Are the bees Swarming, Being Robbed, or Orientating? Let's find out.
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- Опубліковано 31 сер 2022
- After storm systems pass through, honey bees often seem to be very active at the entrance, and that can be alarming to new beekeepers.
In this video I'll provide some explanations and share what you can look for to determine if your colony is in trouble, or just doing what they do.
This is in response to many questions about fire-drills, vs orientation flights, or the presence of drones (male bees).
Where do I get my honey bee stock?
Well, I continue to split (walk-away-splits) and recycle eggs and brood in my own apiary.
BUT, if I'm in a pickle and need something fast, I always go to BeeWeaver for queens.
I was treatment free for 10 years and used their queens throughout that period.
Now, I do treat colonies that have higher mite counts. A 2% mite load in early August will get OAV (Oxalic Acid Vaporization) cycle here.
If you want to know more about why I chose BeeWeaver for my Queens when and if I need them, please watch this interview with Daniel Weaver.
I'm 100% onboard with his breeding philosophy: • Treatment Free Beekeep...
Others have asked about the small vac I use to gather up those bees on top of the cover boards so I can close things up, they "suck" as vacs, but are excellent for collecting bees and returning them to the hive at the end of an inspection: amzn.to/3Qby61b
I have two of them so that I can have one on charge while the other is in use. The bees don't get injured and are easy to release. Plus, you can see them through the transparent holding cavity so you'll know if it's getting full. It's also a great way to put those single angry guard bees that tend to follow you around, into time-out until you're done. (leave it running when you have bees in it during hot days). (the link is an affiliate link so that I may earn from qualifying purchases).
I love watching them in slow motion. They’re so clumsy bumping in to each other.
This is a great idea for a video. New beekeepers are always asking about this so it’s nice to have a visual representation.
Thank you so much!
The three workers that rolled out head frist to the deck back flipped off wings still going. Made me laugh. Great video as always Mr Dunn. Great information. Seems my bees are in wash board mode, have a great weekend
Glad you enjoyed it, and it's fun to see what they are really doing.
I recently found a wild honey been colony in an oak tree about 6 feet off the ground and their entrance was a natural round hole that was 1 1/2" in diameter, it was so fun to watch them going in and out...the guards we all around that entrance. Looked to me like the trunk diameter of this tree was about 12-14". First wild hive I've ever found.
Hi Sean! We can learn so much from feral honey bee colony observations. I'm glad you have them and so accessible. I have several that I'm loosely keeping an eye on but they are a bit of a trip for me to visit.
@@FrederickDunn Hi Fred! Happy last days of summer.
I'm thinking about finding an old oak hollow tree, and splitting in halves cleaning out plenty of room with my chainsaw then putting it back together maybe 6' tall and putting wild swarm in it to see how they fair over time, BTW Frederick my hives are all on a common boxed metal tubing hive stand about 4" apart they all washboard alot, but recently I noticed they even washboard the metal tubing as well, my hive bottoms only have an inch landing space, this metal was painted long ago and we cut it up to make the stand, the paint has oxidized into a dull dark gray, but where they've washboard it, it's a semi gloss colored like you rubbed with a magic eraser.
@@carlsledge3868 Hey Carl, I've got 5 log hives about 5-6' tall and I hollowed them out with a large saw at both ends. Put wired screen on tops and bottoms to keep rodents out and 4" bases and tops. I'm sure you will really enjoy watching go in and out of the logs. I sure do! Back in May had a swarm move into a log I had set up 3 weeks prior, that was really fun to see!
Very cool! I'm still looking for my first feral bee tree and while I wait, putting up some natural habitat for them on my farm.
Thanks for the great description of a fast inspection..did about the same thing today on my layens hive. Loved the slow motion of the hive entrance
Glad it was helpful!
Enjoy your videos so much. Always learn from them and you can count on them being beautiful to watch. 🙏
Than you VERY much!
Excellent information Frederick.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Thank you so much for these videos! I'm considering keeping bees eventually and trying to learn all I can beforehand.
You're welcome, Frank. Definitely tak your time and learn all you can before jumping in. :)
Always something new to learn watching Fred's videos. Great delivery too. He's like the "Bob Ross" of beekeeping.
