Beginning Beekeeping: Lost Queen? New Queens - GSB S1 E5

[@RobsAquaponics]

Thanks for the look Blake & Espen. Am looking at getting a hive once we have the yard all sorted out now. Am hoping to post a clip on a wild Italian hive in the same tree as a native honey bee hive. Not as interesting as yours though. Cheers folks.

[@mizsterious]

Very exciting . . . I love these vids on the bees. You did great! Thank you for sharing once again!

[@daddykirbs]

miz sterious It's more fun when Espen, The Golden Son Beekeeper, is in charge! LOL I like this being his responsibility, but the bees don't always wait for the ideal time to need something :)

[@bobbiemooser5946]

You are amazing. That envelope looks like it might contain “smashed bees”🤫 I’m going to have to educate myself some. Brood, drones, nectar, pollen, . If you are seeing honey, nectar and pollen. Wow lots of hard work.

[@GardeningWithPuppies]

I can see where raising bees can be a bit complicated. I hope it all works out for you, Blake.

[@daddykirbs]

Gardening With Puppies There is so much knowledge, but so many beekeepers have different methods. I get confused. :)

[@daddykirbs]

Gardening With Puppies ... which is why I gave this enterprise to my son. He's too young to get so confused! LOL You know, teenagers always know what's best right? :)

[@GardeningWithPuppies]

Wait until you get my age. That's when confusion really kicks in. I astound my hubby with it all the time. LOL.

[@thuffman44]

*Hi Five* & thumbs up Blake. Beekeeping is a lot like gardening in that there really is no "wrong way" of doing things. Sure, there is room for error but its just like a gardening experience in that nature will always take it's coarse. You only learn from your own experience and observation. Ask 10 different beekeepers how they would have approached your issue & you'd likely get 10 different answers. LOL.. This was an excellent video. Thank you so much for bringing us along

[@daddykirbs]

Tim Huffman I do like sharing my journey. My mistakes are a part of my learning process. Sometimes I find that what I thought was a mistake turns out to be ok. Yep, observation and interaction... good way to learn.

[@bear09871]

I sure wanted to jump in there and give you a hand! LOL One word of advise, never fill a nuc with five frames full of honey. Your soon to be released queen will need a place to start laying right away. Everyone has to learn though! Good job!

[@daddykirbs]

+bear09871 I'm on a learning journey for sure. Thanks for the tips ;)

[@TheAbledGardener]

Great job Blake, I don't know what I would do if I had found what I thought was a queen if there wasn't any brood. If it was a queen, I guess she made the decision for you. I didn't notice the date on this video, I guess after a year, it all went well, LOL. Take care and good luck! Kim

[@daddykirbs]

+The Abled Gardener Not all well... Both queens I installed failed. Only one hive from last year made it through the Winter. This season we added 5 additional hives for a total of 6. We'll see how it goes! :)

[@TheAbledGardener]

+Blake “Daddykirbs” Kirby I guess I didn't see your vid where your queens failed, do you know why? Or why you lost hives during the winter, of course our winters are mild and no snow, so I don't have to deal with the cold. Sounds like you have a good bee business going now and I'll keep watching your "Golden son".

[@daddykirbs]

***** I don't think I did a video explaining the loss of the queens. Sometimes I can't even keep up with myself :) I'm not sure if it's ever going to be a bee business but it's fun giving it a go.

[@yackfzay6224]

Incredible creature these bees are. They are also very fragile. I have seen other documentary about bringing in new queens bee. The bees surround and eat the candy and slowly she is slowly release by them. You just did fine. Can you give us a tour of the surrounding area where you keep the bees. Try to plant some flowers, this will increase your honey yield. Great videos as always.

[@daddykirbs]

yack f zay I will do an apiary tour. Thanks for the suggestion. This Spring we had a lot of wild flowers, but now they are mostly gone. There are plans to plant more flowers. I'd love to encourage bees, butterflies and hummingbirds to call my farm home :)

[@lizspencer605]

I think you did fine. The only thing I might have done different is when you found what you thought might be a queen, I would have made a triple split instead of double.

