Hotham Family Apiary

It is so hot. More than a week has passed since the first formic acid treatment and it has been too hot to perform another one. Fortunately, there are still no dead mites in the colonies, so I may be able to get away with postponing the next treatment until the weather has improved.

Yesterday, I treated the girls with formic acid. Sounds wonderful doesn't it? Actually, for the bees, it is a critical step in fending off the mites, but it isn't a very pleasing experience. Formic acid is an organic substance that is naturally found in ant venom, hence the name (the Latin word for ant is formica), and can also be found in stinging nettles. The acid, in certain concentrations is corrosive and should always be handled with caution. When the acid is allowed to vaporize, it becomes very pungent and causes quite a deal of stress for the bees. The vaporized acid in essence suffocates the varroa mites, causing them to die. Today, I will remove the sponge towel that I used for holding the acid, from the hives, and attempt to count the dead mites that have hopefully fallen off the bees, down through the wire meshing of the floor, and onto the mite board. Ideally, the number of dead mites will be small. This would first of all mean that my bees are generally in good s...

Varroa destructor is the scientific name for an arachnid parasite that can only reproduce in the presence of honey bees. These parasites infiltrate a bee colony by means of external introduction and once they are present, become a burden on a colony. Normally, parasitic relationships are not devastating, as the parasite needs the host to survive. However, in the case of varroa mites, they destroy their hosts. The mites can transmit several types of diseases, that ultimately destroy a bee colony, either directly or indirectly by weakening the bees to the point that they are no longer able to carry about the normal working functions. Varroa mites are relentless but not invincible, that is where the beekeeper comes in. To give you a bit more perspective about the nature of the mites let me first describe the size of the mite. The mites are normally between 1 and 2 mm long and about the 2 mm wide. Honey bees, in comparison, are on average 14 mm long. That means a varroa mite is approxim...

Remember the film, "Good Morning Vietnam" with the late, and great, comedian Robin Williams? One of my favorite lines from the film was when Williams replied to the liason who greeted him at the airfield, "Warm? No. This is a setting for London Broil!" Well, I got thousands of little six-legged Robin Williams' running around the hives saying just about the same thing. The past few days have been in the low 90's and today was especially humid. When the dog days of summer turn up, bees go on vacation. Not a "real" vacation, there is still work to be done, but rather an extended siesta if you will. Most of the bees are just trying to cool down the hive, so they stop building and beging fanning (or collecting small buckets of crushed ice). Some just hang out on the porch and others hang out on the walls of the hive (inside and ouside). This is the problem I currently have. Another round of Mojitos please! © 2015 Jason Hotham It is infact so...

..."what the heck is going on here?" For the first time in my illustrious and well documented career as a beekeeper, I was faced with a situation I had no answer for. There I was, staring at a frame full of capped brood, when suddenly my eyes were drawn to a small concentrated patch of opened cells with exposed pupa in them. Immediately I said to myself, "that's something I haven't seen yet. Are they sick!?" "I wonder what that is," I said to my mother-in-law. "What?" she asked. "Those weird looking open cells with chewed off capping and exposed brood. Huh, guess I'll have to make a note of it and ask my beek mentor about tomorrow." Great. Now I have to wait until tomorrow to find out if my colony is doomed or if it is just normal behavior with a few bees cleaning up sick brood. The internet has thusfar been a treasure trove of beekeeping information, but I just didn't know how to formulate the phrase for the Google ...

Poor drones. You have to feel bad for them. They are bred by the worker bees for one purpose: mating. Some of you male readers may be thinking, sah-weet!, but I promise you, a drone's life isn't as glorious as you'd expect. First off, drones are incapable of taking care of themselves. They need worker bees to tend to them. Which of course, kind of sets them up for what must be a 24/7 hailstorm of nagging and complaining : "Why can't you sweep the floor? Or do the dishes? Or take care of the youngin's? All you want to do is lounge around, watch football, and generally be useless." Yikes! Second, when drones venture out on a mission to give their DNA to a vibrant, young, sassy virgin queen, it is almost definitely a suicide mission. Granted, the drones probably aren't aware of this macabre fact, seeing as they come from an unfertilized egg, but still, seems a high price to pay. Once a male has made his deposit, the queen tears out the probe...ouchy! Ev...

Leia's colony is not as strong as the other two, so I acted on a tip from my beek mentor. He suggested I place a frame of capped brood from one of the stronger nucs into the weaker nuc. The reasoning behind it is that the weaker bees will get a slew of new bees within a few days that will help in strengthening the colony. It is important however, that all the bees that are sitting on the frame be brushed off before the move. Otherwise, we would end up with a lot of dead bees. I was a bit nervous to do this for two reasons. 1.) When you brush bees off a frame, they fly around in a cloud for a few minutes before they settle down and try to re-enter the hive. Since I generally do not work with a veil, I was worried some might get caught in my hair and sting me. 2.) I was afraid I might hurt the queen. Well, no bees got caught in my hair, in fact most of the bees that I knocked off / brushed off fell immediately into the hive, while the others flew directly to the bee house window....