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Name: Warrick
BlogID: beeware
Occupation: Beekeeper & Beekeeping Equipment Supplier
Location: Midrand, South Africa
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Another Bee Removal with queen cell 

Bee removals can be daunting. The one I did yesterday certainly was the exception. The reward: small honey harvest but BIG healthy swarm to boot. Start beekeeping now...

I used to do a lot of bee removals - partly for extra income and partly to build my apiary numbers. No bee removal should be done for free by default as the queen bee is never guaranteed and any honey is bound to be valued at less than the petrol used to do the bee removal - let alone the time spent.

The bees were inside an unused electric box with the door that had opened slightly. Perfect little spot for bees. It was a strong swarm.

We also picked up about 3Kg of honey this time round. There was also an interesting finding on one of the honey comb. A new queen cell was present in obviously was a buzzing honeybee colony. Why a new queen cell?

This time of year beekeeping in South Africa kicks into high gear! Naturally bees will propagate or breed by making splits and the new queen will leave the parent bee hive with 5000 or so bees. They ensure the continued survival as well as genetic development of our bee population.

What you want to do as a beekeeper is inspect your beehives to discover queen cells, if any, are present. If you so, this beehive is preparing to split soon and you should intervene with an artificial split withing a week of finding queen cells.

If the queen cell(s) is sealed or capped then you may only have a few days to act. But be sure to check for young eggs the size of a pinhead are also present in the brood comb so you can confirm the current queen is laying and healthy.

We cover loads of this practical beekeeping on our bee course. I've just completed some new beekeeping videos.

Hopefully the embedding works here. Otherwise go direct to our website on www.beeware.co.za

The bee course video should show below: Come learn beekeeping before you miss the honeybee season! Next bee course is on the 18th September in JHB. Happy beekeeping!

Friday August 27 2010 10:04 AM | Comments (0) 
Bee season kicks in! 

As Spring rushes in with the days getting longer, the sun rising earlier and the bees starting to trek if you ever wanted to start beekeeping the time is NOW!

We just visited our muldersdrift site and transferred two 'free' bee swarms - with one bee colony in a tyre stack and another in a fruit box from the orchard - into our bee hive boxes.

The fruit box honeybee colony was very strong. It will soon be split after we feed it for a week and wait for a few more flowers to blossom.

The honey bee colony in the tyre stack however was a lot less better off. Possibly this was due to the much more exposed venue of a tyre stack compared to a closed wooden fruit box.

Nonetheless, we successfully transferred the two honeybee colonies into our bee hives. These two honeybee swarms were left on the same spot as the original venues. This is so that any field bees that return to the bee hive will find it as they left it.

Tomorrow we will be feeding the honey bee colonies with sugar water. The fruit box bee colony had signs of possible natural splitting and so we would need to ensure that on inspection there is no queen cells.

We've also placed loads of trap boxes on the orchard and on the roof of the sheds. These have been baited to help attract wild honeybee swarms that are trekking now for the Spring nectar flow.

We just taught all of this and much more on our recent bee course for beginners wanting to start beekeeping on the 14th Aug.

If you want to start beekeeping we suggest you do it now! Take advantage of the nectar flow of spring and put out as many beehives as you can!

Our next beekeeping course is on the 18th September! You can register now.

Monday August 16 2010 11:28 PM | Comments (0) 
Start Beekeeping now 

The best time of year to start bee keeping is right NOW! Our beekeeping course is smack in the middle of August just before the nectar flow starts. Bees will be most active in the next few weeks!

Our Bee course teaches you theory and practical beekeeping info! If you ever wanted to start beekeeping now is the time. Bees naturally run by the cycle of the seasons. The moment the flowers start to blossom and the first rains are around in Spring honey bees will become much more active.

For beekeepers this is the best time of year! It is fairly easy to catch bees if you know how to. What you need is a few trap boxes or nuc boxes which can be baited with bee swarm attractant and left on a high place. Within a few days you will have bees inside the bee hive.

Fortunately for beginner beekeepers, we teach this method and a whole bunch more bee info on the full day bee keeping course running this Saturday 14th August!

If you miss this Spring Nectar flow you miss most of the beekeeping action for 2010~!! Start beekeeping by the end of September to capitalise on the season's honey flow.

Contact us on 082 359 8787 or info@beeware.co.za to register for the Bee courses!



