I’d like to start beekeeping this year, I was into it a couple years ago, but never bit the bullet. Are there any websites that sell good beekeeping gear? I think the closest store near me is like 45 minutes away and I’d like to avoid going that far if at all possible. I’m pretty much brand new to it, so any tips or tricks would help too! Thank you!!

I’ve only kept bees twice but decided to do some research on how honeybees make honey. I wrote it all like this as a way to simplify it for others to easily understand and just wondering if I could get a second opinion on how right this is.

Honey is made after collecting nectar from plants, storing it in their honey stomach and bringing it back to the hive. The bees then pass it between worker bees mouth to mouth, changing the contents before depositing it in honeycomb.

Once done, they start fanning it with their wings to dry it out and make more sticky, turning it into honey and sealing it over with wax.

Is this the right order? Some help would be greatly appreciated thank you! 🙏

Location Queensland, Australia

As we prepare for the imminent arrival of varoah to our state I attended an information session put on by the Federal Government. Two questions came up that they could not answer adequately.

1. When using treatments where supers can be left on, we were told that you must still dispose of the wax from the brood box rather then use it in wax products, as it will have unacceptable levels of chemical residue, but when we asked if that then applies for the supers left on the hive, we were told the wax would still be safe to use in wax products. Anyone's experience or opinion on this?
2. With the wax from treated Brood boxes, it was asked if the chemical residue could be washed from the wax either in a solar melter, or by being melted in water, and brought as close as was safe to boiling. If not, was there any risk of reusing this wax to make foundation for the brood box?

Thanks for any opinions/help?

I have a 2nd hive that is completely empty. It’s just in the apiary in case a swarm decides to take up shop in it. I opened it today to put a box off and noticed the inner cover is warmed like it’s gotten wet. The top cover seems a little warped on the inside but not as bad as the inner cover. I can’t tell how the top cover is leaking… seems well sealed. Is there something I can paint over the exterior paint on the top cover to ensure it stops leaking?

I bought my son a honeysuckle plant and told him thats where honey comes from since that is where I thought honey came from.

We watched a YouTube video and it turns out most honey comes from bees and not plants.

We bought a bee hive that had knobs that drops the honey. Should be here in about 5 days.

I have about 20 hives in 2 yards and I'm a 50yo guy who work's mostly alone. I'm looking for something to help me move hives around. One of my locations i have to clear out of in October and I need a little help loading and unloading. I saw one of these at an equipment show I was at for my day job and wanted some opinions. Or if anyone has any other ideas I'm open to suggestions.

Thanks!

I'm in central NC. At OAV time at Christmas, we found that at least 1 of our 2 hives was a dead out. We could hear a little activity in the other. A few days later, when it was warm enough, we opened the lids and nobody came up through the honey super, even when we knocked on the side of the box. The sugar bricks in each looked like they'd been barely touched. Then it turned cold for 3 weeks, below 40° every day.

Fast forward to yesterday, when it got up to 68°. Bees were flying in and out of the hive. Robbing was the first possibility. When we looked at the landing board, there were bees dragging dead bees out. Now robbers don't do any maintenance on a hive, do they? When we lifted the lid, bees came up through the honey super and flew out at us. I'm beginning to suspect they came through the winter. We'll be inspecting this weekend if it's warm enough. Am I on the right track?

Hey yall So I’m going to start buying local honey because I thought honey was disgusting but i think thats just because I buy the store stuff and I’m pretty sure that’s not even honey. I really like the crystallized honey and I don’t trust anything at the stores. There is one beekeeper I know because he has a bunch of beehives scattered across the city(pretty bizarre honestly)

Just want to know if there’s anything I should watch out for or be aware of when buying honey from a local beekeeper?

Just leaving this here for ideas for anyone wanting to make side bars. This jig makes the tapers (bee space) super easy. I’ve made 1000s on this thing. It’s just made with scrap plywood with a slit in the middle a little over 3/8” wide glued to an insert for the table saw. The table saw is set up with a dado blade and you just slide each blank in the slit up to the stop.

It’s cold. I’ve already made way too many frames and other things so now I’m on to decorating hive bodies.

TL;DR How can I best keep 100-200 bees warm, happy & alive in a small “bee hut” that is stored in a cool shed?

Hello bee keepers. Sorry if it’s inappropriate to post this here but I was hoping you guys could help.

