Chickens: May 12, 2012

We went to the tractor supply tail gate late and all of the chickens were gone. They had goats and oddly enough, pigeons. Jim and I decided to join HudsonValleyChickens.com and put a posting that we're looking for specific breeds. We're interested in cold hardy breeds that lay eggs often. We ended up with a black Astrolorp named Sally , 2 Buff Orpingons named Pipla and Berla and an Ameraucana named Joy. Sally lays light brown missile like eggs, Pipla and Berla lay light brown..sort of pinkish eggs and Joy lays these beautiful bluish-green colored eggs.

Sally - Black Astrolorp

Berla and Pipla - Buff Orpingtons

Joy - Ameraucana

We picked them up from a woman, Donna Haines, near Newburgh in a town called Bloomington. She was decent and showed us her operation. When we got them home, they were relatively calm. Sally had feathers missing and Donna said it was from the roosters. The more I see her the more I'm thinking mites but we'll see because the others ones are fine.



Sally seems to be the smart one and understood how to use the water nipples I installed for them to drink. Pipla and Berla soon followed what Sally was doing and ultimately Joy was operating the nipples like an old timer.















They also understood how to get the food from the contraption we set up. The next day was wonderful because when we opened the coop door, they each had laid a beautiful colored egg.

So far they're interesting to watch. I just wish we could watch them more often. While rehearsing a speech for a meeting I was having, they were a good audience. I thought by talking often that they would be more relaxed around me. They were still a bit skittish.
The last thing worth mentioning is that the solar powerd door opener was a SUCCESS! It opens and closes at precisely the right time. We couldn't be happier about this whole experience.

Bees: May 12, 2012

Weather: Upper 70's, Sunny, Overall Beautiful day

It's been a few weeks since we've posted. Although we've been busy keeping our projects Upstate on track, finding the time for the blog in the evenings has been a challenge. In Mid-April we noticed that Hive B had what seemed like the entire hive outside by the entrance. I thought since the weather was beautiful, these were all newly hatched worker bees just getting their bearings.  What we found 2 weeks later while going up to put the finishing touches on the chicken coop was that one of the hives swarmed. There on the honeysuckle bush was a swarm. What luck that it happened over a weekend when we were Upstate.  Jim and I quickly got our gear on, brought up the new cedar hive we bought and a pair of loppers.

We set up the cedar hive where the original hive A was. Jim held the honeysuckle branch with the swarm while I cut the main branch with the loppers. Jim quickly brought the branch with the swarm into cedar hive. We decided to close it while we had lunch and then removed it after they've settled into their new home.

The week after, we checked on the cedar hive all all seemed well with bees coming and going. We opened up the other two hives and surprisingly their honey reserves were full. It was difficult trying to figure out which hive swarmed. Both had honey reserves and both had an ample army of worker bees.
Our purpose was to see if a queen, new or old, existed and Jim spotted a queen in both along with eggs. We felt at ease that those 2 hives were working well. We removed as many queens cells as possible but left the  supercedure cells since our thoughts were that the workers created them for a reason.
This weekend we were working in the vegetable garden and I heard a whurring noise and asked Jim what it was. He then noticed a large swarm of bees hovering near the peach tree and they rested on a nearby Honeysuckle bush in a Heart Shape.

We had the routine down at this point so I ran to the barn to get our gear and we kept to the plan to use the Top Bar hive if we ever got a second set a honeybees this year. We set the Top Bar in a completely new area near my dad's mini-barn shed. It seems like a good location although I'd like to put a more stable foundation to hold it up.

Look how many are guarding the entrance.

We then went to check hive b and c again and sadly, they were practically empty of honey reserves which means they both swarmed.
We found an old saying "swarms in May, plenty of hay" which means that we'll have plenty of honey this year however Jim and I aren't hopeful. We'll see. We're happy because we now have 4 hives which is what we wanted this year.

Chickens are COMING!!! Be Prepared!!!

Over the long winter Jim and I discussed what is it we could do that will bring us some joy, provide a purpose and not take up too much time....Chickens seem to be the answer. Truth is the bugs last summer did a number on our veggies and we thought about getting chickens for the next summer. 

