Honey bee verieties

[Kyanite]

What a lot of great info here! My husband wants bees and is jealous because my Mom just got two hives set up with local bees, and she's got two more packages coming from another source.

We live about 1,000 feet higher than her and have a fairly long winter. This spring though, there were bees in my crocus! I Googled pics to identify them and found that they're native honey/bumble bees... I think. Can you capture these when they swarm? Do they produce enough for it to be worth it?

 

[Happy Chooks]

Another thing. Beekeeping is VERY local. What works in one area, may not work in another. That is partly why it's so important to find someone in your area to learn from.

Swarms range in size, but yes, you can catch them. I had a colony of mine swarm June 2nd last year. I was able to catch them, but they were the victim of robbing in the fall. I thought I caught it in time, but the colony lost their queen and perished.

 

[soarwitheagles]

You may want to consider purchasing local bees or catching some local swarms. If you order bees from out of state, they may not have the resistance required to overcome local challenges. I have friends that spend literally thousands upon thousands of dollars on out of state queens, but they just don't seem to do so well. Many of them have lost large numbers of hives.

Our locally raised hives have performed extremely well with local queens and bees. Very few losses.

I hope you can connect with your local bee club and find some local beeks that can help you in this adventure!

Top bar, Lang, or Warre? May have a lot to do with personal preference and locality.

I prefer Lang simply because it works best for our needs and I have set up our wood shop to make the Langs...

Good luck on your bee adventure!!!

 

[Wolflord]

You may want to consider purchasing local bees or catching some local swarms. If you order bees from out of state, they may not have the resistance required to overcome local challenges. I have friends that spend literally thousands upon thousands of dollars on out of state queens, but they just don't seem to do so well. Many of them have lost large numbers of hives.

We have done extremely good with local queens and bees. Very few losses.

I hope you can connect with your local bee club and find some local beeks that can help you in this adventure!

Top bar, Lang, or Warre? May have a lot to do with personal preference and locality.

I prefer Lang simply because it works best for our needs and I have set up our wood shop to make the Langs...

Good luck on your bee adventure!!!

I have found a few local bees (and beekeeper club) and my beek friends ended up catching at least one swarm and another just showed up (happens every year, a wild/feral swarm shows up.)

 

[soarwitheagles]

I came home today to another incredible surprise miracle. Same tree, same trap, different swarm.

I think this is number 12. We stopped placing swarm traps because we ran out of bee boxes. I just finished building 10 more with tops and bottoms. There is something about placing traps on the west side of our property with strong afternoon shade. Catching one swarm after another. Now I plan on placing 4-5 traps in this exact location and see if we can begin to capture 4-5 swarms every couple of days...

Wolf Lord, please build yourself a swarm trap, and get some free local bees friend!

Enjoy!

 

[Wolflord]

I came home today to another incredible surprise miracle. Same tree, same trap, different swarm.

I think this is number 12. We stopped placing swarm traps because we ran out of bee boxes. I just finished building 10 more with tops and bottoms. There is something about placing traps on the west side of our property with strong afternoon shade. Catching one swarm after another. Now I plan on placing 4-5 traps in this exact location and see if we can begin to capture 4-5 swarms every couple of days...

Wolf Lord, please build yourself a swarm trap, and get some free local bees friend!

Enjoy!

View attachment 34357

Wow! That's amazing! And I think that's what I'm going to be doing. Saw a small honey bee today zipping around on the clover blossoms. Not sure if it's a feral hive or domestic in a 3 mile radius (I'm willing to bet feral) I just followed her for a little bit trying to get a good look at her.