[@daddykirbs]

Liz Spencer I've researched the triple split since someone else mentioned it. Now it's one of those "Doh, I shoulda..." things. LOL

[@jotttn]

I think you did very well. It's a learning curve every year and I think you did the right thing :)

[@daddykirbs]

+jon alford thanks, someday I'll figure it out. :)

[@jefflavoielavoie6636]

Ya

[@jerryprewett5294]

blake you did a great job brother ,even if there was another queen it will work its self out ,when its a queen cage with just her it does not matter ?reason for up in packaged queens is if one of the workers in there with her dies it will fall and she can still get out ,,

[@daddykirbs]

jerry prewett Thanks. I'm hoping it all works out ok. Did you see the swarm balled up in my tree (not related to this video) picture on Facebook? That was a fun experience :) facebook.com/daddykirbsfarm

[@jerryprewett5294]

Blake Kirby no but i will check it out later tonight.got a couple videos on my channel too sir ?

[@oakland002]

In nature , once the queen is gone, new ones will hatch and the first queen goes around and take out the younger queen , even if they haven't hatch yet.. So that's why I was a bit confused why you would need to purchase new queen. Next I've seen where keeper paint the back of the queen with bright colors , so they can be easily seen.

[@daddykirbs]

oakland002 Yes, there is some concern in South Texas for the newly hatched virgin queens to go out and mate with feral drones. These drones could have some negative genes in them that cause them to be very aggressive. Since my hive is less than 150 yards from the house I haven't wanted to risk having a dangerous hive. However, I am reading quite a bit where many beekeepers in TX don't have a serious problem with that so who knows what the future holds.

[@jotttn]

Everyone has their own way but personally I would have the candy facing down just in case any dead bees block the way, others may disagree

[@floriebrown2089]

Thank Blake Great video

[@daddykirbs]

+florie Brown You are very welcome. Thank you for watching and commenting :)

[@itsjustrenee1320]

"be gentle on me"......lol

[@mezleona]

Hi Blake You need to do the checker board method in order for your hive to survive even with a new queen If you do not have brood to take the place of the worker your hive will collapse So, here is the deal.... You get some frame one with honey and pollen Next one with brood combining them into your nuc boxes. The brood of course should be keep in the middle. The nurse bees would have feed the brood and made a new queen, if you have queen cells already use those, maybe you can end up with 4 new hive! So. First frame honey and pollen 2, and 3 with the brood and the last one again with honey and pollen for the nurse bees to feed the brood. I watch a lot of videos from brushy mountain farm bees, and from another university sorry I forget the name. Also there is a lady very knowledgeable that has a website "honeybee suite.com Check it out, if you decide to put in your new queens, since you already bought them, you still have to put at least one frame with brood in each nuc, At least so you have young bees after 21 days Let me know how it went..... I am still working in trying to move my bees.... By the way you forgot to tell me what material do you use to smoke your bees..

[@daddykirbs]

mezleona We use wood chips, tree bark, dried grass and other similar items in the smoker :)

[@joejon5761]

Totally missed Golden Son (Espen) He is way more bee confident, hope he comes back to the videos.

[@franpon6470]

You should always use a smoker when openning a hive. You never know the reaction they may have . And they will fly less around, mluch easier to work in the hive. You don't have to smoke them a lot, just a little.

[@daddykirbs]

Fran Pon Do you ever use sugar water in place of smoke?

[@franpon6470]

No I don't. But I've heard that people spring some over bees when they're adding a full swarm in an empty hive. To avoid them flying all around.

[@MathijsHerremans]

If you don't no of there is a queen, hang a frame withe egg, open brood in you beehive. If the make redcells. You know there is no queen. You can brake after 13 days the queen cells. Brake them after 5 o'clock in the midday, you do not get a swarm. A new queen will start laying eggs if the brood from the old queen is born. But you live in a place with Africanized bees, so you want gentle bees. Please do a course. I hear in Europe, the Netherlands, a lot of bee hives dying in the USA If everyone start by its own beekeeping it isn't crazy there are so many dead hives. (And don't forget the big beekeepers in the USA with 15000 hives that cross the country where there is less diversity in pollen and nectar.) Success with beekeeping, I hope to see more. I start also this year, in the Netherlands.

[@daddykirbs]

+Mathijs Thank you for that advice and encouragement. We will record another Bee episode soon.

[@wildchookMaryP]

Fingers cross everything will be okay Blake.