So here we are after weeks of prep. We bought a Chicken Coop, Solar Powered Chicken Door Opener, Rodent proof feed feeder as well as all of the material to keep them safely in a secured open area. Although we were cut up and bruised along the way, we're happy with the way things are turning out so far. A few weeks back on the way back home to the city we took a detour to Highland NY where there was a Tractor Store Tail Gate and everyone was selling goats, pigs, chickens and every other imaginable livestock.

When we got there all of the chickens were snatched up but we did meet a woman selling her chicken eggs that told us about an economical way to give them water. Jim and I bought 3 of these stainless steel watering pails for $35 each. She told us about these plastic nipples that are drilled into the bottom of a 5 gallon pail. She loved them and preached about how since it's above the chickens, there's no way for the water to get contaminated with their FECAL matter AND it saves water since it's not spilled all over the place. We brought the stainless steel pails back to the tractor store and bought a few of these nipples. I'll write next time about how they're working out.

Next Sunday, April 29th in Chatham they're supposed to be selling 4H chickens. 4H is a group similar to the boy scout which teaches kids about farming. They raise these chickens from eggs and then sell them just before school ends. Jim and I are going to be there bright and early to get the pick of the litter. We've been reading up on them and we'll get a few different ones...4 or 5.

Today we finished putting up the fence and gate and there are just a few last minute things we'll do and it'll be good to go!

Here are some pictures:

Here's the spot we picked a few weeks ago. Surprise, surprise when we started digging we found old remnants of an old chicken coop in the same spot!

Here's the beginning of the Chicken Palace! sort of sounds like a fried chicken place :(

Bees: April 20th, 2012

Weather: Partially Sunny, high 70's, Occasional Wind

It's been a while since we've updated the blog but we're back on track. We've been checking the bees every weekend and since the winter's been unbelievably mild, the bees have been our foraging for a while now. Jim and my concern was that they're all flying around and exhausting themselves only to use up whatever honey was left from the winter. If this were to happen, they'd use up all their reserves and die of starvation because nothing's blooming yet. This of course didn't happen...thank God.

We removed our winterizing material...tar paper, popsicle sticks, overturned the top cover, removed the bottom board wood, etc...and examined each one. One interesting point to mention was the strong smell when you're in the hive area of the queens pheramone. I've seen it written where people describe it as a banana smell. Each one looked incredibly healthy with a huge population. Hive C didn't have much store honey whereas Hive B (nasty hive) was loaded with honey. Both had beautiful brood so the queens were still laying.

In Hive C we noticed a supersedure cell which I thought was odd since it was so early in the season. We left it alone incase the worker bees thought their queen needed to be replaced. We installed a honey super on each and we're hoping they each wanted more space.

Over the winter Jim and I purchased a nice cedar 8 frame hive and spent time making it great. We picked an orange color to make it different from the other two. Unfortunately when it came time to order the bees, it seemed like every place was out of stock on packages. When the demand dies down, we'll order a package and hope for the best.

Here are some pictures we've taken over the past few weeks:

We put out some sugar water on an old frame and watched as more and more came to drink up.

This time of year the property is full of catnip and the bees are happy for it.

Three weeks ago is when we noticed a bunch of our honey bees going through our compost. Was it pollen, moisture or sugar??? Who knows!

Lastly, while planting a persimmon tree near the road, I knelt down and noticed this strange looking bee. What is it? It was all alone and not scared. Just walking over the plants and then took off in flight.

Bees: Sunday, October 23, 2011

Weather: Sunny, 50's, no wind

Our goal this weekend was to remove the sugar water feeders and seal the hives up for the winter. As we approached the hives we noticed that the bees from Hive C had bundles of pollen on their sacks. Each bee was carrying different autumn color...reds, oranges, yellow and whites. The Nasty Hive wasn't as busy but there was activity. It seemed that both hives new what we were going to do and didn't give us much trouble.

