Beekeeping For Dummies

Foreword vIntroduction 1About This Book 1Foolish Assumptions 3Icons Used in This Book 3Beyond the Book 4Where to Go from Here 5Part 1: Taking Flight with Beekeeping 7Chapter 1: To Bee, or Not to Bee? 9Discovering the Benefits of Beekeeping 10Harvesting liquid gold: Honey 11Bees as pollinators: Their vital role to our food supply 11Being part of the bigger picture: Save the bees! 13Getting an education: And passing it on! 13Improving your health: Bee therapies and stress relief 15Determining Your Beekeeping Potential 16Environmental considerations 16Zoning and legal restrictions 16Costs and equipment 17How many hives do you need? 17What kind of honey bees should you raise? 17Time and commitment 18Beekeeper personality traits 18Allergies 19Deciding Which Beekeeping Approach to Follow 19Medicated beekeeping 20Natural beekeeping 20Organic beekeeping 21Combining approaches 21Chapter 2: Getting to Know Your Honey Bees 23Basic Body Parts 24Skeleton 24Head 25Thorax 26Abdomen 27The Amazing Language of Bees 27Pheromones 27Shall we dance? 28Getting to Know the Male and the Two Female Castes 29Her majesty, the queen 30The industrious little worker bee 32House bees 33Housekeeping (days 1 to 3) 33Undertaking (days 3 to 16) 33Working in the nursery (days 4 to 12) 34Attending royalty (days 7 to 12) 34Going grocery shopping (days 12 to 18) 34Fanning (days 12 to 18) 34Becoming architects and master builders (days 12 to 35) 36Guarding the home (days 18 to 21) 36Field bees 36The woeful drone 37The Honey Bee Life Cycle 39Egg 39Larva 41Pupa 41Other Stinging Insects 43Bumblebee 44Carpenter bee 44Mason bee 45Wasp 45Yellow jacket 46Bald-faced hornet 47Part 2: Starting Your Adventure 49Chapter 3: Alleviating Apprehensions and Making Decisions 51Overcoming Sting Phobia 52Knowing what to do if you're stung 53Watching for allergic reactions 54Building up a tolerance 54Understanding Local Laws and Ordinances 54Easing the Minds of Family and Neighbors 55Location, Location, Location: Where to Keep Your Hives 56Knowing what makes a perfect bee yard 57Urban considerations 59Dealing with nervous neighbors 59City bees have the same needs as country bees 59Deciding where to put your hives 59Strike a deal with a community garden 60Speak to your landlord about roof rights 60Providing for your thirsty bees 60Understanding the correlation between geographical area and honey flavors 63Knowing When to Start Your Adventure 64Chapter 4: Selecting a Hive That's Perfect for You 65The Langstroth Hive 66The Kenyan Top Bar Hive 68The Warre (People's) Hive 71The Flow Hive 74The Five-Frame Nuc Hive 77The Observation Hive 79Make a Beeline to the Best Beehive 81Hives for harvesting honey 82Hives for pollinating your garden 82A hive for learning and teaching 82Chapter 5: Basic Equipment for Beekeepers 85Starting Out with the Langstroth Hive 86Knowing the Basic Woodenware Parts of the Langstroth Hive 86Hive stand 87Bottom board 87Entrance reducer 89Deep-hive body 89Queen excluder 90Shallow or medium honey super 91Frames 92Foundation 95Inner cover 98Outer cover 99Knowing the Basic Parts of a Top Bar Hive 99The top bar 100Everything else 101Ordering Hive Parts 101Startup hive kits 102Setting up shop 102Adding on Feeders 104Hive-top feeder 104Entrance feeder 105Pail feeder 106Baggie feeder 107Frame feeder 108Top Bar hive feeders 109Fundamental Tools 110Smoker 110Hive tool and frame lifter 111Bee-Proof Clothing 112Veils 112Gloves 112Really Helpful Accessories 114Elevated hive stand 114Frame rest 116Bee brush 117Slatted rack 117Screened bottom board 118Beekeeper's toolbox 119Chapter 6: Obtaining and Installing Your Bees 121Determining