[@daddykirbs]

***** Fingers crossed :)

[@TheItalianGarden]

that was for sure a queen. they way the bee's huddled in a circle around her as you pointed to her was no mistake a queen. probably she just got bred and will start laying in a few days. but yes she very well could have matted with a feral africanized which would make her bee's slightly more aggressive if she did. you need to locate her and remove her or your bought queen will be rejected and killed or she will swarm off with some of the bee's if she is excepted because the new raised queen is still present.

[@daddykirbs]

TheItalian Garden I'll give it a good inspection to see if I can find her again. So far, however, the 2 nucs appear to be doing really well.

[@TheItalianGarden]

good hope that you find her and that the queen that you bought is not dead or gone. i think for me i like them to raise their own queen here because there are no africanized bee's and they have much better chance of surviving with the local survivor stock.

[@tstran02]

Just for future reference. Russian like to build emergency queen cells. It doesn't mean that they will re-queen with those cells anytime soon. Don't be surprised if you don't see eggs or brood when there isn't a nectar flow. The queen can stop laying if she so chooses. I believe you re-queened prematurely. So don't be surprised if those Russian kill the ones you introduce. Just a heads up. Russian can be picky with their queen. However, if they are in fact queenless they will make new queens from the frames with the eggs and brood from your friend. You will see queen cells within 7 days. Good luck!

[@daddykirbs]

tstran02 Thank you!

[@moniquenaude8759]

Hi there,read somewhere that when the queen dies,they make a new one as soon as possible?insight on this please?thanks for the video 😁

[@Karen-lx2jq]

Lol I keep getting jumpy when the bees fly by the camera and make the buzzing sound

[@Mzgetlite]

Why has there been no more updates?! I've sooo missed this series :(

[@daddykirbs]

+Mzgetlite there is more coming. We've been in a holding pattern for the Winter. We have 5 Nuc hives ordered so the Golden Son beekeeper's apiary is about to expand!

[@razoo]

@@daddykirbs it's now been 4 years....it must be one hell of a long winter.

[@arcadeanimations3539]

You looked very worried in this video!

[@daddykirbs]

+Arcade Animations I was LOL

[@pironiero]

i dont know why i like videos about beekeping and at this point im afraid to ask.....

[@hartrose33]

you did the right thing, I think .but I don't nothing about bees

[@daddykirbs]

hartrose33 I did the right thing by trying to do the right thing LOL... we'll see if it worked.

[@oakland002]

Hey don't those hives just boxes.. I mean you're pretty handy, try building some or even bigger and longer box

[@daddykirbs]

oakland002 my issue isn't how handy I might be... it's time. I ordered some new hive boxes, bottoms and lids today.

[@festivalfreak]

+Blake What's in your video toolbox, ie camera, tripod, editing software?

[@daddykirbs]

Simple $500 camera, mostly hand held. Edited with Adobe premiere pro.

[@festivalfreak]

Cool. Thanks!

[@daddykirbs]

Daniel Strickland Some of my videos are shot with my phone too. I think most of the bee videos are. Right now I have the Galaxy S6.

[@bobbiemooser5946]

Hey‼️I saw some bare hands in this video‼️

[@freakygeaktwo]

Good luck with the new Queens, if they both are accepted does this give you three hives now? thanks for sharing.

[@daddykirbs]

freakygeaktwo Correct, 3 hives if all goes well.

[@roberthrodebert9263]

I know this may sound dumb but I know nothing about bee keeping but I am curious: when you get the queens in those cages how do they not die when they are shipped to you?

[@Toxicrafa]

Robert Drangus Because in that cage there should be as well 3 or 4 normal bees that feed her. And the shipping time is usually one day only.

[@daddykirbs]

Robert Drangus I have wondered that too. Only recently did I discover that they bees will feed each other. Yes, Toxicrafa thank you. They are shipped with several bees to accompany the Queen. I think in my shipment only one worker bee didn't live through shipping.

[@SpecialAgentNoble77]

Put the Queen back in the box. Put three frames in each cardboard box and install new queens with 2 empty frames. Your brood box needs more room. And more frames. Carry the two new nucs two miles plus away. Next time ask the internet first. You should have ended up with two nucs and brood nest.

[@LoyalistViral]

Al Wilson To be fair, the internet isn't always right

[@SpecialAgentNoble77]

LoyalistViral True. Very true. But I found it better than to be clueless.

[@LoyalistViral]

Al Wilson I would agree to that 100%, plus I'm sure there are bee keeper forums all over the place since bee keeping seems alot bigger than it used to be

[@SpecialAgentNoble77]

LoyalistViral The internet is alot bigger than it use to be.