We had all of our equipment handy...hive tool, popsicle sticks, duct tape, tar paper, box cutter and glue. We measured the supers for the tar paper and cut the proper sizes. Last year Jim read that putting popsickle sticks between the top cover and the telescoping cover will keep enough fresh air circulating and it prevents any moist air that would normally be trapped in the super from freezing on the bees wings. We did it last year and it worked. Our bees survived and were healthy. Jim prepared both hives with the popsickle sticks and glued it to the top covers.

We both cut the tar paper and used the duct tape to cover both hives. It's amazing how the black tar paper absorbs the sun and actually makes the paper hot. This is exactly what the hives need to help them expend less energy over the coming cold winter months.

Winterized Hives

We finished the project and won't have to really do anything with the hives until March/April. Even though they're closed for the winter...we'll pass by every few weeks to listen in to their wings all vibrating in unison to make that beautiful humming buzz.

Bees: Sunday, October 16, 2011

Weather: Sunny, 50-60's, slightly windy

There isn't much pollen around and the flowers are drying up. The only flowers blooming right now seem to be mums and you'll see an occasional honeybee or bumblebee on them. The leaves are all changing and I'd estimate that half of the leaves on the maple trees in front of the house have already blown away.

We went to check on the bees to see if we needed to add more sugar water and there was probably a gallon left in each hive. Jim and I decided to leave it on for another week and then remove it. If they're not feeding any longer, they've built up a nice reserve of food to last them the winter...at least that's what the hope is.

We reduced the entrance to the smallest hole on each. Our intention for this coming weekend is to place the wooden boards underneath each and then wrap each in tar paper like we did last winter. We'll use Jim's trick with the popsicle sticks by the top cover to keep the air circulating. We'll leave them alone until just before Spring when we give them sugar water and the cycle begins again.

Bees: Saturday, October 8th, 2011

Weather: Sunny, 80's, overall beautiful day

Today was Jim's birthday and the day couldn't have been better. Last night we made 3 gallons of sugar water and this morning we brewed another 3 gallons. Although we originally decided to not give the nasty hive any sugar water to see how well it overwintered, this morning over breakfast we changed our mind. It didn't hurt our Alpha hive last year and if it helps them fend off any illnesses, it's worth it.

We first went to Hive C and the first thing we noticed was that there was activity near the front entrance but nothing compared to the Nasty Hive. Hive C seemed like it had a number of drone bees milling around the front and we were trying to figure out whether they were tossed out and trying to get back in or just coming and going as they normally would. We opened the telescoping cover and saw that the 3 gallons we gave a few days ago was practically gone. Everything seemed to make sense, the drones outside not being bothered and all the sugar water being gone...it's possible that they have built up enough food storage for the winter and not worried about having the drones around eating since there's so much food. We poured another 3 gallons sealed her up and we'll come back to check in 2 weeks to check up on them again. We also decided to reduce the entrance to the smallest hole in order to minimize robbing situations and allow them to protect themselves easier.

The Nasty Hive

The Nasty Hive was beyond busy in the front without any drones milling around. (check out the video below) Jim noticed a yellow trying to get in but there wasn't any way with the number of honey bees out front that it would succeed. There were so many honey bees out front that I thought they were newly hatched worker bees trying to orientate themselves. When we opened the Nasty Hive I noticed something odd but Jim didn't feel it was anything too concerning. When I removed the top cover on the Nasty Hive last week, we tore through some comb with honey that the bees attached to the top cover. Honey was pouring all over the place because of it. Today it seems like there was no honey in that comb at all....like they emptied it out knowing we were going to remove the top cover while the feeder was in place. I shaved off all of the excess comb they built up on the tops of the Pierco frames, placed the feeder and filled it up. The honey bees all found their way to the top and began drinking right away. We sealed her up and also reduced the entrance to the smallest hole.

This next story is sad because of what we needed to do. We opened our wonderful Alpha hive and noticed it completely devoid of any honey. There were hundreds of bees but the reality of the situation was that there weren't any brood or eggs or honey or nectar. The activity we were seeing were basically robber bees taking any drop of food they could. Jim and I decided to torch the hive since there was a bit of mold and the wooden frames were decaying. We read that the best thing to do in those situations were to torch the supers since it could promote disease. We carried the boxes to the center of the field, laid wood underneath with newspaper and up it went once it was lit. It was sad but beautiful to watch nonetheless.

