Creeker's Past Week's Accomplishments

[Dennis Peacock]

18 Jun 2018

Greetings,
I hope each of you had a nice Father's Day Weekend. I was celebrated by my family and I'm every so thankful for them. I still miss my dad who passed away 8 years ago. We cooked out, I worked in the garden, I worked in the yard, and I help the LOML get some things done around the house. My ZTR lawn mower broke down on my son and I got parts ordered for the necessary repairs. Hopefully, I'll have a mowed lawn by next weekend?? Shop clean up is still taking place. It's a bit slower than normal because of the heat and humidity this time of year here and beside....the daugher and her husband are also storing house goods in my shop until they build their house. I also come off oncall duty at 8AM this morning and then I'll be a free man once again.

Well, that's it for me, so what did YOU do this past week?

Best of weeks to you all.

[John K Jordan]

...My ZTR lawn mower broke down on my son .

I hate it when that happens. My big diesel quit a few weeks ago and the grass was high before I got it back up. I have a spare zero-turn but I was too lazy, er, busy to get it out and cranked up. On the plus side the clover around the farm grew high which translates into more clover honey in the hives.

I spent nearly all day every day supervising a tag team of siding installers who were tearing off the 30-year-old cedar siding and installing new. There were a lot of workers but different guys came each day so someone had to be there to communicate over and over ("no, no, LAP siding goes there"). My spanish improved significantly by the end of the week. I had to trace down one nail through a romex cable and make a repair but fortunately it was only 10' up a ladder and I had to tear off only one board to find it. It was "shockingly" easy to find since one window and flashing were energized.

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Didn't get my Sunday lesson for the large kids group wrapped up until 2am Sunday morning. Today I start on the huge list of things postponed, beginning this morning with the beehives then shearing the alpacas. And talk the painter into coming. And wire the sunroom. And build a cabinet. And clean up the mess from the siding job. And finish the deck railing...

JKJ

[Jim Becker]

'Hope all the dads had a wonderful father's day!

Speaking of grass...for the first time in well over a month I was actually able to cut the entire front lawn. There were still a few small spots of "standing water" (water table high), but at least it's no longer looking like a field in those areas. I was coming close to borrowing back the horses I used to own to "mow" the lawn. LOL

Eclectic week as normal. Installed a new dryer vent that cuts out about 15+ feet of duct work. While I understand that the contractor was required by the local jurisdiction to route things the way they did when the addition was built (because of a window location), I have been becoming more uncomfortable with the fire hazard of what is an almost un-cleanable, long dryer vent duct run. So I eliminated it and went out directly through the wall. Works much better...no surprise there! And if a future owner has an issue...they can always go back to the original duct. It's not going anywhere. Other activities included more paperwork for my mother, some Dr visits, a little CNC work as I continue to prototype things I'm wanting to make and market, the aforementioned lawn mowing, assembling and painting a few more boxes for Professor Dr. SWMBO's honeybees, working on selling off 10 years of equestrian tack and related items, a bunch of cooking and general laziness. This week brings some sign prototypes and a few small projects that just need to get done in the shop and around the house.

[Jay Larson]

I spent most of the last week getting ready for an off roading trip this last weekend. Took Thursday and Friday off from work to get everything completed, packed and on the road.

Thursday I did some work on the suspension to allow the front axle to flex a bit more. I was also able to adjust the steering so that the steering wheel is actually straight when I am going straight, it had been canted off about 45* before that. So now I can make sharper left hand turns...

Since I was trailering my Jeep, I was going to use a tent that fits over the pickup bed. I finished the platform for the bed of the truck, one that we would be able to use a queen size air mattress in there, just in time for my fiance to decide that it was going to be too hot to go. I have to say it was probably a good decision on her part. It was 90*+(F) and the low was only about 75. Anyway, it worked very well, but it does take up the whole bed. No other room for much else inside the tent.

