so, awhile back i asked about bees on the ol' tstout.com. and many people had tons of helpful info, and i am truly appreciative. i did get one email that had pretty much all the info you need for starting to raise bees, which i will be attempting to do. it was so informative i figured i should actually post it up, in case anyone else is curious. my thanks to brad for all this amazing info.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Hi Tyler,
Happy to help out.
Getting started is not that hard, but it does take some capital, planning and time. The Spring is the best time to get started in beekeeping. Ideally, you would get some bees from a local beekeeper in your area that would see you a "Nuc" (pronounced "nook"...long ooooo"), which is short for a "nucleus colony". This is a small colony of bees with a laying queen that will have 4 frames of capped brood and a full frame of honey. Typically, you would get a 5 frame, Deep nuc ("Deep" is the size of frame) and add it to a larger 10-frame box. This is the ideal because the bees have already got a large part of their work done and will be focusing on filling the new space while waiting for the new bees to emerge, plus, they are all related, i.e., the queen in the nuc is their mother.
The second best option is to buy a package of bees, which is a "box" of bees containing 3 pounds of workers and a mated queen. These bees are typically sold by honeybee producers, so you end up with a young queen that is introduced to a lot of un-related bees. Those bees will accept her for the most part, but since they are un-related, the workers will often "supercede" or replace her with a newer queen pretty soon after "installation" into a new hive.
With that aside, you will need to buy equipment. Of course, this depends on what style of hive you decide to go with, but I'll assume you're going to go with the crowd for just a moment. That would mean you'll be buying "Langstroth" style equipment, which is industry standard, therefore, readily available. You can get it at many, many different vendors, some local, some not. I did a presentation on this in January on considerations/cost of getting started. The presentation is at this link:
The other alternative is to build your own Top Bar Hive. Top Bar Hives are one of the oldest styles of hives that have removable bars. The bees will build their comb right on the bars and you can inspect the colonies in much the same way as a Langstroth. There are many pros and cons to using this style of hive:
Pros:
- Cheap - you can build one from scrap material so long as you have a saw, hammer and nails and the skills to do it
- Bees are less "disturbed" when you inspect them- much nicer to inspect happier bees than not
- Bees get to draw out the comb in the configuration they desire
- Non-Standard - it is hard to trade with other beekeepers and harder to combine colonies, etc...
- Takes more time to do inspections - comb is weaker and gets attached to side walls of hive more often
- Honey production is lower - you have to destroy the comb in order to harvest the honey, therefore, it takes more resources (honey) to build the comb every time. Langstroth frames allow for reuse of the comb. You just uncap the comb, spin it out then put it back for them to fill again. They don't have to rebuild the comb every time, so less honey they consumer, which means more in the comb
Now, the final piece (and this is critical), you should get connected with a local beekeeping club. That is where you're going to get the most information and help. There is also a forum called the Western Washington beekeeping forum (nwdba.proboards.org) that has a lot of Western WA beekeepers working together every day. It is an invaluable combination.
Let me know if you have any other questions.
--
Regards,
Brad