We're looking forward to sealing these last 2 hives up for the winter and making sure they have every bit of energy to make it to the Spring. The thought of having 2 hives with loads of honey next Spring is exciting.

What we did learn this summer was that we should let the bees do what they do best and that's letting them decide when they want a new queen. We will continue to stop any swarm cells but other than that, we'll let them BEE! :)

Bees: Sunday, October 2, 2o11

Weather: Cool, Sunny but slightly damp, 50-60's

Last night Jim and I watched the documentary "Vanishing Bees" about Colony Collapse Disorder and we became concerned because 2 weeks ago we noticed the Alpha hive wasn't as busy as the other two. We decided to build up their food supple for the winter so we created about 3 gallons of sugar water, healthy b and fumagillin.  We used a 2 to 1 mix of water and sugar. The healthy b is a mixture of natural ingredients that boost their immune system and keeps mites away with its peppermint scent. The fumagillin is supposed to help the bees immune system in case nosema disease comes into the hive. We let it cool overnight and this morning we put them in jugs and headed up to the hives.

As we approached the hives we noticed not one was busy...in fact no bees were present. I'm sure Jim's mind was racing as mine was that could it be possible that they've all left. I put my ear against the hive and was happy I heard busy. I'm sure they were clustered together to keep warm as the morning sun didn't generate enough heat for them to venture out.

The first hive we checked was the Alpha hive from last year. We opened the cover and all seemed ok as the worker bees all peered out from the hole in the top cover. As we removed the cover and removed each of the frames, we became disappointed at what we were seeing. Frame after frame of empty or dead brood, no honey stores and barely any pollen. We didn't see any drones and any worker bees we saw were probably robber bees from our other hives. The realization that our first hive, our hive that produced so much honey for us, was dead. It was a disappointment that took a few minutes to sink in. Jim and I decided to close her up and discuss what we'd do to it later on.

The next hive we checked was the Nasty hive. When we opened it we were amazed at the amount of honey they stored. We also noticed the amount of honey bees populating the hive was about 8 times what we saw in the Alpha hive. Jim let me do a test. The test was to let the Nasty Hive proceed over the winter without any sugar water or supplements. We closed her up and we decided to check on her in a few weeks.

The final hive check was on Hive C. Upon opening this hive we were happy to see that this hive was also another healthy hive that was going to make it over the winter. Their sheer number, honey store and brood were a wonderful indication of that. We checked frame by frame and lo and behold, the queen was busy doing her thing...checking empty cells to lay her eggs. The interesting thing about this queen was that the previous queen was either not good or died because the worker bees created this new one. Last month Jim and I noticed a few queen cells and one that emerged and killed the other cells. This was the queen we found today.

While driving home today, we decided to get rid of the old pine box and buy a cedar box for the Spring. Next week we'll use the stand from the Alpha Hive for the Nasty Hive. The Nasty Hive is heavy and the plastic stand isn't able to support it. We'll go to Lowes and buy 1/2 inch plywood to seal up the bottoms of the hive. As we get closer to the colder weather, we'll wrap each hive in tar paper. We'll also stick the popsicle sticks under the top cover. Both of these tricks seemed to have worked on overwintering the Alpha Hive so we'll do it again.

Garden: July 31, 2010

The garden continues to be productive, despite the invasion of cucumber beetles and squash bugs. Late season planting of beets, jumbo snow peas, radishes (for Rose Cresci), and peas are all now beginning to grow.



Just a portion of this week's yield:

Bees: Saturday, July 23, 2011

Weather: Extremely hot, sunny and dry, high 90's

We decided not to fuss too much over the bees the past 2 weeks simply because everything seemed to be in order. This past weekend we quickly opened each hive and made some observations. Hive C was extremely busy with tons of beautifully laid brood. There was much activity outside of the hive which indicated to us that these were newborn honeybees. They do this incredible impersonation of a vacuum cleaner, moving forward and backwards with their mouths cleaning the surface. I believe it's helping with their orientation. It was so busy that we removed the entrance reducer to give them more ventilation and ease of entry/exit. We put a queen excluder on and put on a honey super. We don't know how much honey will be accumulated but it's worth a try.

