How To Get Started With Bees - Part 3 (S2, E18)

S2, E18 - How To Get Started With Bees - Part 3 (S2, E18)

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Jeff Ott: Welcome to  Beekeeping Today Podcast  and our special series, How to Get Started with Bees sponsored by Betterbee, your partners in better beekeeping. I'm Jeff Ott.

Kim Flottum: I'm Kim Flottum.

Jim Tew: I'm Jim Tew.

Betterbee: Hey, guys,  Beekeeping Today Podcast is proud to welcome the folks at Betterbee as a beginning beekeeping series sponsor. Betterbee's mission is to support every beekeeper with excellent customer service, continued education, and quality equipment. Just how? Many of their employees are also beekeepers who know your needs, challenges, and answers to your beekeeping questions.

From the colorful and informative Betterbee catalog to the support of beekeeper education, including this podcast series, Betterbee truly is beekeepers serving beekeepers. See for yourself at www.betterbee.com.

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Jeff: We want to thank our regular sponsors, Bee Culture, Global Patties, and 2 Million Blossoms for their continued support of our podcast and welcome Betterbee as the How to Get Started with Bees series sponsors. Betterbee, beekeepers serving beekeepers.

Hey, guys, welcome back. It's been a busy couple of weeks getting ready to get started with bees. The first episode of How to Get Started with Bees, we talked about location, we talked about equipment, we talked about placement, and neighbors. The second episode, we talked a little bit more about equipment, we talked about the races of bees, we talked about types of bees and the casts, and ordering bees and where do you get them. Today, you get that call from the post office and your bees are ready, and you have to go down and pick them up. Where do we go from there?

Kim: That's a good question and it's always one of those high-adrenaline moments in your life when you're getting started. Whether you're going to the post office to get them or you're going over to your local supplier with the other 200 beekeepers in your county to pick them up because they came in last night on a truck, it doesn't make any difference. The adrenaline, it's an adrenaline rush, and a couple of things to think about is how are you going to get them home? That's one thing a lot of people don't think about. "Oh, I'll just throw them in the backseat." Well, maybe. Maybe not.

Jeff: Yes, why can't you just throw them in the backseat? Have your son or daughter hold them in their lap or your wife or spouse.

Kim: [laughs] Yes, that'll be a short trip. What you're going to want to do is have something-- there's going to be some bees on the outside, almost guaranteed, and you want to make sure that they're not going to get in your car. If you've got a pickup, that's one thing, they're going to be outside, you just keep them out of the wind. If they're going to be in the backseat of your car or your SUV, once they get out or once they decide to leave the package, and they probably won't much because I've got bees or I've got a place I don't know, they're going to stick close to home.

If they do fly, they're going to go to a window. Where's the window? One of the things I always recommend is, if you're going to have to put them inside your car, is to throw a piece of nylon netting over them. All you have to do is just cover them. That should get you home. You don't have to put them in a bag. You don't have to lock them up. Just throw a piece of nylon covering over them so that if one does decide to leave, she's going to go up and she's going to run into the nylon and she'll be there when you get home.

Jeff: I guess the big point there is make sure it's breathable so that they don't suffocate and/or overheat.

Kim: Yes. Nylon netting. Stuff you can see through.

Jim: They're not really coming for you. Everything you said, Kim, I agree with, but just so you know, they're not really trying to get to you and to admonish you for being a poor driver or a bad ride or whatever. They're just going to maybe drop down your collar or something accidental and then you're driving, so it's not a bad idea if you're new to all of this to keep your mind on the road and don't be distracted by bees flying around while you try to swap them. Like you said, cover them up, contain them, put them in the back of the truck, put them up close to the cab. Just use common sense, they're pretty hardy.

Jeff: I found in the car, if they get out in the car, they just go to the window. They don't really tend to-- at least the ones I've experienced, not flying around too much. They just crawl around the window edges and try to figure out what's going on.

Kim: If you've never had bees in your car, it can be pretty unnerving. That's just one of life's experiences you can avoid easily. All right, before I went to get my bees, Jim, what kinds of things are you getting ready? What are you doing before those bees arrive?

Jim: Just me personally, I definitely want a home set up for them. I'd like everything out in the bee yard good to go. Everything's already done. We're going to talk about hive stands here in a bit, but I've made my decision on hive stands. I've got the box there. Depending on the weather, I'm good to go. When I get them home straight away, I'm going to atomize them with a little bit of sugar water just to give them a snack, make them feel welcome at their new home here. Put them in a dark place, calm them down.