Friday I got the Jeep on the trailer, everything packed into the truck, and I left my fiance behind. Off to Red Wing MN, 5 hours away. Saturday morning we woke up to thunder and lightning at 5:00 AM. Stayed raining until about 12:00. At about 1:00, we took off for the trails. At the first trail entrance, I took a line about 6 inches too far left. The right tires slid into a rut that was quite deep, and I almost put it on its side. After it stabilized a bit, I tried to steer to the right and get the right tires back out of the rut. Didn't quite work. So I hit reverse and backed out of there. Slowly. I had a passenger who had just bought a Jeep and this was his first time out on a trail. He thought sure we were tipping over. (Actually, I did have that thought myself before we stabilized...) I just kept on telling him that we were okay, and that we will need to adjust a bit and try something else. Everything was anti-climactic after that.
I had purchased some new tires before the trip, and they worked great. Twice I thought I was just going to spin on a rock and have to try a new line. As soon as I had that thought a tire would catch, and over I would go. I did discover a couple of things that will need to fix. First I have to take a look at my on-board air compressor, it did not want to run. I also have to take a look at my trailer brakes, as it seemed at times they were not engaging.

Got home yesterday, unpacked, and took my daughter, her boyfriend, and my grandson out for some supper. Then we went to watch my grandson's baseball practice.

[John K Jordan]

...painting a few more boxes for Professor Dr. SWMBO's honeybees, ...

How are your bees doing this year?

I put in four nucs in April and I can't believe how fast they exploded with bees, filled two deeps with brood, and are filling supers with honey.

JKJ

[Jim Becker]

How are your bees doing this year?

I put in four nucs in April and I can't believe how fast they exploded with bees, filled two deeps with brood, and are filling supers with honey.

JKJ

It's being an interesting year...four colonies into the winter/four came out. Three swarmed; one twice. All re-queened themselves and are doing well, although the "nasty" colony, which The Professor intended to replace the queen anyway, has spotty brood pattern at present. She has two NUCs with laying queens (very nice patterns) ready to go and just did another split to get a third NUC going. Her practice is to keep the NUCs healthy so they can provide brood and queens if necessary during the season and if not needed, will just become new full colonies in two or three months. Honey isn't as much as it could be, but it's moving along nicely, regardless. We should end up with more than last year so that's a nice thing.

[Bryan Lisowski]

It's being an interesting year...four colonies into the winter/four came out. Three swarmed; one twice. All re-queened themselves and are doing well, although the "nasty" colony, which The Professor intended to replace the queen anyway, has spotty brood pattern at present. She has two NUCs with laying queens (very nice patterns) ready to go and just did another split to get a third NUC going. Her practice is to keep the NUCs healthy so they can provide brood and queens if necessary during the season and if not needed, will just become new full colonies in two or three months. Honey isn't as much as it could be, but it's moving along nicely, regardless. We should end up with more than last year so that's a nice thing.

Google translate can do just about every language, but bee keeper, nope! I'm going to guess that all this means the bees are doing what they are supposed to. I was at a lacrosse tournament in PA all weekend and the only woodworking I did was finding a tree for some shade.

[John K Jordan]

It's being an interesting year...four colonies into the winter/four came out. Three swarmed; one twice. All re-queened themselves and are doing well, although the "nasty" colony, which The Professor intended to replace the queen anyway, has spotty brood pattern at present. She has two NUCs with laying queens (very nice patterns) ready to go and just did another split to get a third NUC going. Her practice is to keep the NUCs healthy so they can provide brood and queens if necessary during the season and if not needed, will just become new full colonies in two or three months. Honey isn't as much as it could be, but it's moving along nicely, regardless. We should end up with more than last year so that's a nice thing.

Excellent! I lost all of my hives this winter so I purchased the four nucs and started over ($185 this year). The hives were fine all winter, plenty of bees and honey stores. Late winter I checked them just after a cold snap and found only small clusters of dead bees in each hive. There was still plenty of honey in the deeps and a couple of supers I'd left on the hives. Depressing.