The nasty hive has been slow.... granted it was the last hive to get another queen. We also noticed that much of their building of comb tends to be on one side of the hive for some reason. I'm wondering if it has to do with the hive being made of styrofoam or possible how the hive is ventilated. Regardless, the new queen is laying nice brood around and we're hoping there's a population explosion shortly.

Alpha hive was busy with newly born honeybees too. They were all out and about the front of the hive getting their bearing. We opened the honey super and there were a number of frames full of honey again. We decided to only pull out the capped ones, which amounted to 2 frames and we'll get the rest this coming weekend when the kids are up. Everything else looked in order and we closed her up.

One other thing worth mentioning is that we made our first colonial style beeswax candles this weekend. Here is a picture of them:

Garden: July 23, 2011

This week's harvest:

Bees: Saturday, July 9th, 2011

Weather: Sunny, mid 80's, Perfect Day

Our purpose for opening the hives today was to make sure that the queen we placed in the Nasty Hive last week successfully emerged from her cage and accepted by the colony. Sure enough when we opened it we noticed a remarkable difference in the comb that was built during the week. We found it to be more advanced and uniform than before. Last week the comb tended to be off to one side of the hive and this week we noticed the honeybees were working more frames.

We pulled out a few frames and Jim being better at this than me, was looking for egg laying. We noticed that the brood was evenly distributed and once we sure that we didn't have any laying workers, we were put at ease a bit and proceeded to find the queen. That was the last stressful thing we needed to make sure happened. Sure enough, Jim found her AGAIN! Jim - 15, Frank - 0

Satisfied we closed the Nasty Hive and off we went to check on Hive C. All was well there. A bit messy with the slow building comb but we feel that the frames weren't spaced properly so that's why the comb wasn't even. Brood existed and we closed her up.

Onto Alpha Hive. The hive was very busy and perfect in every sense. We quickly removed the top honey super and found that there were 3 beautifully capped frames which we took and replaced with 3 empty frames. All in all, everything was going well so that's all to report on the honeybee hives.

We harvested the honey and bottled about 17 honey containers this weekend. This batch was much darker and extremely thicker than the first batch which was lighter and with regular thickness. We're hoping for another prosperous honey harvest with the next nectar flow which will occur sometime later this month and into next month.

Here's a picture of the honey harvest:

Bees: Saturday, July 2nd, 2011

Weather: Beautiful, high 80's, sunny, clear sky

Our mission today was to check on the nasty hive and see if there were any signs of a queen...brood, freshly laid eggs, etc. Upon opening the covers you could hear the roar of a colony without a queen but we still pulled out one frame at a time and examined each one. By the 7th frame, we both realized that in order for this colony to survive, we need to re-queen it asap. We closed her up and instead of checking the other hives, we quickly changed out of our INTEL suits and headed off to Greenwich NY.

When we researched to see if Betterbee in Greenwich was open, we read that because of the holiday weekend they were closing for a few days. Jim remembered there was this other guy Salvatore from the same town that may have a queen to sell us. Jim remembered that the last time he contacted Salvatore via email, he responded quickly. Sure enough when I sent an email, Salvatore responded within minutes that he had one and would only charge us $20.

It was about 1pm at this point so we had a quick lunch and took off. Salvatore's directions were good and since Jim and I had done this drive twice this year already, it was very familiar. We arrived at Salvatore's house and noticed he had a huge honeybee setup in the back of his property. He was a trusting individual and left the queen bee in a cage on his porch for us. We took the queen and left the money in it's place and headed home. Here's the queen in her cage with 3 worker bees that will tend to her until she's released by the other bees in the hive:

When we arrived home we suited up again and headed up to the hives. The queens placement in the nasty hive went well and we're planning on checking the hive again next week to make sure she's accepted. IF they kill her, it can only mean that there are laying workers in the hive and we'll need to remove them before putting anymore queens in. To do this we'll need to shake off the boards at least 100 feet away and make sure no bees hitch a ride back on the frames we've shaken. Any bees that fly back to the hive we can be sure aren't laying workers and only then can we reintroduce a new queen.

