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Sourwood Farm
Приєднався 25 чер 2014
SourwoodFarm.com
Відео
Can wax moths be useful foundation cleaners?
Переглядів 134Місяць тому
This plastic foundation was completely covered with pupal casings and pollen and would have been really difficult to clean. Thankfully the waxmoth larva did most of the work. Pretty cool to let a "pest" help out
A mite and her son
Переглядів 141Місяць тому
Unfortunately I found that this booming gentle colony with an old queen was not mite resistant. So I'm requeening with a young queen who's mother showed great mite resistance to move my population in a better direction.
Treating bees with Oxalic Acid and musings on IPM breeding
Переглядів 3432 місяці тому
Treating bees with Oxalic Acid and musings on IPM breeding
Extracting honey efficiently with simple equipment
Переглядів 16 тис.2 місяці тому
An overview of my frugal manual small scale honey extraction workflow. I run about 300 colonies as a full time stationary bee farm. I wanted to edit in more details but accidentally uploaded the rough draft so please enjoy.
Affordable vented robbing screen entrance reducers
Переглядів 3163 місяці тому
I use 1/8" hardware cloth. it's cut long so I can totally seal up a colony for transport or in an emergency during heavy robbing pressure. the biggest downside I have found is stepping on them when I drop them in the ground, OAV leakage and the difficulty to store given the pocky nature of the raw edges
A mini hot room for drying honey
Переглядів 4144 місяці тому
Virginia is a humid environment which can lead to honey with borderline moisture content. The goal of the hot room is two fold. First to reduce the moisture content in uncapped honey and second to keep it warm for easier more efficient extracting.
direct release virgin queen introduction
Переглядів 1154 місяці тому
please note this would likely not have gone as well with an older virgin queen who is more flighty and has stronger pheromones that can lead to her being balled if directly released
introducing a freshly hatched virgin queen to a hopelessly queenless colony
Переглядів 1944 місяці тому
It's very important to pet your queen when you introduce her to a new colony 😁. please note this is a freshly hatched virgin and this would likely totally fail with a several day old queen who has stronger pheromones.
Foolish work. Grafting queens a dusk
Переглядів 695 місяців тому
Don't do this at home😁. Sometimes life sets you behind but a schedule needs to be kept. Surprisingly I was able to work two cell builders unscathed. more queens on the way!
Here comes the honey! Nectar management on a return visit
Переглядів 2845 місяців тому
Revisiting a colony with upsidedown brood nest to manage the incoming nectar and check for swarm pressure
Did the queens come back?
Переглядів 1285 місяців тому
checking on queen mating in homemade double nucs
Nectar management with an excluder using a deep with a medium on the bottom
Переглядів 3695 місяців тому
Nectar management with an excluder using a deep with a medium on the bottom
Water cleaning Beeswax with a modified digiboil
Переглядів 2929 місяців тому
Water cleaning Beeswax with a modified digiboil
anatomy of a hive crashing from Varroa Mites
Переглядів 11511 місяців тому
anatomy of a hive crashing from Varroa Mites
How many treatments are you doing at your ~5 day intervals?
I find the idea of a hair-net beard cover amusing, but also inventive and useful.
Love the posts you make in the VSH breeder facebook group.
Great video! I learned a lot. What did you use as a bottom under your supers that you stacked on the furniture dolly? Do you also have something under it to catch honey drips? If so, what do you use?
I made homemade custom dollies screwing casters to 16 1/4" x 20" 1/2" thick zip sheathing. Then yes I have a silicone mat or a piece of election sign plastic and then a 3 1/2" rim that's cut to allow airflow
Very nice learned a bit also. Wish I could take the heat down here and could get rid of the honey. I didn't pull hardly any this year and hoping it won't bit me later.
Could you do a video on the testing? You open up cells and find mites, but how do you know if they are productive or non-productive mites? I’m not familiar with this. Thanks!
I don't have a video yet but here is a link to very detailed info on doing Harbo assays from the man himself. harbobeeco.squarespace.com/storage/measuring%20etc%20tab%20feb17pdf.pdf
How do you know the difference between non reproductive mites and reproductive mites?
There are no offspring in the cell. The testing takes place with older pupae. At that age a reproductive mite will have offspring in the cell. So a single mite with no offspring means non reproductive
Basically does she have babies or not that are old enough to live when the bee emerges. Here is more info harbobeeco.squarespace.com/storage/measuring%20etc%20tab%20feb17pdf.pdf
NR mites have no offspring in older brood.
I think you have a good plan with treatment and can do that because you do the testing and keep the records. do you think in a few seasons you won’t have to do as many of the extensive counts
Found your earlier video of the brood inspection with the microscope…interesting!
I will likely always need to do them to keep selecting resistant colonies for breeding. That said I purposely tested a lot of high wash colonies this year to see if it's worth testing them in the future. I don't think I will!
The silicone mat has holes in it please explain more about it and thank you for sharing this information and video
If your asking about the solar wax melter mat it actually is solid. The pan is tilted and there is a fine mesh filter cloth at one end where I cut an opening to let the hot wax out.
great video. can you do one on the Harbo assay?
Thanks I will try to do one sometime
That's actually really nice - and if you had chickens you could even set these out in the coop for a few hours lol. Never thought I'd see wax moths be useful
Cool！
I’m going to assume you mite have a lot of patience and attention to detail, always something to learn
Can’t wait to get honey next year.
Ha! I'm so glad to be finished
@@SourwoodFarm I bet
what do you mean by "proud"?
Ahh..good question. It's a construction term to mean sticking out further. So if you use 9 frames the bees will draw the comb "proud" as in our past the frame so it's fat and easier to uncap. New foundation is often drawn in a ten frame setup and the capped comb is recessed and thus harder to uncap.