[@daddykirbs]

Al Wilson The internet is so big that it can be a challenge to get a clear answer. Ask a million people one question and getting anything other than a mindful of boggle is difficult. There are a few trusted sites that I consult. I hope you aren't confusing lack of confidence with cluelessness. I never said I was clueless. I freely admit that I "don't really know what I'm doing" and "I'm not confident", but that doesn't equal clueless. So, when you say "Carry the two new nucs two miles plus away"... do you mean from the original location AND each other? Once they are carried two miles away, how long do they stay that distance. At which point would you bring them back to your apiary? What does "Put the Queen back in the box" mean? Are you talking about the queens I purchased, or the one that I thought I saw? I love advice, but sometimes it isn't clear. This is why I document my journey so others can see real life struggles instead of just one more person believing they know "the right way to do it". Learning is a process and much of it happens by personal observation and doing, not reading 100 opinions. Thank you for taking the time to engage with me. I'd love to continue the discussion. I know there is a lot for me to learn.

[@army1206]

My question is, if you wanted brood, why didn't you just take it from the other hive?

[@army1206]

army1206 Also, if that was a queen you saw, would the hive try to congregate into that one nuc and abandon the other?

[@thuffman44]

Taking brood from the other hive would only make it weaker

[@thuffman44]

army1206 Yeah, if that was a queen, then the worker bees would try to kill the new queen if not separated from each other

[@daddykirbs]

army1206 We considered taking brood from our other hive, but we are concerned for that hive right now too. We don't want to weaken it in any way. As far as all the bees trying to go to the one hive... I thought that could happen, but it hasn't so far :)

[@kuolievikirekire8755]

does that work?

[@andrescelano4179]

how are the bees doing?

[@daddykirbs]

+Andres Celano The bees are doing well so far this season. Tomorrow another beekeeping video will go live. We just installed hive number 6 for this year.

[@ExtraFungus]

where in tx are you?

[@daddykirbs]

+Josh Bishop Near SA.

[@ExtraFungus]

+Blake “Daddykirbs” Kirby Ok, I'm a beekeeper in the Dallas area.

[@meehan302]

Beekeeping is a complex subject for me .

[@aidensmith6277]

Of Course It Is. Your Patrick The Pink Starfish.

[@andrescelano4179]

+Aiden Smith savage

[@SVAROG_FREE_ENERGY]

Hello, Blake! Super bee hive. УЛЕЙ "ВЕЛИКОРУСЬКИЙ" kzbin.info/www/bejne/pJipnKmOrZKfg7s

[@daddykirbs]

I'd like to see some English sub-titles on this :)

[@SVAROG_FREE_ENERGY]

Thanks. Translation will be later. I tell you. All the best.

[@kevinbijsterveld9156]

i'm about to start beekeeping myself. assembling the supers and frames next month. but from my completely inexperienced perspective. it seems wrong to split the queenless hive into two nucs and then puting them back together in the same box. i've seen some beekeepers simply requeening the hive, making sure they have a young queen. put her in a box with a candy plug and let the bees accept her by slowly eating away the candy that locks her in. that would seem much better. at least i think. if you are going to split them in 2 why not put them into 2 new deep supers and space them apart a bit? if you could enlighten me why you are doing it your way i would be very happy since i am trying to understand different strategies and motivations.

[@kevinbijsterveld9156]

+Kevin Bijsterveld also, i have seen a beekeeper fixing the issue by taking out one frame without brood, puting it into a healthy hive, and taking a frame full of brood and placing it into the queenless hive. obviously with a new queen in her neat lil box. this way he says, the healthy brood will help keep the hive population up until the new queen can start laying her eggs. since it takes 21 days for the bees to mature and they may only live 3 to 6 weeks in spring and summer. btw, i like your video's and im hoping there will be more soon. and a lil request if i may. that beekeeper in episode 1 alvin, is so full of info. maybe do another video with him in the future?

[@daddykirbs]

+Kevin Bijsterveld I wouldn't take anything I did there as a real strategy LOL. The queen cages did have the candy plugs. My goal in placing the two nuc boxes together was to control drift. I hoped that the bees would come and go between the two boxes and sort out for themselves how many should be in each box. Overall the experiment failed. Both purchased queens died. There will be more information about that in a video coming soon.