Some day I need to read up on how to do a split - I've never tried that. No swarms here this year that I can tell. I have two deeps and four supers on the most active hive to try to give them plenty of room.

I'm guessing there is close to 20 gallons of honey so on these new colonies. The best thing, though, is there are bees everywhere on the farm - clover, garden, oak leaf hydrangia, thousands in the golden rain tree alone.

JKJ

[John K Jordan]

I was at a lacrosse tournament in PA all weekend and the only woodworking I did was finding a tree for some shade.[/QUOTE]

Now that's a great idea! A translate module for the language of every specialty field from beekeeping to gov-speak to leagaleze to sporting events to woodcarving! When I start on a new hobby the first thing I do is read the mags and try to learn the special terms.

A cheat sheet of beekeeping terms:

queen - a fertile female bee, one per hive, lays all the eggs can sting multiple times but never does
queen-right - a hive with a healthy queen, the opposite of queenless.
worker - an infertile female bee, can sting once then dies
house bee - a worker who tends the hive
field bee - a worker who collects pollen, nectar, resin, and water
drone - a male bee, loud and lazy, good for one thing and one thing only and immediately dies for it, has no stinger
laying workers - one or more desperate workers who start laying male eggs in a spotty drone pattern when the hive is queenless for too long.
re-queened themselves - the colony raised a new queen after the old one died, left, or was not prolific enough.
bottom board, inner cover, outer cover, brood box, super - parts of a beehive structure provided by the beekeeper
frame - a wooden frame that holds with wax or honeycomb, defined by height: deep, medium (or Illinois), shallow.
foundation - a thin sheet of beeswax with a honeycomb imprint, placed in a frame for the bees to build honeycomb on
brood box - a wooden box holding 10 deep frames. A brood box holds brood, honey, and pollen.
brood chamber - where bees raise their young.
super - a wooden box typically holding 9 shorter (shallow) frames, usually for honey
brood - baby bees, either as eggs, larvae, or capped cells with nearly developed bees
capped brood - nearly developed bees sealed in with a brown-looking cap. The chew their way out when ready.
spotty brood pattern - evidence of a poor queen; a good queen lays solid brood patterns in the middle of the frames.
swarm - when the old queen and maybe 1/2 the worker bees take off to find a new home, nature's way to replicate a hive.
split - make two hives from one
NUC - a nucleus hive, a 1/2-sized starter hive with a colony consisting of one queen, a bunch of worker bees, and five frames full of food stores and brood.
package - a starter kit with a cage with about 3 lbs of bees and a queen and attendents in a tiny queen cage - usually delivered by the USPS.
bee suit - protection from stings, not worn by some brave, tough-skinned, or macho beekeepers
smoker - a metal can with a bellows to pump air and generate smoke from combusting material, calms the bees when opening a hive
propolis - a sticky resinous material the bees use to plug holes and glue the hive together
hive tool - a metal tool used to pry the glued hive apart

There are many more words/terms but this should provide some hints.

This is a single "deep" frame with bees and lots of capped brood about ready to "hatch". The darker spots are holes where bees have matured inside a cell and chewed their way out, ready to get to work.

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Tiny beekeeper smoking a hive.

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Putting a couple of supers on top of a couple of deeps. A thin, wire queen excluder is between the deep boxes and the supers to keep the queen out of the supers.

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JKJ

[Jim Becker]

Google translate can do just about every language, but bee keeper, nope! I'm going to guess that all this means the bees are doing what they are supposed to. I was at a lacrosse tournament in PA all weekend a

Yup, that about sums it up...they are still wild beasts and will do what they do. At least they have a system to reach a consensus. Where in PA was the Lacrosse tournament? There is often that kind of thing just a few miles north of me in Pipersville.

Some day I need to read up on how to do a split - I've never tried that.