@@SourwoodFarm Thanks! I "assumed" that it what was meant but just wanted to be sure.
Really nice setup! Thanks Ryan!
Thanks. Always evolving
Amazing and helpful!
Do they not use propolis where you are? All of my frames are practically glued together and so hard to pry apart.
That can certainly happen in the brood nest but is not typically much of a problem with honey supers here as they are only on the colony a month or two
@@SourwoodFarm I guess I must leave mine on too long.
@@GrowCookPreserveWithKellyDawn could be but the type of bees you keep and your environment also are big factors along with time. One nice advantage to the warming tent is that the propolis is quite soft at 95 degrees
learned this the hard way this year. Tons of this comb on my plastic frames. NOT WORTH IT.
It's something I never see in my own plastic foundation frames as I coat them myself with plenty of wax. It was eye opening to see the mess bees make with cheap Chinese foundation without enough wax
@@SourwoodFarm Yeah even the US ones - they give like the most microscopic wax coating imaginable, and half the time the bees don't build properly on their 'wax coated' frames. I realized I have to do manual coats but it's worth the time in how muchit speeds up the drawing process for the bees.
How much you selling the honey for?
I mostly sell honey at the farm, local markets and small shops in our area but I also have it on my website for shipping. sourwoodfarm.square.site/honey
This year Im doing washes on every colony and got quick at it before I treat
That’s a lot of nucs to keep an eye on wow I kept 4 this season to build extra foundation and queens I’m going to make OA pads next spring
Nice Nuc yard. 150 nucs must mean you sell some next year right?
Yes nuc sales are a good chunk of my business
Why dont u wear a big mask to protect the face from stinging bees 😂😅
I like to use OA also, fine it works great for me.
I must never show my wife this video. Or I'll never be able to use the car for bees.
Just don't leave the door open 😁
Nice setup! Just started this year and hoping I get to the point where I can justify a machine extractor like that
Great video! Got some good ideas from watching.
So many good ideas I’m going to try
I didn’t know you had a channel! I met you and gave you a ride at the bee expo. My family really liked the taste of your honey. The weight difference of foundation I didn’t think about this winter I want to swap out most of my wax frames to plastic. Hope to see you in January
Hey Drew I remember you and thanks for the ride. UA-cam is a newish thing I'm dabbling in as folks kept asking. Glad you enjoyed it
Wow! Very detailed. A lot of thought and experience went into this. Thank you so much for sharing. I’m a much smaller, hobbiest beek but I have picked up some genius tips from you.
Thanks. I'm glad to hear that there were a few useful tidbits. My goal is to put more useful videos up when I can
This is a great overview! I’ve been looking for this!
Informative video. What is the brand of the bread knife? What I have on hand is not flexible.
I picked up the "T.V. Knife" at a thrift shop and really like it but so does our family for cutting bread. Unfortunately the new version is thicker steel so I spent some time grinding it thinner and taking off the aggressive teeth. If you can find a used one on eBay that says made in Taiwan you are golden. The teeth might need to be delivered out a bit still
👌👌
Nicely organised with good detail ideas. Thank you.
Thanks
So when you pull your honey why don’t have to tester ? Why don’t you let the honey cure on the hives and then pull it when it’s ready ?
I pull by the super so I'm not inspecting each frame. The drying tent allows for that harvesting effencay without worry. Sometimes I need to get supers off spun and back on hives to keep up with a heavy flow or unique nectar harvest. Also at the tail end of a flow the bees often won't cap the last honey
😅
Love your setup. Great ideas for uncapping and wax clean up. Thanks
Wow. Really nice setup. Subscribed.
Thanks. I missed a lot of details in retrospect but I suppose those will be for future ones
excellent set up, thanks mate , gave me some good ideas
Where do purchase your rim for the top of the honey storage buckets? Do you make them or can they be purchased? Thanks!
I make them from buckets that have met the end of their useful lifespan. Offset metal shears are amazing at cutting them
Very nice set up! What are you using for your uncapping tank? It kind of looks like a stainless steel utility sink. I thought about using one of those since the drain is in the middle.
It's a 36" stainless home sink I bought used. It's not ideal as it's a bit to shallow and about 8-12" shorter than I would like. I like that the drain is out the bottom so the extractor can push right up to it and thus less drips on the floor
Very nice. This is the second video showing the use of an inner cover with wet supers. Few people know about that trick.
Nice setup, you're doing well. Blessings.
Thanks
Thanks for the video
Great process!
Ryan this is an awesome video! I might steal that honey drying set up idea. I've been using the laundry room in my house but we've been growing and running out of room. I'm a fellow minivan beekeeper too. We traded hot honey at the bee expo!
Thanks...I had some of your honey today😊. I really liked the change to the greenhouse and drying dollies.
Great
nice, well thought out. I use to stack boxes on hives but they would also leave some honey behind in little condensed pockets. it can also be a strain on the hive to clean that much comb and give beetles are a concern in my area. i stack the boxes criss cross to let nearby hives rob out, not much tearing and fighting. If the boxes are stacked for robbing so there is only an entrance on the top they tear a lot more comb and fight much more.
I used to have the same problem until I started putting an empty super under the inner cover. Neat observation on staggering vs stacking on robbing. My home bee yard is so over populated that they would totally destroy the young comb in the feeding frenzy.
Niceee3
Nice process. I use blue tape on everything too. I label all the supers in the yard as the season progresses. And a low power dust buster to suck up the window bees is a must. Doesn't hurt them and they can fly back home.
Sometimes I use the bees from the hand vac to boost weak nucs as the bees are not from my home yard
Your process is well thought out and looks very streamlined! Thanks for sharing!