What do you do, Kim, if you don't have a basement? What do you do, Jeff, if you don't have a basement? I always go to the basement or put them in a cool area. What if you're in a warm climate and there really is no basement? I suppose just find the coolest, darkest place you can until the rain stops or until you get off work or whatever.

Jeff: That's what I've done.

Kim: I've always had a basement. Garages work. Keep the door closed and keep them out of the-- Don't put them where the sun's going to shine. You don't want them overheated, certainly. Even if you don't have a place to put them, enclose them in the shade of the side of your house or someplace. One of the things I've seen done that works pretty well is you just sit them as close to the foundation as you can and you put a couple of big boards slanted so that the light isn't coming in at them directly.

Jeff: Hey, Kim, can I quote you on that? Put your bees where the sun don't shine. Did I hear you say that properly?

Kim: [laughs] You did.

Jim: I'm not getting involved in this. You two are on your own.

Jeff: All right. I just want to make sure that we got that right.

Kim: I will get you for that, Jeff.

Jim: It's going to be tough to do because he's the editor of this piece.

Kim: You're right. Okay. Anything that you can do, if you've got to keep them outside, to keep direct sunlight off from them is going to help. If you've got to wait until tomorrow and you don't have a garage or a basement to put it in, then just make that enclosure, that shade a little more secure because it's hard telling. You've got neighborhood kids. You've got skunks. You don't know what might go bothering them. First choice basement, second choice garage, third choice secured outside.

Jeff: I keep them up on a workbench or a tabletop so that they're out of the draft and off the floor for where the animals, pests can get to them.

Jim: I don't know about you two, but this is just me personally, but no matter where you put them, they make that hum, and the warmer they get, when you turn the lights on, they ratchet it up two or three levels. It just makes me itchy to think that those things are trapped, they're confined. I'm antsy about it. I want to get them out and I want to let them go and the rain's still coming or something's holding me up.

There's a sense of urgency that I can't shake until I finally get those things out. I will put that out there just in case you're feeling it now. Turn them loose now, let it go down, do this now, or just wait a while. Can I do it now? Can I do it now? For me, that's a pretty standard feeling all these years later.

Kim: I'm going to interrupt you here for a minute, Jim, because lately I've heard people talk about doing a pre-installation mite treatment and I've never done one. Have you had any experience with that? Is that something that's becoming standard procedure? I don't know, I'm going to guess that if you've got a mentor or you belong to a group or taking a beginner's class, you're at least going to hear it mentioned. What's involved with that? Do you know?

Jim: I've not done it personally. Jeff, have you or am I on my own here? Is Kim and I on our own here?

Jeff: No, actually, I've done it the last two seasons. The only challenge with that is the recommendation that after you treat them, you're spraying them with oxalic acid solution to let them rest for 72 hours. That can be a challenge because of the same reason, Jim, you were just saying, that you want to get them installed, you want to get them flying, let them be bees. With the Varroa being such an issue these days, it's a great opportunity to get any of the Varroa that are just climbing around on the bees before they get into the equipment.

Jim: The reason I've never done it is that somebody else has been doing the mite treatment for those bees before I got them. I've always thought, well, they probably had a treatment just a few weeks ago, a few days ago, I don't know when, but the commercial guy has to treat for sure. As the Varroa is more and more relentless, it's not changing, I'm just becoming more and more aware. It's always been relentless.

I don't feel as comfortable as I once did thinking that everything's taken care of and I've got a free couple of months there. I don't want to put one more thing on the new beekeeper to do. It's probably something you want to do. We keep bringing up mentors, and what do you think, Kim, ask the mentor if they want to help with that, what they do locally, what their opinion is, do it, don't do it? It's not one in the world either way, but it probably would help some.

Kim: I guess if I'm taking a beginner's class, I'm going to ask the people who know what they're teaching. If I've got a mentor, I'm going to talk to them. It has to do with where are the bees coming from and what's the history of this bee producer, I think. Also, where are you? What part of the country are you in? If you're in the South, the world is exploding already. If you're in the North, you've got a little bit of a window yet before the bee population explodes.

I'd ask the local people what their experience has been with the producer and without doing a treatment and with doing a pretreatment and see where the decision gets made, how it gets made and why before I would jump on this. I agree. I want to get them in, but I agree with Jeff that this is something we need to look at.

Jeff: Yes, I would recommend that if someone is sitting there by themselves and they have no help and no mentors and they're just reading from books, I would say don't worry about it this year. Get them going. Get them installed. If you have a mentor or if you have a buddy you're working with or a friend you're working with, then you might consider it. I wouldn't stress it right now.

