Honey bees

[CloverKnollFarms]

I’m only in year 4 and this will be my first spring to live on the land (house got delayed by COVID). As such I’ve been much more of a “keep ‘em alive for valuation” than a beekeeper.

Now that we are here full time I hope to put out my old nuc boxes with swarm attractant and try to catch a couple; I haven’t had the opportunity to do so before. I also want to do my first split. Two of my hives went into the fall very strong and are likely candidates.

I don’t know that I can get $25/pint across the board. That what local sells for in feed stores and nursery’s but that’s small quantities. Farmers markets range from $8-20/pint. I’d probably have to sell to the retailers at $10-12. Still if I can repeat last years 6 gallons in a drought I can sell 3 gallons and at least pay for one of my nucs!

We currently sell for $12/lb and cannot keep it on the shelf. That’s $18/pint… we also live in a very economically depressed region

 

[Hoot Owl]

I had 24 swarms in traps last year. Non of them were from my own hives.
Nuc's are ok for late summer swarms. If you have extra full size boxes use them for your swarm traps. The big swarms won't go in the nuc's. I have had early swarms that filled 2, 10 frame deeps. I never did farmers markets. I don't have time to go sit and talk to people like that. I have been selling honey for about 10 years now and people call me when they need it. 6 qt's this morning.

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

I had 24 swarms in traps last year. Non of them were from my own hives.
Nuc's are ok for late summer swarms. If you have extra full size boxes use them for your swarm traps. The big swarms won't go in the nuc's. I have had early swarms that filled 2, 10 frame deeps. I never did farmers markets. I don't have time to go sit and talk to people like that. I have been selling honey for about 10 years now and people call me when they need it. 6 qt's this morning.

We also don’t actively sell… it’s word of mouth, and it goes fast

 

[LittleBittyBigJohn]

I'm hoping to get enough honey this summer to test the market here. I expect that it will sell easily.

 

[Eaglesfate]

We no longer buy bees. Our swarm catches far outperform the farmed bees. I usually grab about 4 swarms per year…

How late in the season do you catch swarms?

 

[Torvy]

Just curious. At what point do you have to get the FDA, FTC and such involved in your business. Not an invite to devolve into politics, just a legit question. We would like to sell (on a small scale) small jars of products from our land (probably 3-5 years from now). We considered a web sales model with shipping (I'm not looking to make a bunch of money OR talk to people). It will likely be 3-5 months before we can move onto our land permanently.

 

[Hoot Owl]

Each state is different. Here in Mo. we have to stay under $50,000 before they get involved.
We don't need to have our hives or honey house inspected till we reach that number in over all sales.
Check your state bee keepers web sight, it should have a link to that information.

I came in from the shop after cutting 200 more med. frame ends for around 800. Then assembled 100 frames after lunch.
300 more tomorrow then foundation. (My back is hurting)

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

How late in the season do you catch swarms?

Mid June is as late as I go. I catch most in mid May

 

[LittleBittyBigJohn]

Just curious. At what point do you have to get the FDA, FTC and such involved in your business. Not an invite to devolve into politics, just a legit question. We would like to sell (on a small scale) small jars of products from our land (probably 3-5 years from now). We considered a web sales model with shipping (I'm not looking to make a bunch of money OR talk to people). It will likely be 3-5 months before we can move onto our land permanently.

In Arkansas you can produce up to 500 gallons of honey before inspections are required. That would be close to 120 hives at an average of 50lbs of harvested honey per colony. If you were to ship across state lines I think you have to abide by the recipient state laws also.

 

[LouNY]

Interesting thread, I don't keep bee's and have no desire too.At my brothers on the farm an outfit keeps 15-20 hives year round.
They are one of the larger Bee Keeper outfits around here they sell a lot of bee;s and all the hives and equipment for them.

Myself I get all of our honey from a local bee keeper that has quite a few hives. His honey room as I recall has 4 300 gallon tanks that he keeps honey in and he has quite an extraction and cleanup unit, I've watched the process a few times when I was picking up honey. We go through quite a bit, my wife likes it in her morning coffee and we use a lot in baking and such.

