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 Post subject: Re: Starting wiht beekeeping
PostPosted: Tue Jun 13, 2017 4:19 pm 
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I'm impressed that you know a lumberjack! I've never even met one.



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 Post subject: Re: Starting wiht beekeeping
PostPosted: Thu Jun 15, 2017 5:17 am 
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tielfan wrote:
I'm impressed that you know a lumberjack! I've never even met one.


I don't think you would use the term 'lumberjack' for him... but it's the closest thing I knew to use.

He's got a fulltime job and only cuts down trees in his spare time. It's not like he's operating huge machinery and transports entire logs. The logs come to him when he orders a shipment, then he uses the chainsaw to cut them into 50-60 cm high blocks. I've helped him out on occasion to split those blocks into smaller pieces ready to use in the stove or fireplace. He likes to do it the old fassion way, with a (cliff or sledge) hammer and a piece of iron to help split the log. Or the regular axe.
It's not like he's using his log splitter a lot.

We don't have forrests and jungles out here... ;-)



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 Post subject: Re: Starting wiht beekeeping
PostPosted: Mon Mar 12, 2018 11:36 am 
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Small update on my beekeeping adventures...

I have my first beehive!

It is only 6-frames big as of yet (they came in a nucleus box) but as soon as weather conditions are right I'll be moving them over into my bigger boxes!

Also if you would be interested in that kind of thing, I'm keeping a logbook of sorts in a blog... https://beekeepingwithbob.blogspot.be/ now and again I'll be putting up a bigger post, but most of the time it's just me putting down what the weather was like and what I noticed near the hive.
I hope to include pictures in the future.
Next adventure is starting a youtube series about my bees...

(yes, my birds are still around I have one couple of cockatiels sitting on eggs already and a second pair is going at it! My zebra finches already have 5 hip young chicks flying around and I've got one canary sitting on eggs)

Bye all!



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 Post subject: Re: Starting wiht beekeeping
PostPosted: Mon Mar 12, 2018 9:11 pm 
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Congratulations on making your beekeeping dream come true! The weather must still be cold in Belgium though - is it normal to start a hive at this time of year? I suppose the bees would be less active (and less likely to sting!).



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 Post subject: Re: Starting wiht beekeeping
PostPosted: Thu Mar 15, 2018 6:28 am 
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You are right, it is not the time of year to start a hive.

BUT

The hive was a gift from a neighbour and since he's close to my home I walked home with the hive on my shoulders. (2 min walk)
I did it now for the cold weather means the bees that will be born in spring don't know where they live yet. They will leave the hive at my place and will have never known anything else. If I had moved the hive later in the year I would lose all the forager bees, since they'd fly back to my neighbours place looking for their hive.

NORMALLY

You get bees from further away (+5km) in the late spring (after beekeepers made splits or decided what hives that made it through winter they want to keep for themselves and sell or give away the rest) The distance is important, since when a bee goes out forraging and recognizes the land she is 'harvesting' from she goes back to where she thinks home is. Bees forage about 3km around their hive (hence getting them from +5 km away is a thing).
If you get them from closer by, it is common sence to place them further away for 3 weeks and then bring them home. (A normal worker bee is born in 21 days and all the foragers that knew the old enviroment will have died after 3 weeks)

As for stings, I havent worked in the hive yet - too cold, but I've observed it a couple of times already in front of the hive without being stung.

I made a new post on my blog where I have put up pictures of what is to become a top bar hive (rather than the boring log-type notes)



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 Post subject: Re: Starting wiht beekeeping
PostPosted: Thu Mar 15, 2018 7:05 am 
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I didn't know that bees had such interesting habits! Taking them now was a smart move. It sounds like you're going to have a lot of fun with them.



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 Post subject: Re: Starting wiht beekeeping
PostPosted: Thu Mar 22, 2018 12:39 pm 
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tielfan wrote:
I didn't know that bees had such interesting habits! Taking them now was a smart move. It sounds like you're going to have a lot of fun with them.



To be honest, I'm more psyched about bees and reading up on them then I ever was about birds.
There's so much that we as the human species still don't know about them.

I'm having fun, but I also fear of loosing the colony as the weather hasn't cleared up nicely yet. The beekeeper I got them from is planning to feed them again soon, but I want to go more 'natural' and not force the bees too much... That also means taking the risk of them starving...



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 Post subject: Re: Starting wiht beekeeping
PostPosted: Thu Mar 22, 2018 10:16 pm 
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How do you feed them - put honey in the hive?



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 Post subject: Re: Starting wiht beekeeping
PostPosted: Fri Mar 23, 2018 8:25 pm 
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Bjornlefevre wrote:
To be honest, I'm more psyched about bees and reading up on them then I ever was about birds.
There's so much that we as the human species still don't know about them.


It's really cool to find what you click with. I remember about 7 years ago that was me and birds. Birds gave me everything good in life, so I owe them a lot.



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 Post subject: Re: Starting wiht beekeeping
PostPosted: Tue Apr 03, 2018 8:39 am 
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tielfan wrote:
How do you feed them - put honey in the hive?


You can feed bees in multiple ways.

Dry granulated suger on top of the hive on some newspaper (They'll only eat it when they need it and carry it out of the hive if they don't - so this method is mostly used in winter)

Foodpacks can be bought our made. That's a mixture of water and sugar and sometimes other stuff (minerals, vitamins, ...) that's more dry than wet.

Or you can feed sugarwater (mixture that's more wet than dry) in a feeder of some sort (prevents the mixture to seep ou to fast into the hive or prevents the bees from drowning in it).

But of course you can put honey in the hive, preferably capped honey still in frames! And to avoid spreading eventual disease, give them their own frames.


@ STephy: I am clicking with bees! I was a bit nervous today. It was my first time working inside the hive...


I'll put up a youtube video of it later (both on youtube and my blog)



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