Actually quite easy. Take a couple of frames that have brood, including just laid eggs and the nurse bees. (clearly you should be sure you don't have the queen on one of those frames!) Put those frames in a NUC with a few more frames to fill it out. Use a migratory cover with a feeder and temporarily block off the entrance for a few days with some dried grass, etc., just like you would if you were physically moving a colony to a different place. The bees will recognize that no queen is present in short order and make a queen with one or more of the recently laid brood. After the normal growth cycle and the new queen emerges, she'll do her "let's go play with the drones" flight and hopefully return to start laying her own brood. As the NUC develops, you'll be able to use it for resources or move it into your normal 8 or 10 frame boxes to start another colony. Professor Dr SWMBO learned even in the first year that having a "utility" NUC or two can be a good thing when something goes wrong and doesn't go to waste otherwise. I built a table for on our front porch to support the NUCs and make them easy to attend to. The NUC on the end is ready to move into a full size stack "now'...kick-butt queen! The closest one is a new split created this week with the method mentioned above. Hence, just one box.

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[Bryan Lisowski]

Yup, that about sums it up...they are still wild beasts and will do what they do. At least they have a system to reach a consensus. Where in PA was the Lacrosse tournament? There is often that kind of thing just a few miles north of me in Pipersville.

Jim

The tournament was in Downingtown area off of 30 and 340.

[Mick Simon]

I put the first coat of finish on the Morrris chair I'm finally completing.

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I also got the webbing done so now it's on to the upholsterer!

[Jim Becker]

Jim

The tournament was in Downingtown area off of 30 and 340.

Kewel. If your team/player ever gets one at the Pipersville facility, let me know and hopefully a 'Creeker visit can occur. Not that you need a sports excuse for that. LOL

[John K Jordan]

Actually quite easy. Take a couple of frames that have brood, including just laid eggs and the nurse bees. (clearly you should be sure you don't have the queen on one of those frames!) Put those frames in a NUC with a few more frames to fill it out. Use a migratory cover with a feeder and temporarily block off the entrance for a few days with some dried grass, etc., just like you would if you were physically moving a colony to a different place. The bees will recognize that no queen is present in short order and make a queen with one or more of the recently laid brood. After the normal growth cycle and the new queen emerges, she'll do her "let's go play with the drones" flight and hopefully return to start laying her own brood. As the NUC develops, you'll be able to use it for resources or move it into your normal 8 or 10 frame boxes to start another colony. Professor Dr SWMBO learned even in the first year that having a "utility" NUC or two can be a good thing when something goes wrong and doesn't go to waste otherwise. I built a table for on our front porch to support the NUCs and make them easy to attend to. The NUC on the end is ready to move into a full size stack "now'...kick-butt queen! The closest one is a new split created this week with the method mentioned above. Hence, just one box.

I might try that, I have some of the corrugated plastic nuc boxes that might work - I think they'll take a feeder. I suppose I could add a frame of honey thawed from the freezer too, eh?

I can certainly see the value of a nuc or two for resources. A couple of years ago I suddenly had queenless hive and had to order one at $25.

I try to keep a close watch after having one go too long one year and ended up with laying workers. I was able to save it with some intense gyrations but it wasn't fun.

Is there a wrong time of the year to make a split. There would need to be a good drone supply of course, anything else?

JKJ

[Jim Becker]

Is there a wrong time of the year to make a split. There would need to be a good drone supply of course, anything else?

My impression is that most of the normal season would be fine...once it's warm enough for drones to head to the "meeting places" to start through late summer. Starting anything once you're into fall is a risk...better to do a "newspaper combine" at that point if you lose a queen.

You should make up a few NUC boxes, simple bottom boards and migratory covers to have on-hand. Unlike the cardboard temporary ones, they can be stacked just like full size boxes and come in handy. We only have six currently, but it's "on my list" to make a few more for flexibility. They are the same dimensions as the regular boxes, but 9" wide inside to accommodate 5 frames. For bottom boards, I just use scrap exterior sheathing plywood and scrap 3/4" wide pine sticks, either 3/4" thick or 3/8" thick. I prefer the latter at this point for bee-space so they don't build below the frames, but the first ones I made had the full 3/4" thickness stock to support the boxes. And hey...it's a woodworking project.