I usually get 4 or 5 five pound jugs at a time, last year I think it was around $21 per jug. I just called Saturday about picking some up and he called back this morning to let me know it'd be ready to pick up this afternoon. The price has gone up considerably now it's $31 a jug unless I get a case of 6 in which case it drops to $25 each, so 6 jugs it is today. I'm transferring the last of our last 5 pounder into her small squeeze bottle this morning.

 

[LittleBittyBigJohn]

It warmed up to a little over 60 this weekend. I mixed up some 2:1 sugar water and open fed. My 3 hives took in 60 lbs of sugar in 2 days. They were very active.

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

Wow. All seven of mine are flying. Praise God. I was told they would never survive without feeding and treatment. In two years, no losses.

 

[LittleBittyBigJohn]

2 of my 3 probably would have been fine without feeding. They were established, strong and had a reasonable amount of honey stores. 1 of them had been weak all year, barely grew, then immediately shrank down at the end of fall. I'm just trying to get them through winter so I can re-queen that hive and hopefully save it. I found mites in that hive during a routine inspection, which caused me to go ahead and treat all 3 hives. The mites could have been the cause of the colony being so weak. With that suspicion in mind, I'm going to start a nuc with her instead of killing her. If she's still not producing much brood in the nuc I'll go ahead and pinch her.

 

[Hoot Owl]

Checked 60 hives yesterday. Intending on adding Mt. camp sugar. 40F when I started, 64F when I finished and very windy. Lost 3 more hives in the first yard. All 3 had 3 frames of brood and that is were they froze last week. They each had a 10 frame deep full of honey and 2 also had a supper full. All of the other 57 are looking good. only 1 felt light. 2 still had stores in the bottom box, with a 2nd deep and medium full. Did not feed them.
It felt GOOD to get back in the hives.
Also sold some equipment for an 83 year old beekeeper who just cant do it any more.

 

[LittleBittyBigJohn]

Did a little work this weekend. It got warm enough to check on the hives. I was by myself so I just snapped a couple pics when I first started.

Random frame of bees. Lots of brood and pollen coming in already. No idea where they are finding pollen. This was an end frame, most are drawn fuller than this.

Found Momma

And assembled a few more hive bodies. I'm so ready to build a shop.

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

Beautiful queen there. I made it to the shop late last night, worked on frames. I have to cut 400 individual pieces and then assemble. Luckily I have a few months.

 

[LittleBittyBigJohn]

I have 160 frames to assemble still... I'm sure I won't need them all this year. But, as soon as I decide not to build them all I'll need them.

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

I have 160 frames to assemble still... I'm sure I won't need them all this year. But, as soon as I decide not to build them all I'll need them.

This is true. I can never have too many frames or hives on standby. Right now my hive capacity exceeds the # of frames I have. 11 hives is equal to 220 frames of full capacity. Most hives only fill out to about 15-17 frames… but then there are swarm traps!

 

[HawkinsHollow]

I have never been interested in beekeeping, but this thread might be changing my mind. I guess we can never have too many beekeepers in this world, right? On a scale of 1-10 where 1 is "Eh, I spend a couple hours a month on this" to 10 which feels like a full time job is having enough hives to supply my family with honey all year and have plenty to give away. (does that question make sense?) Basically how much work is it to have a nice little supply of honey for me and my friends?

 

[CloverKnollFarms]

I have never been interested in beekeeping, but this thread might be changing my mind. I guess we can never have too many beekeepers in this world, right? On a scale of 1-10 where 1 is "Eh, I spend a couple hours a month on this" to 10 which feels like a full time job is having enough hives to supply my family with honey all year and have plenty to give away. (does that question make sense?) Basically how much work is it to have a nice little supply of honey for me and my friends?

With a couple horizontal hives? An hour per month? I’d keep two hives. With a Langstroth it could be more. Two hives would produce 60 pounds reliably. Up to 80 perhaps.