MinnPost - Colony collapse disorder: The bees' disease

MinnPost - Colony collapse disorder: The bees' disease

bees ordered

May 11 is the big day!

Order placed

I did it. I ordered the equipment to start up 2 hives of bees!  Tomorrow I will order the bees themselves, two four-pound packages of Russians are what has been recommended since we will have a late start in the Spring. Hopefully I can obtain them from a supplier about an hour from here so we don't have to freak out the postal workers - they are under enough pressure as it is!

So in mid to late May I may get to drive an hour in the Prius with 2 queens and 8 lbs of  workers and drones. Anybody wanna ride along??

Order practically ready!

I never found the feeder I was looking for, and decided to wait on a few purchases until we see how much harvesting we will be doing this first year. I expect it to be very little or even, possibly, none the first year. I believe in keeping my expectations low so as to prevent disappointment.  

We'll get one 3XL bee coverall including veil - Sweetie and I will share (no, not at the same time) and a junior-sized one for Kiddo.

We'll have 2 complete painted and assembled hive sets, queen excluders, 2-frame extractor, smoker, some commercial bee food, a sting kit, one top feeder and one front feeder, scratcher, hive tool, frame lifter and seems like a myriad other things. I am hoping the order will go in this afternoon.

It is one minute after noon already. I suppose it's time for me to stop researching and actually get myself ready for the day!

I'm a newBEE

We've decided to follow through and take action on my beekeeping dream. I'm not sure exactly when this started appealing to me, somewhere in childhood while my fascination was blooming, I suppose. I never put a whole lot of serious thought into it, although I did attend a beekeeping workshop several years ago as part of the Midwest Renewable Energy Fair in Custar, Wisconsin. Last year - our first summer living outside city limits, with over 2 acres of propert than includes a lovely pond - we witnessed dozens of honeybees visiting to partake in beverage on our pebblesome beach. This spring, we're ready to take the leap into starting at least 2 hives.

Last night wee watched the 90-minute beginning beekeeping DVD from World of Beekeeping and after just a bit more discussion, we became emotionally invested. No for the financial part! Hubby worked up an order on Dadant that totals just under a thousand bucks. I'm interested in doing some comparison shopping before we place the order. So far I haven't found any real competition, but I honestly haven't looked hard enough. I'm open to suggestions. We will probably get our actual bees from a place that is somewhat local.

I'm skeptical of having my natural little pals working in a plastic environment, too. Everything seems to have plastic in it that I'm finding on the web. I'm pretty sure Rev. Langstroth didn't have that available when he started. Then I start worrying what kinds of plastic are in those pieces. I mean - we really don't want our buddies exposed to vinyl and BPA, etc, do we? So, I'm interested in feedback: does it really matter? Am I worrying too much?

One thing I'm still searching for is this top-feeder they showed in the DVD which had a little viewing window so that you could watch the bees feed. I think that would be a great way to help my get my 9 year old interested and involved in the new hobby.