The thing that I wanted to bring up during the packaging and installing the hive or installing the packages is no doubt the day after you pick up your bees it's going to be raining. One time in Colorado it snowed. The weather will not cooperate when you receive your packages. If you are set up and planned to be able to keep your bees inside in the packages or in the garage or wherever you're going to store them for one or two days after you receive them, you'll do yourself and your bees some good.

Kim: I've put bees in when it was snowing, Jeff, in Wisconsin. Not a good day, let me tell you. The decision was made at 7.30 in the morning to, "Okay, let's put them in," and we drove out to the bee yard where we were, and it started snowing on the way out there, and by the time we got to the bee yard, you couldn't see across the road, but we were committed. Interesting day.

Jim: I bet you were committed. You should have been. [laughter] I can't help but believe that a lot of Canadian beekeepers are chuckling at us right now and our weather woes here because I understand they've installed packages when by our standards it's just not doable, but I can't get off on that. I don't have much experience in helping Canadians install their bees in hard weather.

Kim: Jim, you mentioned early on about what you've got ready. You've mentioned the hive stand and having the hive ready. What did you mean by that?

Jim: I want the frames in place, and if I'm going to be shaking them, and we'll talk about that in a bit, I want the hive positioned, ready to go. I want the frames out. I've got a hive tool there, and I won't really need a smoker. Anybody use smoke here? You two? I don't ever use smoke on a package. I don't use that.

Depending if you've got the plastic cages or if you've got wooden cages, you need a hive tool to get those things apart, get the lids off, and probably want a pocket knife. Dealing with the queen cage in one way or another, don't release her immediately, but for prying out the staple or the little wire tab that might be holding her, a small pocket knife is handy. Essentially, if the day is good, when I get there, I'll go ahead and release them then. There's nothing gained by holding them overnight or holding them longer unless there's a reason for it weather-wise or schedule-wise.

Jeff: Do you have a preference in what time of day you install them?

Jim: Yes, I have a preference. In a perfect world, I would probably do it around noon or so they have the afternoon to settle down. I have installed them much later in the afternoon, but I'm always skittish when I sit there watching TV later at night. Did they find their way in? Did they find a hive anywhere? Do I have a lot of bees out there spending the night on leaves waiting to find the nest the next morning? Probably I'd like late morning, 10:30, 11:00, noon, 2:00, just to give the bees a chance to find their way around, settle down some, get ready for the night.

Kim: That's good advice if your schedule allows that. Yes. One other thing, having all that stuff outside, I get out of the car, I grab the package, I walk to the bee yard, put my veil on, my protective gear, of course, get all that ready, but then I would just walk out and get them in as soon as I can that time of day. If it's 4.30 in the afternoon, maybe I'm going to wait until tomorrow morning, right?

Jim: I probably would because if you're shaking them, we haven't discussed that yet, but if you're shaking them out, it's a chaotic moment back there with bees flying all over, and they're going to be taking cleansing flights, so there'll be a little interesting yellow rain coming down on you and your car and whatever else is close by, so be prepared for that. It's not the end of the world if you keep them a day or so. Now, if it goes on three, four days longer, I would be outright panicky then, and I'd be pushing the envelope on the weather or my schedule or whatever it is.

Kim: They've probably been in that package on the average about two days from the time they got installed in that package at the bee yard of the producer, put on the truck, shipped across the country, taken off the truck late yesterday afternoon, and then you come and get them this morning. Probably maybe as many as four days, but two is going to be about the average. They've been in there two days, 10,000 bees eating all that syrup, waiting to take that cleansing flight, you said, so sooner rather than later if possible.

Jeff: The process of taking that package and putting them into the hive, and we've already discussed this in a prior episode, we're recommending beginning beekeepers start out with a standard 10-frame Langstroth hive. What's the process of doing that real quick? It's going to be hard to describe that on a podcast, but real briefly maybe we can describe that process and then check the show notes. There will be some videos that we'll have posted that will actually show the process of starting the package.

Jim: You want to go, Kim?

Kim: Yes. There's 50 ways to do it. There's basically two ways, and one of them is I've got my 10-frame box. I take the cover off. I take the inner cover off. I take out the middle five frames. I just set them aside real close. Then I open up the package, get the cover loose, and depending on the package I've got, if I've got one of the old wooden ones with the screen or if I've got one of the newer plastic ones, it's going to make a little bit of a difference. The newer plastic ones, the end opens, and you can just pry that off with your hive tool, and that's how you get them out of there.

