to being cool little

July 30, 2017

bumblebee?

Yesterday afternoon about a half dozen or so of these large, fluffy, yellow and black flying insects with clear wings were feeding on the lilacs. First thought it might be a bumblebee queen, but it didn’t make sense that there would be so many in one place. I asked some fellow beekeepers. Turns out it’s not a bee, but a moth — Hemaris difinis to be exact. Some call it the “flying lobster” due to its flat, splayed tail. It’s also known as a “hummingbird moth” (pic below from erie.wbu.com). Unlike other moths, these lose the scales on their wings that give other moths their wing color so the wings appear mostly clear

May 31, 2017

beehive dead-out

Planet B Gardens’ bees, sadly, did not make it through this winter. After the bear attacks in the fall that took out half the hives, I had one large, strong hive left and one small, weak one. The remaining hives went into winter with plenty of fresh capped honey. When I opened the large hive, 75% of the honey remained, undisturbed. The smaller hive had 50% left. There was no sign of moisture build-up, no mold, no varroa mites, no other visible disturbance in either of the hives. A ball of dead bees huddled together in the center of the hive, while the remaining dead ones littered the bottom board. This

April 25, 2017

beehives in winter

Bees seem to be surviving the winter so far, even with as many sub-zero days we’ve had. Ear to the hive you can hear a faint hum of thousands of bees shivering their flight muscles to generate heat in the hive. My only job this time of year is to keep the entrances free of snow. With the hive cover propped open slightly, and the front entrance unblocked, the hive will hopefully have just enough ventilation to let moisture evaporate and keep fresh air in the hive without making it too hard for the bees to maintain the hives’ internal temperature. Fingers crossed, both hives will make it through their

December 29, 2016

remote hive monitor

Now that the outdoor garden is done for the season, time for more indoor projects. I decided to try my hand at building a remote beehive monitoring system from (almost) scratch. My goal is to build a system that monitors hive weight, temperature and sound levels inside the hive, bee comings and goings (via external camera), ambient temperature, and motion (in case the hive gets knocked over or otherwise disturbed). If all goes as planned, that data will get fed wirelessly to an online dashboard that keeps track of trends over time. I can also set up email or text alerts to let me know if the hive gets tipped or if something else out of

November 17, 2016

beehive bear fence

After a little trial and error, the electric fence to keep the bears away from the beehives seems to be working. It’s questionable whether what’s left of the second hive will survive, but the larger hive remains healthy and intact. Here’s to it making it through the winter! Installing the fence is relatively straightforward. For the way I set mine up, you need a 1-joule fence charger (I got one that would work plugged into an outlet, a solar charger, or a 12v battery), 4′ t-posts (however many to surround your hive spaced 3-4 feet apart), 14-gauge galvanized steel wire, 5″ offset insulators for t-posts, gate handles equal to the number of

September 25, 2016

the bears and the bees

Lesson learned — if you live in bear country, install a high-voltage electric fence around your bee hives even if you’ve heard bears aren’t a problem in your immediate area. They can smell honey a mile away! I woke early one morning to find my weakest hive had been taken down over night. A small black bear came back just before sunup and I chased it off. I was leaving for a work trip that day, so did what I could with the time and materials on hand to secure the remaining 2 hives. I moved them inside the 8′ deer fence around my garden near a motion detector light, strapped

September 17, 2016

first honey harvest

Honey is in good supply for my two hives that are thriving, so decided to harvest one frame of my Montana forest wildflower honey from the strongest hive. The frame above is one of the foundationless frames I added to the hive. The girls did a beautiful job building it out! As a kid in coastal California my mom sometimes bought us honey in the comb. One taste brought back memories. My bees forage from wildflowers and flowering trees in the surrounding forest — lupine, dandelion, St. John’s wort, purple thistle, and a bunch of other flowering plants I’ve yet to identify. They also gather nectar and pollen from the garden — broccoli flowers, nasturtium,

August 21, 2016

early summer

Garden is off to a good start for the brassicas, tomatoes, and chilies. Broccoli is looking pretty and should be ready to start harvesting in the next couple weeks. Cabbage will be a while, as will the cauliflower. Purple jalapenos are starting to ripen nicely. Summer squash it appears will be ready to harvest soon, too. I’ve been letting one of each species of weed grow in the garden to see if there are any the bugs like more than the vegetables. So far I haven’t had to deal with pests destroying my edible crop. They seem to like to eat some weeds better, along with sunflowers that popped up

July 2, 2016

swarm capture

Monday’s regularly scheduled program got derailed this morning as I walked outside just in time to see one of my hives start to swarm. First there was a lot of activity swirling in front of the hive. I thought maybe they were being invaded by another colony of bees. Then a large tornado of bees ascended toward the sky and started making their way to the treeline at the side of the driveway. Within several minutes they started coalescing on a branch about 10 feet up, and I knew that have had swarmed. It was a dramatic sight. I’d added a new medium super with all foundationless frames when the bottom

June 21, 2016