BEEKEEPING LEARNING CENTER > EQUIPMENT USAGE, EXPERIMENTATION, HIVE PLANS, CONSTRUCTION TIPS AND TOOLS

How Do You Smoke your Bees? 🐝

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Terri Yaki:
What are you smoking them with, MJ?

BeeMaster2:
Just pine straw.
Jim Altmiller

cao:

--- Quote from: BeeMaster2 on January 13, 2025, 09:47:01 am ---You get the smoker making thick smoke, smoke the hive from the bottom 3 or 4 puffs. Then you wait 10 minutes and smoke them again and wait 30 seconds.

--- End quote ---

I don't follow that exactly but basically do the same thing.  I think it works so well because after the first few puffs of smoke gets the vast majority of the bees to gorge themselves with nectar.  By the time you smoke them the second time, the nectar stuffed bees have calmed down and the rest start filling themselves. I have had that smoking method not work a few times.  When it didn't work was late in the summer during a dearth.  After getting into the hive, I noticed that they had no open nectar so they couldn't gorge themselves. 

gww:
Cao
That is the difference between a commercial guy that just has to get stuff done and a hobbyist like my self.  The very few time I find them just in a bad mood, I close up and just pick a different day.   I also notice they can get a little funny right after they swarm or when they first start making a queen after a split.   Sometimes early spring when a flow is just starting they will fly out and bug me.  Of course it could be a skunk bugging them or some robbing started when resources are tight in the spring.  I love not really having a schedule and being able to walk away and take it up later as it usually does not last too long before they are nice again.

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