The old wooden screen ones, you have to take the feeder can out and let them come out through that feeder can hole, or you can, some people do, I know they'll just cut the screen and make the whole side open up. That's a lot easier on the bees, I think, rather than shaking, rattling, and rolling them to get them through that small hole on the top.

Jeff: What do you do with a queen? At what point, do you pull the queen and the little queen cage out?

Kim: Before you do any of this, is you get the feeder can out, depending on where the queen is, you may have to remove the feeder can to get the queen out of the package. On some of the plastic ones, she's actually exposed and you're able just to remove the cage from the top. However you get her out of there, if you have to open up the package to do it, what they tell you to do is to thump them down on the bottom so that all of the bees are released from the feeder can and the queen falls to the bottom of the cage. You very quickly take your feeder can out, take the queen out, put the feeder can back in. That way you've got your bees contained and you've got maybe three in the air, if you're lucky.

Jim: If you're lucky.

Jeff: Instead of putting the feeder can back in, if your package came with a little-- the wooden square over the feeder can, just put that on top, that way you don't have to-- I've always found in that wooden package that getting that feeder can out is probably the most difficult thing of the entire operation.

Kim: It fits in there nice and snug and tight.

Jeff: It does.

Kim: That way bees aren't getting out, nor does the feeder can get out. You're right.

Jeff: It's making some engineer very proud of how tightly that fits.

Kim: Once you get the queen out, you've got the feeder can out, you either cut the screen in the front or you're going to shake them out through the feeder can hole. Then you've got that cavity in your 10-frame box and you very slowly and carefully turn the cage over or on its side end and pour the bees right into that cavity in there.

I've seen people bounce them and bang them and just be really rough. You don't need to do that. You just need to pour them in there and you're not going to get them all. Some of them don't want to leave. Usually, the best way to handle that is, once you get most of them out of there, is to simply put that cage in front of the hive, right by the front door, so that the bees that are in the cage on the outside can smell the bees that are in the hive on the inside. "Oh, there's home," and they'll walk right in.

That's why Jim's timing for that part of the time of the day is good. If you're doing it 10.30 to noon, one o'clock or so, they've got the rest of the day to figure that out, to get out of that cage, get into the hive.

Jim: It's really simple when you strip everything away. You're basically just opening up the package, either kind, wooden or plastic, and you're doing whatever it takes to get the bees out of there and put that queen in your shirt pocket, in that cage, so you know where she is. You can make it sound so simple, either here or on a video you might be watching, but when you've got bees flying all around you and you're trying to get that queen out, it's exciting. It's not terrifying, it's not a bad thing for those who've never done it. You don't have to have some kind of gift to do it, but get them out of there.

Kim: One of the things to consider, you mentioned bees flying, is to have a Mr. Bottle with that sugar syrup with you. To give them a squirt every once in a while, the bees that you've dumped in, that keeps them from flying. The bees that are in the cage, if you can squirt those just a little bit, it moistens them and makes it hard for them to fly that way.

When they fall into the cavity, they stay there. What you're missing them with is food. You're giving them a good lunch and you're keeping them from flying as much as you can. You mentioned putting that queen in your shirt pocket. Ever take that queen home with you and get home and sit down for supper and suddenly you've got a buzzing going on in your shirt pocket?

Jim: I never considered doing that till you suggested it. Now I'll probably do it later this spring, but no, I haven't done that yet. There are some horror stories. I've had queens just fly away when I tried to release them directly after a few days. That's a philosophical moment where you try to keep up with-- it's a classic Where's Waldo moment. You try to follow her in the air to poof, she's gone.

You can release them inside. There's a different way, it requires more equipment, but it's not nearly as photographically of an event. Requires having a second deep, I'd like a deep, you could probably get by with what you call it, a Western or six and five or Illinois depth or a deep shallow, it's got so many names. Everything's right up the same to the point that you start shaking. When you release some quietly, have an empty super of some kind. A deep gives me more room to work.

Without shaking the bees out, lay the package on its side. I put the queen right in front where the bees were mounding up, coming out of the entrance. I put the feeder can there, I take the hive tool, knock another little hole or so in it, and I put the feeder can close by. Put the inner cover on, put the outer cover on, and then I just cannot leave. I just have to wait for those first few bees to come out of the entrance because I want to see them. Not because I'm concerned, but just because it's a moment. I want to see where they come out and expose that nice enough gland and begin the very first phase of setting up home.

Kim: You're leaving them on the outside the box. Is that what you're telling me? You're leaving that package outside of the hive.