the Kind of Bee You Want 121Deciding How to Obtain Your Initial Bee Colony 124Ordering package bees 124Buying a "nuc" colony 126Purchasing an established colony 127Capturing a wild swarm of bees 128Picking a Reputable Bee Supplier 128Deciding When to Place Your Order 130The Day Your Girls Arrive 131Bringing home your bees 132Recipe for sugar syrup 132Putting Your Bees into the Hive 133Hiving steps for Langstroth hives and Steps 1-7 for Top Bar hives 134Hiving Steps 8-14 for Top Bar hives 139Watching your bees come and go from their new home 140Part 3: Time for a Peek 143Chapter 7: Opening Your Hive 145Establishing Visiting Hours 146Setting an Inspection Schedule 146Preparing to Visit Your Langstroth or Top Bar Hive 147Making "non-scents" a part of personal hygiene 147Getting dressed up and ready to go 147Lighting Your Smoker 148Opening a Langstroth Hive 151Removing the hive-top feeder 153Removing the inner cover 155Opening a Top Bar Hive 156The Hive's Open! Now What? 158Chapter 8: What to Expect When You're Inspecting 159Keeping a Journal 160Inspecting a Langstroth Hive 161Removing the first frame of your Langstroth hive 161Working your way through the Langstroth hive 162Holding up frames for inspection 163Knowing when it's time for more smoke 164Replacing Langstroth frames 165Closing the Langstroth hive 165Inspecting a Top Bar Hive 166Working your way through the Top Bar hive 167Top Bar comb management 168Looking into Top Bar cells 170Replacing the top bars and closing the hive 170Understanding What to Always Look For 170Checking for your queen 170Storing food
 raising brood 171Inspecting the brood pattern 171Recognizing foodstuffs 172Your New Colony's First Eight Weeks 172Checking in: A week after hiving your bees 172Verifying that the queen was released 173Removing any burr comb 173Looking for eggs 174Replacing the missing frame of the Langstroth 174Providing more syrup 174The second and third weeks 174Looking for larvae 175Evaluating your queen 175Hunting for capped brood 176Looking for supersedure cells 176Provide more syrup 177Weeks four through eight 177Adding a second deep-hive body to your Langstroth hive 178Witnessing a miracle! 178Watching for swarm cells 179Providing more ventilation 179Manipulating the frames of foundation 180Making room for honey! 180Inspecting your multilevel Langstroth hive 181Chapter 9: Different Seasons, Different Activities 183Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer 184Your summer to-do list 185Your summertime commitment 185Falling Leaves Point to Autumn Chores 186Your autumn to-do list 186Your autumn time commitment 191Clustering in a Winter Wonderland 191Your winter to-do list 192Your winter time commitment 192Spring Is in the Air (Starting Your Second Season) 193Your spring to-do list 193Your springtime commitment 195Administering spring medication 195Reversing hive bodies 196Managing Top Bar Hives in the Spring 197Finding the cluster 198Preventing the urge to swarm 198Expanding the brood nest 199The Beekeeper's Calendar 199Part 4: Common Problems and Simple Solutions 203Chapter 10: Anticipating and Preventing Potential Problems 205Running Away (to Join the Circus?) 206Swarming 206Understanding why you want to prevent swarming 208Keeping the girls from leaving home 208They swarmed anyway Now what? 211Capturing a swarm 213Hiving your swarm 215Absconding 216Where Did the Queen Go? 217Letting nature take its course 218Ordering a replacement queen 218Introducing a new queen to the hive 218Avoiding Chilled Brood 220Dealing with the Dreaded Robbing Frenzies 221Knowing the difference between normal and abnormal (robbing) behavior 221Putting a stop to a robbing attack 222Preventing robbing in the first place 222Ridding Your Hive of the Laying Worker Phenomenon 224How to know if you have laying workers 224Getting rid of laying workers 224Preventing Pesticide Poisoning 226The "Killer Bee" Phenomenon 227What are "killer bees"? 