Wow, thanks! It's an honor to be compared to Bob :)
That is way cool Fred, but I have a question 😏why do they keep running into my bald head😉Ty this was very interesting.🐝bumper cars, makes me laugh.🤣
If you are getting head-butted... they are politely asking you to leave :)
Always great watching!!!
Hey, Video day with the Flow Team was AMAZING! Sooo much fun. Boy these guys got amazing footage--and you will soon get a look into my hive--excited to share it with you. I told them you said hi, they they said," yes, we love Frederick; he does a lot for us." All the best to you.
Hi Brad! I'm so glad you had that experience with the Flow-Cinematic Team :) everyone at Flow is great and a joy to associate with. I'm sure they got great sequences and I'm looking forward to seeing that entire presentation!
Fascinating video once again. Im learning so much. The slow motion filming is great to see. Thank you for posting.
Glad you enjoyed it, and you're welcome!
Good info Fred. The slow motion, I really love watching it. The clumsy movements, we might think so but as you said they are much faster than us clumsy humans. 20% drones, did not know that. Hope you have a great Labor Day weekend.
Thanks Brian! You too.
really kool slo-mo for someone like me interested in flying behaviors and patterns,,,u wer right that bees dont need pollen sub this time of year
I really appreciate videos that are good enough to save and watch multiple times. Thank you.
Glad you like them!
I have been watching my bees and I was just wondering, wow, Fred, you're the man! Very timely, thank you
Glad to help :)
loved the slo mo and info!
So glad!
Great watch , fabulous to see how they are doing hopefully a strong happy winter ahead for that hive . Have a nice evening /day , good night from me 😀
Thanks, you too!
Great info and guidance. Thank you so much. Well done
Glad it was helpful!
love the translucent abdomens ,...and big clouds at the end
Thanks so much what a great presentation the slow motion explaining what the bees where doing, I appreciated it very much. Your calming voice matched with this video A+.
Thank you so much, I really appreciate that compliment :)
This was great Fred, always enjoy your videos Thanks and have a blessed week
Thanks, you too!
Thank you for your continuous efforts, amazing quality at all levels!
Thank you so much!
Always a pleasure watching your videos!
Glad you like them!
Gr8 video, Fred… always amazed at your capabilities and thanks for the personal background info… we are kind of like minded. I did Technical Sales and Marketing in 14 countries in Asia Pacific for 7 years.
I am brand new to learning about Bees & go to a Beekeeper just near me every 2nd Wed. & Saturday with others that actually have their own hives. We have just moved out of winter & are in our 2nd day of Spring here in Brisbane Australia.
I have a fabulous market garden & we do trades but I have so many Bees in my garden at the moment it is terrific to see. Thank You for your videos as they are so informative & have helped me greatly. Cheers Denise-Brisbane Australia
Hi Denise, thank you so much for watching and sharing what's going on in your part of the world. I hope you have a fantastic year there.
Very helpful information. Thank you!
Wonderful footage like always .
Glad you enjoyed it
Hello Frederick 🥰🥰🥰🥰
Very helpful information! Thank you! ❤ 🐝
You are so welcome!
Always good thank you Fred
I always glean some new knowledge from your videos, Thx Frederick.
Hi Carl! Thank you so much.
Since you are foremost expert in photography I know, could one use a Flir thermal camera or something simular, to look at and make reasonable cluster evaluation and save the data on a per hive basis to know if their bees are near starving when it's too cold to open the hive for a formal inspection? I ask because last spring when we had the artic bomb cyclone and it below freezing all the way into mid Florida, I don't have anything like that, but a friend has a night thermal hunting scope and I used to look at my triple deep that had started bringing in pollen so I knew they started spring build-up and I could tell they had a cluster size of about 6-7 frames wide and it was about a frame tall with 1/2 into the second box, more oval shaped from the front of the hive, kind like football stood on end, but longer from the side of the hive like a football lying down. lol that whole week I wrapped the hive with some old moth eaten quilts we had stored in out building and used bungy cords to hold it in place, only the small entrance was left uncovered, in the mid day a few bees came out to do cleansing flights, but as soon it warmed back up to our normal weather they were back at it finding pollen, that's the hive I got 2 splits off In early April.
The video. I learned a lot. It was interesting to see that kind of hive. I’ve never used one. Thanks!
Glad it was helpful!
Great Job and instructive. Thanks so much for your efforts.
You're very welcome.