Jim: No, I've got an empty deep on there. I'm putting them in the deep. Thanks for clarifying that if I didn't say it. No, they're definitely inside. It's dark and quiet. I don't have them all flying at the same time. If I'm in a hurry and I've got a short schedule, I need to get this done, I'm at a distant yard, I'd shake them like crazy. If I'm here at home and I got plenty of time and I want to savor the moment, I'll release them slowly. I don't have as many bees in the air, as many bees having to find the home quickly.

There's good and bad things about both. You got to have extra equipment to release them slowly. You got to go back the next day and then gently take all that off with the least disturbance possible. Just in one night, cage will be empty the next morning. If it's not, shake them out.

Jeff: Might be an option if the weather's really bad, but you need to get them installed.

Jim: I have done that when it's raining, just to not have the bees flying in the rain.

Kim: One thing we haven't talked about, Jeff, maybe that's what you were going to bring up is, where do you put that queen?

Jeff: Exactly where I was going. Yes because sometimes the queen comes with attendants and sometimes not. What do you do with the queen with attendants? What do you do with a candy plug? If it has a candy plug, if it doesn't have a candy plug on the queen cage? Let's talk about that real quick because that can cause some consternation.

Jim: Jim, you want to?

Kim: The one thing you want to do is make sure that when you put that queen in the cage, you're going to put her between two frames, probably towards the top of the box. Depending on the cage she comes in, every year there's something new out there, but you want to make sure that there is at least one surface in that queen cage that is exposed so that the bees can get to her and feed her.

If you've got the three-hole cage, that's one thing. If you've got the little white plastic one, and then now there's another little plastic one, but somehow she's got to be in there so bees can get to her and feed her for the three or four days it takes for her to get released. That's one thing to consider.

Jeff, you mentioned that candy plug. There's a couple of schools of thought going on here about queen acceptance taking longer than it used to. I'm not sure if that's exactly correct or not, but there's a school of thought going on that queen should be in that cage five or six days. Then there is a school of thought that said, "I want her out of there almost as soon as I can get her out of there." Jim, Jeff, where do you go with this?

Jim: Go ahead, Jeff, you go first.

Jeff: Yes, I'll go with the hobbyist approach. I just go with what way I learned way back when, and that's just, I install it with the candy side up and between two frames with the screen facing to the front or the rear of the hive. Yes, with the candy side up, and let them eat through the candy. If there's no candy in there, pulling that little cork is always a challenge too without skewing, stabbing the queen if you're trying to poke something through there. Then I use a marshmallow. Even if there's no candy with the queen, when I get her, I put a piece, a little one of those tiny mushrooms, tiny marshmallows in the hole and let them chew their way to release her.

Jim: I don't have any problem with that at all. That is the solid traditional way. I don't know, I understand too what Kim's talking about, leave them longer. I don't know if that's just based on they're so much harder to introduce or if they just cost so much more. I want to err toward the side of keeping her alive, whatever it takes. It's one of those itchy moments that comes along when you do this whole thing. There's been several itchy moments. I want her out as soon as I can get her out, but I want her to be as safely released as possible. Get an idea from the cage. If they're just still crazy in the cage and they're clinging to the cage bees outside, they're trying to-- won't let go, you can't shake them off, they may be a little, the least bit stingy, well, they're not happy with that queen still, so. Back in the box she goes for some more time, but if the bees move away and they're fairly gentle, and I were just beginning this, I'd probably puncture that candy plug. We've used the names of candy plugs and three-hole cages, and this will all be obvious once you actually see this stuff, if you're brand new.

Kim: I think one of the best tests to do this with, you mentioned the bees clinging to the cage, is to, when you first open the hive, not use smoke, if you can, and very gently blow on the cage. If the bees are moving away from the cage when you blow on it, because they're going to move away when you blow on the hive every time anyway, so if they move away from that cage when you blow on it, you can be reasonably sure that they're comfortable with that queen. If they don't move, and they're looking up at you like, "Don't do that again," you might want to think twice about releasing her, because like you said, I want her alive, but I want her safe.

Jim: I like that, don't use smoke. You really won't need smoke on a package colony three or four days later, it's still pretty much a kitten. They're easy to work, and Kim said in one of the other sessions, to use dishwasher gloves or something, that'd be a good time to put on some thinner gloves instead of the heavy gloves that come for beekeeping once you're working big hives, just so you can have some agility there and deal with her gently and caressingly.

Jeff: The consensus here is to, what, to really watch the bees, see how they're accepting her? If you decide you want to release her, what do you do, do you just punch a hole through the candy or take out the cork and install the cage, or do you rip off the screen and just dump her into the hive?