228Bee prepared! 229Chapter 11: Colony Collapse Disorder 231What Is CCD? 232What to Do If You Suspect CCD 233Why All the Fuss? 233What's Causing CCD? 234The cellphone theory 234It may be the perfect storm 234Parasites 234Pathogens 234Pesticides 235Other possibilities 237Answers to FAQs 237What You Can Do to Help 238Chapter 12: Understanding Diseases and Remedies 241Medicating or Not? 242Knowing the Big-Six Bee Diseases 242American foulbrood (AFB) 243European foulbrood (EFB) 244Chalkbrood 245Sacbrood 246Stonebrood 247Nosema 247Nosema apis 247Nosema ceranae 248A handy chart 248Chapter 13: Heading Off Honey-Bee Pests 251Parasitic Problems 251Varroa mites 252Recognizing Varroa mite symptoms 253Using two surefire detection techniques for Varroa 253Knowing how to control Varroa mite problems 256Tracheal mites 259Symptoms that may indicate tracheal mites 260How to control tracheal mite problems 261Natural source options 261Synthetic chemical options 263Zombie (Phonid) flies 265Other Unwelcome Pests 265Wax moths 265Small hive beetle 266Determining whether you have a small hive beetle problem 266How to control the small hive beetle 267Ants, ants, and more ants 268Bear alert! 268Raccoons and skunks 270Keeping out Mrs Mouse 270Some birds have a taste for bees 272Pest Control at a Glance 272Chapter 14: Raising Your Own Queens 275Why Raising Queens Is the Bee's Knees 275Understanding Genetics 277Dominant and recessive genes 277Inbreeding versus outcrossing 278Accentuate the positive 279What Makes a Queen a Queen 280Talking about the Birds and Bees for Honey Bees 282Creating Demand: Making a Queenless Nuc 283Queen-Rearing Method 1: Go with the Flow 283If the queen cells are capped 284If the queen cells are open 284Mind the timeline 285Queen-Rearing Method 2: The Miller Method 285Queen-Rearing Method 3: The Doolittle Method, also Known as Grafting 288Tools and equipment 288How it's done 291Providing nuptial housing 293Finding Homes for Your Queens 294Evaluating the Results 295The Queen Rearer's Calendar 295Marking Your Queens 296Part 5: Sweet Rewards 297Chapter 15: Honey, I Love You 299Appreciating the History of Honey 299Understanding the Composition of Honey 301Healing with Honey 302Honey and diabetes 302Honey's nutritional value 303Honey and children 303Choosing Extracted, Comb, Chunk, or Whipped Honey 303Extracted honey 304Comb honey 304Chunk honey 305Whipped honey 305Honey or honeydew honey? 306Taking the Terror out of Terroir 306Customizing your honey 306Honey from around the world 307The Commercialization of Honey 312Is it the real deal? 312Raw versus regular honey 312Organic or not? 313Your own honey is the best 313Appreciating the Culinary Side of Honey 314The nose knows 314Practice makes perfect 315Recognizing defects in honey 315Pairing Honey with Food 316Infusing Honey with Flavors 316Judging Honey 317Honey Trivia 318Chapter 16: Getting Ready for the Golden Harvest 319Having Realistic Expectations 320What Flavor Do You Want? 320Assembling the Right Equipment to Extract Honey 321Honey extractors 321Uncapping knife 321Honey strainer 322Other handy gadgets for extracting honey 323Double uncapping tank 323Uncapping fork or roller 323Bottling bucket 324Solar wax melter 325Honey containers 326Planning Your Extracted Honey Harvest Setup 326Gathering Comb Honey Equipment 328Section comb cartridges 328Cut comb 328Branding