Today I installed five colonies of package bees that I bought from Beez Neez in Snohomish. The bees fit into our farm plan by producing honey for us to include in our Thanksgiving Dinner Baskets. You can find more photos of the installation here.
I find that working with bees is actually pretty easy compared to many other farm tasks. They take care of themselves for the most part, and only require attention a few times a year. They don't cost anything to maintain, and give you many pounds of honey each year. There are downsides to bees, though: risk of sting (I got stung twice today), expensive equipment (each colony cost about $300 to get going), risk of poor honey years (most people didn't get a crop last year, and possibilities that your colony will die (our first colony finally died after five years of production without re-queening).
There are lots of good tutorials on installing package bees on the interwebs, but the basic idea is that you shake the bees into the hive, add some sugar syrup as a supplemental feed, close up the hive, and introduce the queen and hope the bees accept her. In a few days, I'll check to make sure the queen is laying eggs. The colony won't grow for 23 days (length of time it takes for new workers to emerge from their cocoons after egg laying), so we really won't be getting any honey collection until the beginning of June. Here's hoping we'll get enough this year to share in your baskets!
I find that working with bees is actually pretty easy compared to many other farm tasks. They take care of themselves for the most part, and only require attention a few times a year. They don't cost anything to maintain, and give you many pounds of honey each year. There are downsides to bees, though: risk of sting (I got stung twice today), expensive equipment (each colony cost about $300 to get going), risk of poor honey years (most people didn't get a crop last year, and possibilities that your colony will die (our first colony finally died after five years of production without re-queening).
There are lots of good tutorials on installing package bees on the interwebs, but the basic idea is that you shake the bees into the hive, add some sugar syrup as a supplemental feed, close up the hive, and introduce the queen and hope the bees accept her. In a few days, I'll check to make sure the queen is laying eggs. The colony won't grow for 23 days (length of time it takes for new workers to emerge from their cocoons after egg laying), so we really won't be getting any honey collection until the beginning of June. Here's hoping we'll get enough this year to share in your baskets!
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