Jim: If I were a new beekeeper, I would err toward a little bit longer, instead of punching cages. You do that later, but don't do it first time out. Just stay cool. You mentioned-- I still punch a hole through the candy. We have historically done that, Kim, help me, just because it speeds up that release a little bit, right? It encourages the workers to-- both inside and out, it's mainly the outside workers that are eating through the candy, but you don't have to, but if we're to that point, we've decided to release her, short of just pushing the candy plug out or releasing her directly, I would take a frame nail or twig, put a small hole through that candy plug to encourage them.

Kim: The other thing that does is that sometimes that candy plug will dry out and get hard and you'll have bees that won't be able to eat through that candy plug. Punching that hole in there gives the bees on the outside a little better way to get through there, and it makes sure that plug isn't dried out and hard and they wouldn't be able to get through there. I always wait two or three days before I punch that hole.

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Jeff: All right, we have the queen installed, we have the bees installed, so it's time to button them up. We put the inner cover on top, and then you put the cover on top of the hive, and you sit, stand back and watch them get settled. That's really one of the most exciting times as a new beekeeper is when you have that package installed. You see them starting to fly. As you said, the bees that have decided that's going to be home, they're out front, they're fanning, they're letting everybody know that's their colony, that's their hive. The bees are starting to settle in, and that's a really good time.

Kim: They're looking for lunch.

Jeff: Yes.

Kim: You've got to get some feed into them. Now, what do you feed them?

Jeff: Do they need to feed them? I would feed them.

Kim: Yes. The food that you're going to give them is what they use to build the wax comb that they're going to live on. They've got to get going right away. It's going to take a couple, three days for that queen to get released, a couple, three more before she begins laying, and she's got to have someplace to lay. To do that, they've got to have food. If you don't have another hive that you can give them honey from, or something like that, you're going to have to give them some sugar water to get them started. How do you do that?

Jim: If it's a beginner kit they're using, help me here, Jeff, if I go wrong, but if it's a beginner kit, it came with some kind of a feeder. Whatever it came with, I would use. There's better feeders if it's those feeders that go on the front. There's better feeders than those, but I don't want to suggest that right away you've got to go buy different equipment.

If you've still got that empty deep that I referred to a bit ago when I released my packages slowly, you can just take a common jar with a lid on it and punch a couple of very small nail holes in it and prop that up and be sure those holes are exposed to where the bees can get to it and they will find it. They'll pull that syrup out of there eagerly. Either use what came with it or improvise a simple feeder. A chicken watering device can be used as a feeder if you put it inside that empty hive equipment I was referring to a bit ago.

Jeff: Yes, and most beginner kits, they'll have their second deep box available so that you have that, you can put that around any feeder you put on top. The only thing I would caution against is if you make your own feeder, or even you do a store-bought feeder, a lot of them you turn them upside down and it depends on you, or it depends on a vacuum being formed to hold that sugar syrup inside, and I've experienced where the vacuum didn't hold, and I'd come back the next day and I see sugar syrup running out the front of the hive and everyone's drenched inside, and that's not a happy feeling.

Just be careful with the equipment that you use. We have the bees, we have our new colony set up, the package is installed, we've got them fed, the bees are flying around, we're sitting back admiring our handiwork and our beekeeping skills. That's a really good feeling. What if you don't have a Langstroth hive? What if you've opted to go with a top bar hive, Kim?

Kim: I'll tell you, Jeff, basically you're doing the same sort of thing. You're preparing the cavity before you put them in, you're making sure you've got your feeder ready, making sure you've got all the tools that you need to get the hive open, and all of that. You don't have to have a hive stand, of course, because the top bar hive basically is its own stand, but what you do want to do, and I think the recommendation pretty much always is you make sure your entrance is on the end, not the middle, and if you bought a top bar hive kit, or if you made yours, one of the things that will come with that is that piece of wood that you put in that closes off a portion of the top bar hive.

You want to put that in so that you're about four frames deep. You want to make a cavity that's about four frames deep. You take your top bars off, you install your package just like you do on your Langstroth hive. You put your top bars back on, and you put your lid in, and you get your feeder in there. I don't know what kind of feeder, and that can be tricky because sometimes you don't have room on the top above your frames to put a feeder, so you're either putting one inside, in which case you'd make a little more room, or you do one of those outside feeders, but you get a feeder in there so that the bees can get at it safely and rapidly.