and Selling Your Honey 328Creating an attractive label 329Finding places to market your honey 332Selling your honey on the web 332Chapter 17: Honey Harvest Day 333Knowing When to Harvest 334Bad things come to those who wait! 335A few pointers to keep in mind when harvesting liquid gold 336Getting the Bees out of the Honey Supers 336Shakin' 'em out 338Blowin' 'em out 339Using a bee escape board 339Fume board and bee repellent 340Honey Extraction from a Langstroth Frame 342Harvesting honey using an extractor 342Cleaning frames after extracting 344Harvesting Honey from Your Top Bar Hive 345Selecting the comb to harvest 346Getting the bees off Top Bar comb 346Harvesting using the crush-and-strain method 347Harvesting honey using a honey press 348Harvesting cut-comb honey 350Harvesting Wax 350Part 6: The Part of Tens 351Chapter 18: More than Ten Fun Things to Do with Bees 353Making Two Langstroth Hives from One 353Making One Langstroth Hive from Two 355Dividing a Top Bar Hive into Two Colonies 357Combining Two Top Bar Hive Colonies 358Building an Elevated Hive Stand 359Building materials list 361Cut list 361Planting Flowers for Your Bees 362Asters (aster/callistephus) 362Bachelor's buttons (Centaurea) 363Bee balm (Monarda) 363Hyssop (Agastache) 363Malva (Malvaceae) 364Mint (Mentha) 364Nasturtium (Tropaeolum minus) 364Poppy (Papaver/Eschscholzia) 364Salvia (Salvia/farinacea-strata/splendens/officinalis) 365Sunflowers (Helianthus/Tithonia) 365Brewing Mead: The Nectar of the Gods 365Create Cool Stuff with Propolis 368Propolis tincture 369Propolis ointment 369Propolis varnish 370Making Gifts from Beeswax 370Beeswax candles 370Dipped candles 371Molded candles 371Beeswax furniture polish 372Beauty and the Bees 372Use your cappings 373Equipment 373The recipes 373Ultra-rich skin cream 374Rich body balm 375Beeswax lip balm 375Beeswax and olive oil salve 376Beeswax lotion bar 376Natural homemade sunscreen 377Packaging and labeling 377Chapter 19: More than Ten Frequently Asked Questions about Bee Behavior 379Chapter 20: My Ten Favorite Honey Recipes 385Honey Curry Vegetable Dip 387Golden Cornbread 388Honey Picante Chicken Wings 389Apricot Honey Bread 390Asian Honey-Tea Grilled Prawns 391Broiled Scallops with Honey-Lime Marinade 392A Honey of a Chili 393Beef and Potato Tzimmes 394Chewy Honey Oatmeal Cookies 395Apple Honey Tart 396Part 7: Appendixes 397Appendix A: Helpful Resources 399Honey Bee Information Websites 399Apiservices - Virtual beekeeping gallery 399The Barefoot Beekeeper 399BeeHoo - The beekeeping directory 400Beemaster Forum 400Bee-Source.com 400Facebook - Top Bar Beekeeping 400Mid-Atlantic Apiculture Research and Extension Consortium (MAARAC) 400National Honey Board 401Bee Organizations and Conferences 401American Apitherapy Society 401American Beekeeping Federation 401American Honey Producers 402Apiary Inspectors of America 402Apimondia: International Federation of Beekeepers' Associations 402Eastern Apiculture Society 403International Bee Research Association 403USDA Agricultural Research Service 404The Western Apiculture Society 404Bee Journals and Magazines 404American Bee Journal 404Bee Culture 405Bee World 405Beekeeping Supplies and Equipment 406Bee-commerce.com 406BeeInventive 406Bee Thinking 407BeeWeaver Apiaries 407Betterbee 408Blue Sky Bee Supply 408Brushy Mountain Bee Farm 408Dadant & Sons, Inc. 409Glorybee Foods, Inc. 409Kelley Beekeeping 410Mann Lake 410Miller Bee Supply 410Rossman Apiaries 411Sacramento Beekeeping 411Swienty Beekeeping Equipment 411Thorne Beekeeping Supply 412State Bee Inspectors (United States) 412Appendix B: Beekeeper's Checklist 413Appendix C: Glossary 415Index 423