This was fun to watch!
Thanks!
Wish I would've seen this a couple weeks ago. This exact behaviour was happening at my hive and me being a new beekeeper since April this year panicked. So I got a garden hose and sprayed it in the air standing about 8' away from the hive to mimic a rainstorm. Within 5 minutes all was calm and stayed calm the remainder of the day. Maybe it wasnt being robbed after all. Thanks for another great video.
The frist robbing I seen was a feral hive that swarm late. It was a battle, bees everywhere not just at entrance. Bees locked up on ground. They got clean out in one day the robbers stayed the night and left the next day. It can happen fast
You have to act fast I've seen that frist hand
You definitely want to get on top of any robbing incidents... but prevention will go a long way if you can reduce entrances on less productive colonies.
Irish spring soap cut in quarters and placed around the hive during robbing period helps to blanket out the smell of honey.
Very well explained the situation that was going on and again amazing footage. A+++
Glad you enjoyed it, and thank you so much!
Thank you for another wonderful video, so interesting and informative, as always!
Thank you.
Thank you Fred.
You're welcome, Kennith! Thanks for watching.
I know wasp have a purpose too! But I always try to leave bees alone & not step on them when I see them! But wasp/hornets too close to your active areas…. gotta go! This was a very educational video & thanks for taking care of these bees 🐝 🤘🏼👌👋🏼
I'm a 'big' person so I should be easily seen but when I walk by my hives on my way to the garden or shed, I know a couple of bees are going to fly into me on their way to the hives, so I'm not so sure about that bee motion detection frame rate :)
That small world feeling when I hear you're in PA. It's makes me really curious how close by you might bee.
Excellent filming. I love your detailed explanations during the video. Very clear and precise details. I noticed some of the bees were carrying in white pollen. What flower does this come from? I have never seen that before. Thanks again. Take care and bee safe. Tim
Thank you very much! We have lots of jewelweed around here aka Touch-Me-Not, and it produces white pollen. Just one of many, but that would be my guess this time of year :)
just caught a small swarm august 30,and relocated ,odd late season swarm,so far so good
Hi Mark! I've had September swarm captures make it through winter just fine. I think your chances are good this year!
Down in the 40's I WISH. 70's here at night.
Amazing. Thank you.
You're very welcome :)
Just yesterday I was at one of my hives and I thought of three possible things. swarm, robbers and maybe clearing hive to make room for easier faster air flow to cool it. .. not to the video .... honey picken soon.
Busy bees are a pleasant sight
Hi Fred thanks for another great video, always learning lots from them love the slow mo as well. When do you have time to do all the normal things of life ha ha. Just coming into spring here in Sydney we have had so much rain this winter poor bees. Just wondering do you reduce your entrance even further than the 2-3 inches in the winter? Also so much mould in the frames and in the flow frames do I need to clean them before they fill them with honey that we are going to harvest?
Hi Francine, the mold that often can occur on the hive interior when cold or damp conditions are present is easily removed/cleaned by the bees as they take control of their interior surfaces. When it comes to Flow-Frames, there are mating surfaces that the bees can't get to, after a few seasons I soak those in a 10% bleach solution with the frames in the OPEN position and that solves that issue. I dont' try to remove the wax or propolis from those frames as the bees re-use it. I hope that helps :)
I had to setup another feeder because of larger honey bees. They were fighting with my smaller bees. The larger bees have mites too. I leave a spacer at bottom corner of my follower board. I leave the hive full of frames. Lesson learned. Day 2 of feeder my smaller bees got early start and took over 2nd feeder. My bees would rather go after soda cans and buck wheat than golden rod. The larger bees are more aggressive too. I saw a sign at main road neighbors are selling bees. They are the reason I started keeping bees and because of amount of bees at camp. Watched carefully slowly driving down 2 track for bees. Does seem like a gap between my bees and theirs. Noticed some smaller honey bees coming from the south and larger from the north. I will get video of the honey bee sizes end of month. The larger bees could be winter bees. Making a swarm trap from hollow tree I cut up. The bees like the new hive. Didn't even mist the bees as I swapped them into the hive. I did when I did my last check before heading home from camp. Bonus I smashed lots of choke cherries for the bees setting up the hive. That's why I set up feeder away from the hive. Even watched a bee roll a cherry pit around. The bear bait pile was swarming with all kinds of bees before I left.
