Building a Bee Business [Vlog #3]
Вставка
- Опубліковано 23 лют 2023
- I'm documenting my struggle and process in scaling a beekeeping business.
Support the channel - purchase honey, a t-shirt, or donate through our website:
duckriverhoney.com/ - Навчання та стиль
![Building a Bee Business [Vlog #4]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/KwhM1x7Op0w/mqdefault.jpg)
![Building a Bee Business [Vlog #4]](/img/tr.png)
![Building a Bee Business [Vlog #10]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/ZvasuZmEVq4/mqdefault.jpg)
Thank You for sharing your story about your Grandma!! She sounded like a great Woman!
She was awesome!
God be with you Nathan, now she is dancing with the Lord.
I have NO doubt of that!
Sorry to hear about your grandmother. Older people are the best. I lived with my wife's grandmother when I first got out of the Marines 36 yrs ago to help her out. Here's one of the best stories she ever told me. Her husband had past away yrs ago and she always called him "pa" . When I ask her granddaughter to marry me she had to tell me about when she got married. She got married at 16. I asked her didn't her parents try to stop her. Completely serious she said ..." yes they did, but pa's horses were faster than anyone else's. She was the greatest. I know this has nothing to do with bees but I loved that old woman. She would be over 120 yrs old now if she was still alive.
My grandmother had to elope as well!
Sorry to hear about your grandma. Grandmas are always missed.
Thanks
Sorry for your loss. They don’t make them like your grandma anymore. Thanks for the video
Thanks Dave! It’s amazing to think of everything she witnessed in her life. Electricity, automobiles, radio, TV, space flight, computers…
Man, I wish those warm temps were here in NW Iowa...-5 this morning. My condolences to you in the loss of your grandma.
It was 80° here yesterday!
Fellow Iowan! 👋
I hope this early increase in temperatures works in favor of early splits. I am in the same boat as you in growth of bees versus honey production. Good luck. Enjoying your videos. Thanks. Take care.
Thanks!
condolences. Your grandmother sounds like an awesome woman.
Thank you for sharing.
Thanks!
Sympathy for the loss of your grandmother. They are such a great part of our lives, even after they have moved on. Thanks for another informative post!
Thanks Susan!
My Condolences! Sorry for your family loss!
Thanks Francisco!
In early spring, when I have frames empty from overwintering, I will pull 2-3 per box and replace with foundation frames. Given all the young bees in the hive, they draw the foundation out nicely once things start blooming and I don’t feel like it slows the growth of the colony. It’s an early window for comb building, and helps me build my supply of built comb for later use. Since my main flows aren’t until June, slowing things down a bit to prevent swarming doesn’t impact my honey crop.
Thanks, I haven’t had much luck getting mine to draw wax early in the season, though I’ve been told that’s a good time to get drone combs drawn out.
The fastest way to grow is by making a 1 frame splits, Joe may used to do a lot of those and barnyard bees too, and March, April are the best time.
Informative and thought provoking as always! I am sorry to hear about your grandmother, it sounds like she was a wonderful person.
Thanks Rainier!
101 is a good run. Sounds like it was well spent, too. Very sorry for your loss
Good overview of evaluating early Spring hives. Please keep these videos coming as long as it makes sense for you, because is makes a lot of sense to me (us). Thanks.
Thanks Barry! She was a delightful lady. Everyone who met her was better than they were before they met her.
Sorry you've been sick and that your granny passed, feeling your loss, had my middle brother pass last year. Wow those bees are looking ready to soar and drones to boot! Best get yourself several cups of coffee or sweet tea and get moving! Did you see any mites in the broken drone bridge comb? We just had a 70 degree day two days ago followed by plummeting temps so my new Duck River Honey hoodie will come in real handy with the colder weather that has set in. Seems to be our winter pattern (too warm then freezing cold) and its not good for the 🐝's and has all kinds of spring bloom starting way too early. Will just have to see how it all shakes out. Bees are looking good but lighter on food stores than they should be (too much fly time not enough tight cluster). Granny will be watching over you from above! Peace be with you and your family.
Nancy I haven't seen any mites yet, I think I got them pretty well under control during December. I hope that hoodie fits, I love mine.
@@DuckRiverHoney Hoodie fits great! Thank you! We are actually having snow flurries right now! Tomorrow it will be upper 50's!
Sorry to hear bout your Grandmother Nathan, prayers up for the whole family! Thanks for a great video!
Thanks Doug!
