A Little Bit on Honeybees and Bee Keeping

[Still_Small_Voice]

Honeybees have been fascinating to me for a few years. My brother recently purchased some honeybees and became a Bee Keeper. All the bees cost him $80 but I do not know how much the rest of his equipment cost.

There is only one queen per hive. The queen is the only bee with fully developed ovaries. A queen bee can live for 3-5 years. The queen mates only once with several male (drone) bees, and will remain fertile for life. She lays up to 2,000 eggs per day. Fertilized eggs become female (worker bees) and unfertilized eggs become male (drone bees). When she dies or becomes unproductive, the other bees will "make" a new queen by selecting a young larva and feeding it a diet of "royal jelly". For queen bees, it takes 16 days from egg to emergence.

All worker bees are female, but they are not able to reproduce. Worker bees live for 4-9 months during the winter season, but only 6 weeks during the busy summer months (they literally work themselves to death). Nearly all of the bees in a hive are worker bees. A hive consists of 20,000 - 30,000 bees in the winter, and over 60,000 - 80,000 bees in the summer. The worker bees sequentially take on a series of specific chores during their lifetime: housekeeper; nursemaid; construction worker; grocer; undertaker; guard; and finally, after 21 days they become a forager collecting pollen and nectar. For worker bees, it takes 21 days from egg to emergence. The worker bee has a barbed stinger that results in her death following stinging, therefore, she can only sting once.

The drone bees are male bees. They are kept on standby during the summer for mating with a virgin queen. After mating a drone dies. There are only 300-3,000 drones in a hive. The drone does not have a stinger. Because they are of no use in the winter, drones are expelled from the hive in the autumn.

Agriculture depends greatly on the honeybee for pollination. Honeybees account for 80% of all insect pollination. Without such pollination, we would see a significant decrease in the yield of fruits and vegetables.

My brother filmed the bee transfer from his car trunk to emptying them into their new hive.

You can watch it all on YouTube here:

You hear a child screaming at one point during the transfer. He was not stung.

Edited April 25, 2011 by Still_Small_Voice

[slamjet]

1) That's absolutely fascinating!

2) I would hate to be his neighbor.

[Captain_Curmudgeon]

Could you ask your brother this:

Does a Beefeater ...

• Feat bees ...
• or ...
• Eat beef?

Thank you. Want to know before the royal wedding.

[classylady]

My older brother has been a bee keeper, and we always had bees on our dairy farm when I was growing up. It was fascinating to watch my brother gather the honey and care for the hives. It's been sad these last few years to see so many of the bees and the hives die off. I watched a documentary about the bees dying off. In China (maybe it was Japan), they are having to pollinate the pear blossoms manually because of no bees. Can you imagine what would happen to agriculture if the bees all died off?

[pam]

I'm glad there are others who love and are willing to do this. For me..I'm petrified of bees.

[mightynancy]

I often think of taking up beekeeping, but I'm not sure of the time commitment. It's not even that I want the honey and wax so much, it's just that I adore bees. I follow them around the yard and everything, especially the big, fat ones. True confessions.

[slamjet]

I often think of taking up beekeeping, but I'm not sure of the time commitment. It's not even that I want the honey and wax so much, it's just that I adore bees. I follow them around the yard and everything, especially the big, fat ones. True confessions.

You truly are warped.

[Backroads]

Hey, I also love bees! They're cute, and my uncle keeps them.

[slamjet]

Hey, I also love bees! They're cute, and my uncle keeps them.

Well...

[mightynancy]

You truly are warped.

You truly are chicken. You have, like, a kabillion times the mass of a bee.

[Blocky]

I've had neighbors who kept bees. There were actually less bees in my yard there because we didn't have anything except grass than when we lived in places with lots of flowers but no near by beehive neighbors.

Keeping a beehive is one of my life goals.

[Still_Small_Voice]

Here is an update on my brothers honeybees. He smoked them and opened up the hive. Everything looks like it is going well. The queen bee is laying eggs, the bees are producing honey and being productive. I have never had honey in the comb and I cannot wait to try some.

I used to be really scared of going near the hive but when he smokes the bees I have no issues now getting within 6 feet of the hive.

Honeybees are so industrious and useful. They are quite fascinating creatures the LORD created.

[bcguy]

Watched a documentary on it. We need bees. Bees are responsible for 2/3 of our agriculture.

I was also watching Japanese pollinate flowers by hand. It was estimated that if bees were to die off in the united states, it would cost billions of dollars to hire people to hand pollinate fruit flowers.

It was a good documentary and not sure if the problem is getting worse, or getting better.

I wished I had a hive. I wonder if I can have one on BChydro power line property? I guess I could ask.