This is so timely, sometimes I really need a bit of advise that helps me learn and help care for my bees. By the way, how is the progress for your school?
Thanks, Joe! The School is great, we've has a couple of groups through already and the kids LOVE it!
Thanks for the video Fred ,another good one, well up here in northern British Columbia it hasn't been a really good year for honey production, got some but not what we were all hoping for, I took what I could from my five hives,and checked them for Varoa, suprising very low counts ,2to 3 in each hive, starting treatment with Apavar strips, since I have helped myself to their hard won honey since the season is coming to a halt should I continue with 1to 1,syrup or change to 2to 1so they can get in enough for winter,thanks in advance, always enjoy your videos, Marten.
I hope they do well! Thanks for watching and taking time to comment :)
Great video! How far away is your apiary from your house? Our bees have been angry lately so difficult to spend time in our backyard. We are feeding 2:1 feed at the moment.
That particular hive is just 75 feet away. If you count the garage, the primary apiary is 80 feet from the kitchen.
What camera did you use to get this? It looks amazing
For most of my video work, I use Sony cameras, the rest are Nikon. Lots of options... this sequence was shot at 1080p 1000 frames per second, so the two minute segment in this video was really just a 12 second capture. www.krontech.ca/product-category/cameras
You mentioned that the bees in this hive are Varroa Sensitive Hygienic to help defend from Varroa mites but didn't mention the type. Being new to your channel, you may have answered this in another video but I'm trying to decide what type of honey bees I should start a hive with in Pennsylvania. Thanks for another lesson in my journey in starting a colony hopefully next spring!
Hi David, there are lots of popular VSH bees from lots of reputable breeders. When and if I purchase stock, I go with BeeWeaver Queens from Texas. They have demonstrated excellent traits and are my go-to stock. They went down the treatment free path decades ago. You can learn more about why I chose them by watching this interview with Daniel Weaver: ua-cam.com/video/svF-0p9BIN8/v-deo.html
Yes I am also interested in this bee ...and how we can get these genetics. Thanks.
@@FrederickDunn I watched the video link and now realize that BeeWeaver is basically it's own strain compared to Italian, Carniola ect. Before I had a chance to watch it, I submitted a question on your "ask a question page" but maybe it would help others if you touched on it in an upcoming video. Problem... I am in the same boat as most where I am just starting out and can't just purchase a queen without a colony. What would the best way to approach that? Start a hive this year with a local nuc them switch out the queen the following year once the colony is established?
i have a dumb quistion for you have you thought about puting flow frames in that kind off hive i am thinking about getting back into bee keeping in the spring hear in the finger lakes of new york i cant lift all the heavy boxes and more and that hive whould be great and with flow frames even beater just was looking for ideas and why or why not off use in that idea thank you
That's a somewhat complicated configuration, being that the flow-frames don't match the space for standard deep Langstroth frames, you need a custom access and the hive must tilt for harvesting honey from flow-frames. BUT, now that I've said that, you can surely try it out and see if they do what you want them to :)
I can't find area to ask a question on your website so I will just ask here. Is their such a thing as to many full frames of pollen. My horizontal top bar hive has 6 bars of fully drawn pollen then brood frames, then honey. I dud put a couple of pollen frames in between some brood but will they need all this for winter and should I put this closer to honey in winter or pull some out. Combs are a little larger than langstroth frames.
Hi Brenda, I make it a practice to never divide/checkerboard frames of brood. They work hard to keep their brood cells facing each other so they can conserve energy and warm them. When we put something else in-between brood frames, they are instantly challenged to compensate for that unplanned gap and now it takes twice as many bees to control the climate there. So, I'd suggest sandwiching the brood frames with the pollen, and then honey frames beyond that. I hope that makes sense :) I personally wouldn't toss frames of pollen as they can go through that remarkably fast.
I noticed robbing gets really bad when the California beekeeper takes all the honey supers off their hives (all over the fields here). They become robbing machines! I always reduce way down.
BTW I found wearing double nitrile gloves don't stop stings but you can quickly take the outer glove off and prevent that pheromone from spreading.
Hi Susan, when it comes to commercial beekeeping, they really don't have a lot of choices and have to push through or they would never keep up with what they need to have accomplished.