I am suffering from chronic Lyme disease. I won’t detail this hellish illness but suffice to say; it really sucks. Lyme disease feels like having the flu, getting hit by a truck and having MS all rolled into one. You feel like death every moment. At times you’d rather be dead than alive and when you’re awake, you just suffer every moment with an illness that doesn’t go away.

To help recover from this disease, I will be starting Bee Venom Therapy (BVT); where I am stinging myself with bees 3 times a week. To me, it sounds bat shit crazy but, for some people, it’s the only thing that helped them recover from this awful infection. The thing is, I live in a cool winter climate AND I have an allergic family member. This means I can’t keep my bees in our house and have to keep them outside in a shed. I want to keep the bees warm, alive (and if possible, happy) which leads me here.

Some bullet points:

• A local bee keeper (god bless him) will be providing me with bees each month
• I’m in a cool climate in winter
• Night time temperatures drop to about 5C / 41F
• I will keep the bees in a little wooden “bee hut” outside in a small shed
• I will walk my little bee hut from the shed to my house
• Sting myself
• Take the little bee hut back to the shed

So my question is …

How would one keep the bees warm and happy in a cool outdoor shed?

Thanks in advance for any advice or suggestions!

🙏

Bonus Content (for those of you interested:)

Yes, I feel bad about killing about 3000-ish bees over the course of my protocol. When you feel as deathly sick as I do, you’ll try almost anything to feel better. I’ve lost 5 years of my life to this hellish illness, and the impact on me and my family can’t be described. To atone for my actions, I will be either sponsoring a couple of hives or beekeeping myself when my health returns. I’m smitten by bees already, they are truly fascinating creatures.

Bee venom therapy (BVT) has proven to be one of the very few treatments where some Lyme sufferers can make a (rare) recovery from this disease. See BVT episode on Netflix “Unwell” if you care to learn more. I’ve been sick with Lyme for 5 years, it’s vandalized my entire nervous system causing at least 30 horrendous symptoms. I’m about to start BVT, working my way up to 10 bee stings per day, 3 times a week. I am learning this protocol from a woman called Ellie Lobel and guided by other BVT practitioners on the Healing Lyme with Bee Venom FB group. If you’ve gotten this far, thanks for reading and learning about all this and whatever you do, protect yourself from ever getting Lyme disease.

I'm a fairly inexperienced beekeeper looking to buy two new 4 frame nucs this spring through my local association. They offer both overwintered queen and 2025 mated Queen's. What are the pros and cons to each? Barrie, Ontario Canada.

Hi all, I live in the greater San Francisco Bay Area and was wondering if there are any good books about beekeeping specifically in California. I’m about to get myself a few hives at the end of February and wanted to pick up some reading before then.

I have a 25 gallon, horizontal tank, with a 5 inch opening at the top. Currently I fill my water and sugar and use 2 800 gph aquarium pumps to circulate. It works but not like I want. They flop around and get knotted but they work. Bit of a cleanup. I want a 55 gallon drum so I can just put a trolling motor in it as a mixer.

So the question is what do you all use and what ideas might you have for a, single, large pump that will fit in a 5 inch opening.

SC, getting warm. Swarms are coming!!!

Temps hitting 55°F here in eastern NC and will be over the next week. I cracked open the hive today because I wanted to remove the top feeder that I didn’t remove in the summer. Bees had, of course, turned it into a honey super and it had nothing but capped honey in it. I removed the comb and honey, put in a bucket, took the top feeder off so I can clean it up to get it ready for spring feeding. And put the inner cover and top cover on and did nothing else. My question is, what should I do with the honeycomb and honey? Keep it? Put it back in hive for the bees on inner cover? Somewhere else? Outside the hive? I feel bad for taking it now. 😆

2nd year, Central florida

I hung my raincoat on my window and a bee started building a hive in the sleeve. It's right by my front door and I need to move it. Seems simple enough since I can easily hang my raincoat anywhere in my yard. Problem is my yard is pretty small because I have a huge rockery in my yard because I live in a very rocky area? Lol. I don't have any other sheltered area to hang it for it to be out of the way for my kids safety - other than on top of the rockery, but again, it's not sheltered and the raincoat will definitely get drenched in a storm. (I live in south Africa.)

Can I perhaps build something? What would be the most practical way to go about relocating them?

I have a huge bush of lavender in my yard among some other berries and water features which is why I'd prefer to keep them close.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks