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GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. / Re: What did you do in your Apiary/Bee yard today?

« Last post by The15thMember on July 18, 2024, 12:44:26 pm »

By "crash", I'm picturing a plane that has lost its landing gear, but is making a controlled landing, not a plane that has lost an engine and whose pilot has been murdered and is spiraling out of control and on fire.    Bees that aren't overburdened tend to land lightly and walk into the hive in one swift motion, like an experienced parachuter who breaks into a run as he hits the ground.  But bees who are really full will land heavily, because their trajectory is off.  It's kind of a broad generalization, and not every single bee will crash land when the flow is really on, but you just tend to see more bees having trouble landing gracefully than when the flow is light.       

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GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. / Re: What did you do in your Apiary/Bee yard today?

« Last post by Terri Yaki on July 18, 2024, 11:37:35 am »

Yep, that makes sense. They were drinking at a cracked pipe at the pool filter but that crack sealed itself up so they must be getting water elsewhere but I don't know where. I gave them a chicken waterer full of pool water but they didn't touch that.

 I placed the honey extracting equipment out back last week and some of them filled up so much that they couldn't get off the ground. I don't know what they finally did but they did take off eventually but I'm not seeing what I would consider crashing on the porch. Though, I might not have the right idea of what constitutes crashing. Some of them do take a while to make their landing.

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GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. / Re: What did you do in your Apiary/Bee yard today?

« Last post by The15thMember on July 18, 2024, 11:29:47 am »

Just cups, a little bigger than a pea.

Okay, thanks.

Does what they're bringing in say anything about what's going on inside the hive? i e, does heavy pollen traffic indicate food stores for one particular stage in their lives?

Eh, kind of yes and no.  So pollen is predominantly used to feed brood, both directly and by nurse bees eating it to stimulate their hypopharyngeal glands to produce royal jelly.  A colony harvesting a lot of pollen, therefore, would logically be intent on rearing brood.  But bees will also store excess pollen so they will have some accessible to begin brood rearing in early spring before the first pollen flow.  So are they gathering pollen because they want to rear brood now?  Or because they want to have some for over the winter?  Or just because they are bees, and gathering whatever is available while it's available?  Probably all of the above.  The other factor here is that the amount of pollen and other stores coming in will basically tell the bees if they can afford to rear brood now.  That's why your girls aren't rearing brood during the dearth.  So the amount of stores coming in from the foragers determines whether brood rearing is feasible, but brood rearing also increases the demand for stores and therefore foraging activity.  Does that makes sense? 

And is there any way to tell if they're toting water or nectar?

       
Bees with very heavy crops will sometimes land heavily or even crash land under the extra weight.  But there is really no way to tell if that weight is honey or water on a bee by bee basis.  If your bees happen to drink at a watering hole on your property, that can be a good indicator of how much water they are bringing in.  And of course if the bees are filling honeycombs and especially if they are drawing wax, then you can be sure there is nectar coming in.   

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GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. / Re: What did you do in your Apiary/Bee yard today?

« Last post by Terri Yaki on July 18, 2024, 11:14:43 am »

Just cups, a little bigger than a pea.

We finally got some rain here the last few days. No all day rains but some good soaking thunderstorms came through and cumulatively, they gave us some water. This morning, all three hives are bringing in yellow pollen fairly heavily. Does what they're bringing in say anything about what's going on inside the hive? i e, does heavy pollen traffic indicate food stores for one particular stage in their lives? And is there any way to tell if they're toting water or nectar?

95

OUTDOOR ACTIVITIES FORUM / Re: Lets Go Fishing!

« Last post by The15thMember on July 18, 2024, 11:09:55 am »

Thanks for the tips, Terr.  I'll do some experimenting and see if my luck changes any.  We do have some rain on the horizon (supposedly), so maybe that will help too. 

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GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. / Re: What did you do in your Apiary/Bee yard today?

« Last post by The15thMember on July 18, 2024, 11:08:02 am »

Just so we're all clear, does this hive have uncapped queen cells (with an egg or larva in it, but just not capped yet) or just queen cups (the empty beginnings of a queen cell, without an egg or larva)?  Queen cups are nothing to worry about.  Queen cells indicate the hive is in the process of superseding or swarming.   

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GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. / Re: What did you do in your Apiary/Bee yard today?

« Last post by Terri Yaki on July 18, 2024, 09:44:45 am »

Often get queens taking laying breaks when little forage about, usually late summer here,before they start laying in their winter bees. Uncapped queen cells though means something totally different.

My hive #1 seem to be preppers, they always have some empty queen cells laying around. I wonder if they're dropping a hint, or what.

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GENERAL BEEKEEPING - MAIN POSTING FORUM. / Re: What did you do in your Apiary/Bee yard today?

« Last post by NigelP on July 18, 2024, 08:52:08 am »

Often get queens taking laying breaks when little forage about, usually late summer here,before they start laying in their winter bees. Uncapped queen cells though means something totally different.

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OUTDOOR ACTIVITIES FORUM / Re: Lets Go Fishing!

« Last post by Terri Yaki on July 18, 2024, 07:04:01 am »

The problem I think is that because the water level is so low, the water temperature is too warm, and then the trout are stressed and don't want to eat.  You always hear that the technique on a low water day is to fish the deep pools, and some days I see trout in the deep pools, but they just won't bite.

As I said earlier, there reaches a point where trout won't eat anything but a fly. I took my nephew fishing with me a couple of times in NY and he taught me something that you might want to try...He made a float/weight out of a dried stick and tied a fly onto his casting rod and tossed it out and fish hit on it. Since you know what those pools are and where they are, you'd have nothing to lose by trying that method.

Oh, and stand upstream of the hole and let the current drag your rig down into it.

100

HUMOR IS A FUNNY THING / Re: Memes 2024 7 16

« Last post by Terri Yaki on July 18, 2024, 06:57:49 am »

Is its name Pat?    SNL is missing out on a great opportunity to be funny again. I know that they think this DEI garbage is all fine and dandy but sooner or later, the facts had to smack them in the face. Pieces of corporate America are starting to see the errors of that ideology but let's hope that our military sees it before one of our enemies shows it to them/us. The fact that those who fumbled that ball that badly are still in their positions is a bit concerning for me and this is a case of them being too stupid to see that they're stupid.