Placing your beehives is a tricky business. Once you’ve located a suitable site, there are still many other things to consider. Get the position and orientation wrong, and you could cause problems! So quite naturally, beekeepers often ask what direction a hive should face. Thankfully, if you keep a few simple factors in mind, your…
It can be very confusing… There are several different types of hives. All with various pros and cons. Some look very similar. Others look entirely baffling! But thankfully, some hives have become standard and commonly accepted by a vast number of beekeepers. Of course, beekeepers can’t always agree on which is the best 🙂 Some…
Your role as a beekeeper is to look out for the best interests of your honey bees. And at various times of the year or in specific situations, you can use an entrance reducer to do this. Entrance reducers can be used for various reasons at different times of the season. But how do you…
I’m sure you’ve seen them. Beekeepers who work their hives without the slightest protection. Bees buzzing all over the place. A loud hum in the air… And not getting stung once! How do they do it? What’s going on? Why is it that beekeepers don’t get stung by honey bees? Why do bees not sting…
When honey bees swarm, they say “whoopee”! Swarming is a bee colony’s idea of success. It’s a sign of a prosperous population and strong growth. There are so many bees that the hive now needs to divide in two. You might even congratulate yourself as a beekeeper on your flourishing colony 🙂 But losing a…
Most of the time, when you visit your beehive, your buzzy friends will be easy-going. But bees can be a bit moody sometimes. And certain seasons of the year more than others! Bees can show aggressive behavior in late summer, for example. But how do you explain why they suddenly seem so hostile? What changed?…
Bees are flying insects that belong to the family of Hymenoptera. (In other words, a type of insect that has wings). There are many types of bees, but two of the most common ones are bumblebees and honey bees. Although both types of bees are important for pollination, there are some key differences between them….
Swarms are natures way for honey bees to reproduce and expand. If the season is good and a beehive’s population has grown, a single colony can become overcrowded. So much so that bees start to have difficulty understanding whether or not there’s a healthy laying queen in the hive. So the queen decides to find…
You won’t find many male bees in a beehive, and the few you do find just lounge around the hive and don’t do any work! The majority of bees in a hive are female, and not surprisingly, they do all the hard labour. A honey bee colony is an amazingly organized society. We call this…
Honey production naturally slows down in the autumn. Most beekeepers harvest the honey crop and leave enough food stores for the bees during the coming months. But sometimes bees may have trouble building up their reserves. In this situation bees need a helping hand you will have to feed your bees in the fall. After…
End of content
End of content