Wednesday August 11 2010 04:02 PM | Comments (2) 
Bee removal in Midrand 

The bees are inside a phone box. We should be able to remove the bees at dusk and hopefully it will take about an hour to transfer the bee colony over to my bee hive and then relocate it.

It's best to warn the neighbouring houses and security staff that a bee removal is going to take place. All pets should be kept indoors and no pedestrians should be allowed into the area covering at least 100m.

Bees are night blind but will be attracted to light. Where there is light they will be able to have minimal sight and target anything that moves.

Bee keeping is not all fun and games. It is actually hard work when you get down to it. thankfully bee farming doesn't require too much interference to make it profitable.

Good beekeeping.

Monday August 2 2010 09:47 PM | Comments (0) 
Easy Buzzing bee course - 14th Aug 

Always beekeeping
It's almost that time again! Bees will start splitting naturally across the southern hemisphere. The cycle of nature takes place every season. We beekeepers need to take full advantage!
Come on our Easy Buzzing Bee Course on the 14th August in JHB. We offer a full day of bee info and practical 60 min session at the apiary on site!

The Easy buzzing bee course runs on the 14th August at 8am until 17h00. It includes lunch and loads of bee info and beekeeping secrets! You also have a minimum of 60 min of practical beekeeping with a live bee hive at our apiary!

We also recommend that you make sure that as we move into the next season you have ensured that firebreakers have been cut or that you have managed your apiary site's surrounds grass length.

We've recently left one of our apiary sites for too long and the grass got out of hand... Unfortunately, the unplanned took place and a fire set out on our apiary site which is a farm near Diepsloot.

As it happens, one apiary site had not been cleared for months as it slipped through our list of sites to ensure the firebreaker had been done! We lost 4 hives...

Experts's advice So our tip for the month going forward is to ensure that your apiary site is always cleared of debri as well as long grass and any other fuel that may cause damage to your bee hives in the event of a fire breaking out.

The fire break should be done every year, at least twice, but especially once the long grass and debri goes dry in about June.

The main focus for any beekeeper is the number of bee hives you have with bee colonies. Besides losing bees by absconsion or vandalism the hardest pill to swallow for a beekeeper is to lose bee hives and bees to fire! Be diligent at managing your apiary sites with fire breakers.

What other preparations:

Seasonal changes have begun. It is starting to get warmer. Bees can now be fed honey or sugar water to encourage the queen to lay more eggs and to develop a new season's brood to take advantage of the nectar flow.

The sooner you get the queen to lay more eggs the earlier your colony will be in a position to harvest excess honey for you.

Do not feed your bees for longer than 2 weeks at a time. They will get dysentry and die.

Business Solutions

Suppliers of bee hives, bee tools and bee suits we also offer a bee course on a monthly basis with practical sessions at a live apiary.

Splitting of bee hives will take place naturally now. It will provide the best opportunity for beginners to catch their own swarms. You can learn to split your own colonies with honeybee colony creator! Visit www.practicalbeekeeping.com

Stock up on trap boxes or nuc boxes and make sure you place them in elevated positions with the bottom bar of the frames painted with honey and or propolis to attract free trekking bee swarms!! For more info, get a copy of the Swarm Catcher ebook now at the www.practicalbeekeeping.com site.

Contact us

Beeware.co.za 25 Glen Carlou, Bradford Str, Highveld, Centurion info@beeware.co.za www.beeware.co.za Phone: 082 359 8787 Fax: 086 50 33 055

Sunday August 1 2010 10:24 PM | Comments (0) 
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My Books
Beekeeping in South Africa: The Blue Book
"The Blue Book" of beekeeping in South Africa is a comprehensive study of how to keep bees in South Africa. Any person who is interested in starting as a hobbyist or going professional should have rea
Guide to Investing
Rich Dad's Guide To Investing is a good start if you want to learn to be successful with investing
Penny Stock Secrets
It contains information that covers everything you need to know about the techniques and strategies on How To Really Make Money Trading Penny Stocks
Forex Trading Machine
Revolutionary And Unique Method To Generate $500 Per Day Trading The Forex Market. Three Systems In One Course!
Practical Beekeeping book
A practical, step-by-step guide on beginner beekeeping. A digital bee book immediately available.
Bee Books site
Start beekeeping now! Get bee farming secrets with these Master Beekeeping books

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