Thanks for sharing your thoughts as always, Nathan. I'm sorry to hear of your grandmother's passing. They are very special people in our lives, no doubt.
Thanks!
I’m sorry to hear about the loss of your grandmother, she sounds like an amazing person.
I also run all mediums, and it has made things much simpler for me. As always, thanks for the great information, and I look forward to the next one!
Thanks!
Nathen sorry for your Grandmothers loss..She lived a blessed life.
Thanks Dan, she was truly one of a kind.
Great demo on the rotation of hives, I'm on my 5th year and just getting the hang of how I need to rotate my bees to help prevent swarming. Good luck on the expansion this year.👍👍👍
This is A way, not THE way. It’s probably not the best way either, but it is time efficient and achieves most of what I want.
Sorry for your loss Nathan, she will live on in your memories. Good luck on this season and the full time bee business. I sure it will go great!
Mimi is someone to try to live up to! I don’t think I’ll ever achieve that.
I'm in Virginia not very cold but this year I added some corrugated plastic to my covers in an attempt to keep condensation off of the center frames and force it towards the side walls. I did not lose any colonies this year. So with your covers whichever you choose, I suggest either the corrugated plastic or silver bubble wrap.
Thanks!
Brother you are getting there.
Sorry for your loss, Nathan. Nice to see a fellow Hives for Heroes member.
Thanks!
Nathan, sorry for your loss but her memories will live on. Her generation seemed to have a sharper tongue then we're used to. My mom was the same way but that sharpness of tongue was to train and teach to help guide us, never meant to hurt.
Michael Palmer said that he used the weak hives to make splits on. Pinch the queens, split the resources and drop in a new queen which leaves you with lots of strong hives. What are your thoughts on that?
There’s a difference in weak and small. I’ll boost the small ones, and weed out the weak ones to make nucs.
I am really enjoying your journey in this vlog
Thanks!
Watching you being able to do this at the level you are at is truly something I enjoy. I'm trying to follow in your footsteps (and several others I deeply admire) and make a bee business but I am severely limited by storage. I WISH I could triple my bees every year but I live in an apartment and only so many supers can be stored in a shed. Been thinking of getting an enclosed trailer to use a storage and a mobile honey house but those are... Pricey. I'm at a point where I want to work with bees full time but I keep hitting walls.
People like you are the reason I'm hanging on through those... Frustrating obstacles. Thank you, keep making those videos they help more than you think :)
Thanks! But I wouldn’t shoot for my level. Shoot for a couple levels above me 😂
Hey Nathan. My condolences to you and your family. I was surprised to hear my question and thank you. My plan is similar to yours. I'll equalize and split all 25 March 1st. Half or so will be honey production hives and the rest, bee production hives until June/July. Hopefully, I can sell 20 nucs and still double my numbers. Fingers crossed.
Thanks Hope! That was one of those layered questions that I think are really interesting.
Sorry to hear about your loss 😔 Very much enjoyed the video. Looking like an early spring here in Oklahoma as well. Excited to see how your year goes!
Thanks Chris!
Awesome INFO Sorry about your Grandma,,, Prayers to you and yours. Trying to grow also
Thanks Harold!
Hey Nathan, very interesting on your journey growing your honeybee operation.
I tend to gather as much information from as many people as I can regarding techniques and appropriate time frames for different applications. I ultimately use bits and pieces of all my research to apply whats best for my operation. I am right here in middle TN, I don't believe too far from you, so I estimate that we are having basically the same weather. I was curious, due to the warm winter and warm weather we have been having, when you personally anticipate making your first grafts this year?
Thanks,
Also, so sorry to hear about your grandmother passing, prayers to you and your family
Brady a lot of folks say you can graft when you see purple eye drone brood, because the drones would emerge before grafted queens would. The good queen rearers prefer to see drones walking around before they start grafting. That’ll be happening in the next 1-3 weeks. So I’ll start equalizing my big ones next week to slow them down and plan to graft around the middle of March most likely.
Sorry to hear about your grandmother. A great generation bridging the "old ways" to modern times. I hope she shared her old memories of family and life for you to pass on to your kids. So much is lost when we don't talk to our older relatives. Great video. I also use all mediums and have the same basic plan in mind for drawing comb and making honey. On the subject of OA, are you still using sticky boards and the "drop" method to determine mite loads and judge the success of your treatments? I am, and so far have been pleased with the results. Thanks as always!!
I am, and plan to build on that foundation.