Not a judgement at all. The guy is super generous (gives ranchers honey), brings diversity of drones and stays on top of things pretty well. I think the bees are just looking for more than sugar water if they can get honey.
How much honey will you harvest and how much will you leave in the hive for winter
I leave around 50 lbs on for winter, everything above that gets taken off. This horizontal hive provided 4 gl of honey beyond what they needed for winter. Last year. This year they are even more productive.
What about the bees around 3 minutes who seem to be tumbling backwards out of the hive? Are those drones? Thanks.
They are just workers with heavy loads from foraging. It's something you only observe when there is slow motion :)
Hi fred. What was the resource hive 5 over 5. I have a hive in really bad shape. I think like convert it over to resource hive.
Hi Peter, depending on how small the initial swarm was, I start them as a single 5-frame deep, then add up as they build. A full sized swarm of 2+ lbs would go into a double- 5 over 5. This year, I've had to add a third level to some of them as they are just too productive. But I grow the boxes with them and insulate/cap the top box. I hope that makes sense :)
@@FrederickDunn yes it does ty so much
Just after 1:40 or so
Was that a couple of bees falling and bouncing off the landing board, and if so what happened there? I think I saw this happen a few other times in slow motion sections.
They do that often and we miss it because it just happens too fast. They even collide and fall to the ground or fly out just prior to hitting the ground. Just bees disrupting one another.
@@FrederickDunn
Thank you!
Can you tell what kind of bee it is by looking at it? Also, do you turn your flow hive bottom tray upside down in winter? Thank you ❤️
Only in very general terms, the genetic lines are becoming very muddy. The old "white" trays I would turn upside down for winter, the new yellow trays are ok right side up but still need to be periodically emptied.
@@FrederickDunn emptying the tray won't chill the bees in winter? It is super cold here, -20c 🫤
@@FrederickDunn today I was shocked to find about 20 dead Yellowjackets in the yellow tray and 2-3 dead bees. They may be entering through a gap at the entrance. Will sticking propolis in any gaps solve the problem?
I will go to the restroom outside at work and there is honeybees on the ground are they after something
Honey bees are always "after something" could even be minerals on pavement or something they know they want/need.
I got package bee's back in May and about 2 months later I couldn't find a Queen I don't know if they killed her or what happened to her and then I bought another Queen the same thing happened after about 2 months something happened to her thing happened to her I would like to know what's going on
Hi Dale, waiting two months to follow up on a queen is just too long. When you put a new/replacement queen into a queenless colony I'd do an inspection within 12 days to see that she's laying. If you allow them to be potentially queenless for more than 3 weeks you run the almost certain risk of having laying workers. Once that begins, you've got an uphil climb as the laying workers will actively reject and attack a new queen. Now, you'd probably like to know what to do. I think your numbers in that hive may be way down as they haven't been producing replacement workers. You may be too late to recover that colony this year. Are they producing drones? How many frames of worker bees would you say are still in the hive? IF there are still plenty of bees even without brood, you could install another laying queen if you can find one this time of year. Just prior to her arrival (24 - 48 hours), I would shake out the bees from every single frame in your hive onto the ground 10 or more feet from the hive. The foragers will just fly back to the hive, any heavy-bodied laying workers will be grounded and have difficulty getting back. It doesn't sound like you have other hives? So, when the new queen arrives, put her into the hive and observe how they attend or attack the cage - I leave you with this video showing how new queens can be introduced: ua-cam.com/video/n_TjDxnHETA/v-deo.html If you have fewer than 3-frames of bees in your hive, I would not invest in a new queen this time of year.
Where do you get the bee wac
The link to that vac is in the video description, it's from Amazon, probably available elsewhere also.
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Sorry, as a person who semi-professionally plays video games, I guarantee humans can resolve far more than 20 hertz, let alone 200, and bees can definitely resolve more than 200 hertz.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts on that, but the science doesn't support your statement. It's about motion detection, and it's been well studied. Here's my reference: journals.biologists.com/jeb/article/217/11/1933/12155/Can-bees-see-at-a-glance I invite you to share your research as my mind is always open to scientific debate.
In this study, humans could only resolve a picture at 13 ms. Our brains fill in the gaps for our eyes which is possibly why gaming gives you the feeling better motion awareness. mollylab-1.mit.edu/sites/default/files/documents/FastDetect2014withFigures.pdf