We then opened up the other hives and they were both operating wonderfully with no issues. Jim and I ended up taking another fully capped frame from the Alpha Hive and set it in the freezer since the bees had created a tunnel in it and were difficult to remove. The next time we have a few frames of honey....hopefully by the 2nd nectar flow...we'll go through the honey harvesting again. In the meantime, we'll keep it in the freezer.

We also filtered the beeswax this weekend in order to make candles at some point. Here's a picture of the pure filtered beeswax that was poured into an aluminum baking loaf pan...along with some of the harvested golden deliciousness:

Melted Beeswax....and our honey

After we finished with the hive maintenance, Jim and I walked around the property to see what new flowers were sprouting and Jim noticed a honeybee cleaning itself. It appears that this honeybee is a water carrier. These little ladies carry water back to the hive and make sure the temperature is comfortable for everyone. They use it to cool the hive as well as for drinking. Here's a clip Jim took:

While at work this week, we'll be thinking of how this new queen in the nasty hive is fairing.

Bees: Saturday, June 25, 2011

Weather: 80's, Partly Sunny/Cloudy, Quick Shower later in the day, Rainbow Appeared

Capped Honey on the Frame

Jim and I decided that this weekend was going to be a honey harvest weekend. We were up at the house 2 weeks ago and we saw that the Alpha Hive was ready to give up some of its golden delicious. We made our first stop there. I tried getting the smoker going but had difficulties. As we pulled off the covers, I realized that the bees were very calm and we didn't need to smoke them. We purchased several clear storage totes earlier in the week to store some stuff in the barn. I realized one of them would come in handy to store the capped honey frames as we pulled them out. The upper honey super was still being worked on so Jim removed it from the hive and left it on the side. The next honey super was loaded!!! We pulled out the first one and not only did it have every cell filled with honey but it also had over 200 bees on it. I followed the instructions and slammed a corner of the frame on the floor and sure enough...all of the bees fell off in a clump.

We continued to do this on each of the fully capped frames we found. At the end of it, we had 5 fully capped frames to harvest which wasn't a bad harvest. The 5 frames weighted about 25-30 pounds. The sun at this point was blaring and we were sweating up a storm. We decided to move quickly on the other hives by giving them a quick run through to see if we saw any brood or eggs being laid. Unfortunately, with a quick check like we did, we didn't find anything. This coming weekend we'll spend a bit more time on them and fingers crossed everything will be fine. Here's a video of Hive C:

Earlier this year I purchased everything I thought we needed for honey harvesting except the proper honey containers! We set our honey collection area in the kitchen. We cut a 3X3 piece of cheesecloth and placed it over a micro-strainer which straddled the 5 gallon pail we had with a gate at the bottom which controlled how much honey of the filtered honey we wanted to release.

Jim sat on a chair and held the honey frame over the cheesecloth which was over the strainer and pail. I used a regular kitchen plastic spatula that we use to flip pancakes and scraped off the combed honey from the frame and into the cheesecloth. Jim had the difficult job of hold the frame which weighted quite a bit. Once all of the waxed comb was removed from the frame, Jim and I squeezed the cheesecloth with both hands to release the partially filtered honey into the micro-strainer. On and on we did this and realized we had an easy 2.5 gallons of honey!

It's impossible to do this alone and thankfully Jim enjoys doing this as much as I do. We used up a case of jelly mason jars and then moved onto another case of smaller jelly jars only to find out we had much more to do.

Here are the jelly jars we used this first go around:

Honey in Jelly Jars

We decided to hold off doing anymore until we ordered the right kinds of honey containers...which I did today. Hopefully they'll arrive before we head up to the house again.

Here are some more pictures of the honey:

Scraping off the waxed comb and honey into the cheesecloth

More deliciousness being removed

Garden: June 25, 2011

And two weeks later...