Sorry to hear about your grandmother. Watching people who have had such an impact on our lives grow old and eventually leave us has been one of the hardest parts of getting older.
I appreciate it. The last year has been very heavy.
good to see you ,god is so good,ive been building hives,i hope to go to 20 or so,thanks for teaching us about beekeeping, the pvc tops is interesting,wish i knew where to find bottoms n tops
Thanks Mark!
Thank you, Nathan.
Thanks Mike!
If you have 2 frames of capped brood the first of March in a strong nuc. Feed it 1 gallon in 2 deeps and can give them 4 drawn frames top and bottom you can get two supers of honey. If it hasn’t taken off by end of March drop in another frame of capped brood.
I appreciate that! The frame counting and calendar watching is a weakness of mine.
As long as you don't mind buying a lot of sugar you can split your hives during the summer dearth and double to triple them at that time.
That’s sort of the plan. I’d like to double before the flow and then maybe double again after.
Here is a question for you. Spinach has oxalic acid. If you put spinach leaves above the brood would bees chew it up and remove the leaves and spread the oxalic acid threw the brood.
Maybe, but the concentration in spinach leaves probably isn’t enough to have much effect.
Sorry to hear it, condolences
I appreciate it!
Great video, hope things go as planned this year.
They usually don’t, here’s to hoping I adapt and make good decisions!
@@DuckRiverHoney Sounds like you have a good plan, mother nature just has to be on the same page. I'm worried these early warm spells are going cold in April and May though, it happened several years ago here. Snow and ice messes up everything when it happens in those months.
A late freeze could hurt a lot.
Yeah, I wish my father used mediums and left me those instead of all deeps. I have boxes from the 80s that look better than some new ones.. more than i need.
You know, you could "shook swarm" on all new sheets, everything that you find with swarm cells.. move all they had on the next hive and keep doing that.. depending on what you need more (frames or swarms/queens.. use some swarm cells this year... go full queen production next year).
Here, they draw a deep of Wax sheets over night (don't know how fast it would be with plastic) at the start of black locust. And you still get the flow. Just some ideas, if they're already swarming. It can be done in many different ways.. why use only one. You know what I'm saying. Put your back into it 😅
Thanks, I appreciate it. Shook swarming is interesting.
@@DuckRiverHoney it's old stuff my father's generation did before varroa. If they think about swarming than they don't collect or draw comb like they should. This way you make them think they swarmed already.. (just on the seme spot) and immediately, they start to work again.
On a nice big colony, I would shook them on 3 mediums of only sheets and give them 2, max 3 days.. than combine everything back (that next hive would get 2 days of brood hatching from those frames). And now you have a colony that thinks they swarmed and they will work and collect much better. It's the fastest way to change their mind and make them work. They draw beautiful frames this way. But it's a lot of frame shaking.
It can be done as a comb drawing method before swarm cells, but then is good to put one frame of open brood between those sheets. Ppl with strong flows still do it here. If you work 300 by yourself, then it's a good swarm prevention method
I know some people still use it to make comb honey.
@@DuckRiverHoney l had them draw 20 deeps (home made wax sheets, no wire) and fill with thin nectar in 3 days.. on black locust. There would usually be one with brood in the middle.. then they get recombined back with those new ones above excluders. It can be done with a strong flow
Goodness! My black locust flow isn’t that good here. I understand in some areas of Europe it can be fantastic.
How are you raising your nucs ie…size of box? Have you seen Mike Palmers brood factory lectures? I started last year keeping new queens in five frame boxes (deep) I know you run medium. They draw out comb and raise brood faster than ten frame hands down and overwinter well too. Also can pull honey. Then move them to ten frame the following year. Just a thought.
I use a medium with a double frame feeder for my nuc boxes. I only have one footprint and top lid.
You’ve mentioned your business plan is focusing on honey production. Wouldn’t it be better to pull any full honey frames off now andextract it, then feed sugar syrup?
Honey frames this time of year could have syrup from late fall feeding. They’ll eat that up for spring brood production and refill with real honey during the flow.
My condolences- what a wonderful long life! Few people get to hug someone who’s made it to 100.
My question is are you planning to separate new queens in different apiaries - Like put all your graphs in one, all of Cory’s in another, all old ones in another? Or mix them up?
I’ll mate queens out of a mating yard that’s in between my other yards, then move them out to fill in spots in new yards. I’ll grade them out over the year and populate drone flooding yards next year with high performers.
RIP grandma.
Thanks
Swarm year ahead
They’re working toward it.