Once you're preparing the cavity, you've got the top bars with some sort of attractant, usually, some beeswax or a starter strip, and the hole on the end, and it's basically the same way. You're putting the queen between the top bars, you're securing her up there, probably with something like a Twist-Em, those work pretty well, so that she stays up towards the top and they can get to her. Some put them on the bottom, I don't like that, I just don't like putting a queen on the floor, but that's me. The basics are the same.

Jeff: I would assume it would be much the same thing with a long hive?

Kim: Exactly. You're going to make, you're going to just seal off a section so it's smaller than the whole hive is completely. You handle it just like a Langstroth.

Jeff: How soon should you open the hive up again? Whether you release the queen or not, that's probably the first thing that we're interested in. How soon is too soon to open up that colony?

Jim: Can I say if that, if we think the queen is out, the cage is gone and everything's the way it should be inside the hive, I tend to leave them alone for a week, 10 days, even though I want to go check on them, I just let them take on their sense of self, and Kim, I would gently open it minimal to no smoke, and if I can see eggs one time, I can see eggs anywhere in there, or ideally see the queen, put that colony back together and go do something else and let them establish that. She's not fully accepted until she's got some of her own brood really going nicely there. That's me. What's you?

Kim: You hit a couple of good spots there. One of them is patience, which at that time in my beekeeping life is pretty much impossible. I want to be there tomorrow, maybe yet later this afternoon, let alone wait a week. The two things that are going on is if you're opening up that colony, you're disturbing the process, disturbing the system that they're beginning to set up and too often they will take that disturbance out on the queen and they will kill the queen because things aren't normal and quiet and calm.

You're taking that chance there. The other thing is, as you said, I'm going to wait, no smoke, if I can avoid it and look for eggs. You and I aren't spring chickens anymore. Do you see eggs really well?

Jim: There's delightful appliances that will augment my failing body parts. In this case, I will stoop to using magnifying glasses and these delightful little digital flashlights. I do whatever it takes to see.

Kim: The other thing to try and take a look is the glasses that skiers use that are, have a yellow tint to them, they make eggs stand right out for me.

Jeff: Really?

Kim: Yes.

Jeff: Haven't tried that.

Kim: Any of those things work. If you can't see an egg at the bottom of a cell and you've got to stand so the sun's behind you and shining down over your shoulder into the bottom of the cell, and if you can't see them, then try one of those appliances, as you put it, and see if that helps. Once you see a pattern of eggs, then you know that life is in that colony beginning to be normal and going in the direction it should, I think.

Jeff: Yes, I agree. The other thing is the sound of the colony, you'll develop a sense for, but when they're happy there, it's a nice gentle hum. It's a comforting sound once you get used to it. If they're unhappy, if the queen is not producing, if something else is going on, it'll have a different tone. As a beekeeper, you become in-tuned to a lot, the smells, the sounds, not only the sights, something to think about as you're looking at your colony. What are we looking for in that first month, the first two months? I have this equipment. When do I install the next brood chamber? The next section of hive.

Jim: Do you want to guess first, Kim? You want me to guess or you want to make--

Kim: [laughs] I try not to guess on this one. the books will tell you and your beginner class is going to tell you is when you've got comb being drawn on four to six of the frames in that first box, it's time to add the second box. That's a rule of thumb and that's what it is. It's a rule of thumb. If you're going to be gone and they're not quite there yet, you might want to get it on earlier. If you're able to look at that hive every couple of days, you might be able to wait a little bit longer, but when you've got some comb on four to six of the middle frames in that bottom box, you can reasonably be assured that it's time to add the second one, in my experience.

Jeff: Is that the same rule of thought with a eight-frame hive?

Kim: Good question. It is. Four to six frames. It has less to do with the number of frames in a box than the number of frames that are covered because it's-- what's the word I want? It's sort of a measurement of the ambitiousness of the colony to get those four to six frames covered as opposed to how many frames are there anyway. If there's six frames, you want six covered. If there's 10 frames, I still want four to six covered. That makes sense?

Jim: Yes to me. I guess if you've got to make a mistake, make the error on putting the space, the extra equipment on too soon. I'd rather you put it on too soon than wait till they're already drawn out to eight or frames or so. By then you've missed a bit of the honey crop because I would think you're in the middle of your nectar flow too at that time. Do the best you can do. That's all you can do. Do what you can do.

Jeff: All right. What else should we watch for in the next-- that first week, the first month, the first two months?

Jim: Kim, can I say I want you to watch that queen? I don't trust her. I don't trust her at all because I want to know the day that she first begins to feel badly because to get a replacement queen, first of all, contact your mentor, contact someone, and see if they agree that something's not right here. I want to know the condition of the queen in that first month, nice brood pattern, felled out. Everything looks good. The sounds that Jeff talked about, good aroma, nectar pours on your feet. When you turn the frame sideways, those are all good signs. If that colony is not building up, you can't readily see eggs and capped brood.

Kim: There's a question, Jim, and it's one that I hear a lot. You've mentioned capped brood. How much capped brood should I be seeing after a month?

Jim: After, Oh, I can't guess at that, Kim, I'd want to see a frame or two, but not like full frames, the center parts of those frames. I want to be able to readily find capped brood. If you pin me down, I guess, I don't know, half a frame or so, three-fifths of a frame on two or three different sides. Then I want to see big larvae that I can see. Then I want to see that little pollen band around it. I want to try to think that everything's in sync there because seasons are going to vary. Queen's productivity is going to vary. Too rainy. I don't know. There may not be a reason why I can look for a specific amount of brood at that time.

Kim: One of the things to think about here is actually the length of each of the cycles that are going through. Once that queen starts laying, which is going to be, if you're lucky, a couple of days. If the weather is not cooperative, it may be as much as a week before she starts laying. The first eggs that she lays is going to be, they're not going to cap them for three weeks, right? If you go in there after a month, you've got a week's worth of capped brood. The first week that she was laying of capped brood, it's not going to be very much.

Jeff: Especially if they had to pull the foundation, if you started them on foundation and had to wait.

Jim: Good point.

Kim: After that first month, I'm looking for capped brood. It's nice if I see it. What I'm looking for is a lot of larvae.

Jim: Yes.

Kim: By then they're big enough that I don't need those devices to see them. That's what I'm looking, I'm looking for a lot of larvae, and a queen can lay an egg and larvae can develop in a not fully developed cell. It doesn't have to be as deep as it's going to be eventually. They get started in a hurry. I'm looking for larva more than capped brood, but some capped brood too.

Jeff: This has been really good. We've taken our listeners from setting up the yard, setting up the equipment, choosing equipment, setting up the equipment, they've received their bees, we've talked about how you get that package started in the hive, got the queen set up and the bees established and getting them going in the first couple of months. I think it's been a good episode.

On our next and last episode, we're going to talk about the rest of the season as a beekeeper. We're going to talk about some of the growth, some of the common problems you can see. We'll touch on the pests and diseases. That's a whole bunch all by itself, but we'll talk about some of the big hitters that you'll definitely be hearing in your monthly beekeeping meetings and be reading in your magazines, such as  Bee Culture Magazine.

We'll talk about that and wrap up the series at the end of next episode. If you look at the show notes, you can find our recommendations for books, some YouTube videos, and some national or some classes online that you can follow up with.

Kim: Yes. I got to add one thing here, Jeff, not only  Bee Culture Magazine, but the other magazine that they produce, it's called  BEEkeeping Your First Three Years. It's aimed right at that group of people. It's the people that are still trying to figure out which end of a hive tool to use all the way up to harvesting after the third season.

Jeff: Good articles, good photographs, and not to mention, a book. What's the name of that one book you wrote?

Kim: The Backyard Beekeeper. That's who that's aimed at . Jim, your beginning book.

Jim: Mine's more of a question-and-answer hypothetical situation. I have to say that yours is more of a useful text for someone who's just starting out.

Jeff: I think that the question and answer is really good too because, as beekeepers, I think we always have questions that we're looking for answers. I'd recommend looking at both those books, and find those links in our show notes. That about wraps up this podcast. Before we go, I want to encourage our listeners to rate us five stars on Apple Podcasts or wherever you download and stream the show. Your vote helps other beekeepers find us quicker. We want to thank our series sponsors, Betterbee, for sponsoring this four-part series on how to get started keeping bees.

As always, we also want to thank  Bee Culture, the magazine for American beekeeping for their sponsorship of  Beekeeping Today Podcast in 2020. We want to thank our regular episode sponsor, Global Patties. Check them out at www.globalpatties.com. Finally, we want to thank you, the  Beekeeping Today Podcast listener for joining us on the show. Feel free to send us questions and comments at questions@beekeepingtodaypodcast.com We'd love to hear from you. Anything else guys?

Jim: Not for me. I'm done.

Kim: Yes, I think we've covered enough today, Jeff.

Jeff: All right. I'm going to go out and look at the bees while it's sunny. Thanks a lot, guys.

Jim: Bye-bye.

Jeff: Bye-bye.