วีดีโอ

Oh, one thing I would like to mention is that bees don’t like when we have perfume on or strong orders, I just don’t know why, but they don’t like it

I’m so sorry you had to go through all that pain, l hope your recovery goes fast and well, I noticed you didn’t used smoke when doing the inspection, remember, it’s always a good idea to use some smoke it helps, One last thing try to remember to inspect your suit before putting it on, I know we forget, it happens to me too, thank you for Sharing

You need a real bee suit. That will keep you from getting stung. It didn't look like all your deep frames are drawn out. You shouldn't have put the med box on til it was drawn out. Why are you letting them lay brood in your honey supper. Instead of putting sugar water in your spray bottle use white vinegar. Spay it on yourself the bees will stay off of you. Just don't spray it in the hive or on the frames. Try using Allegra or zertec it seems to work better then benadryl

I love them ❤

Dang girl! That is scary stuff! I'm glad your ok now.

Time for new genetics and two things use smoke and buy a better hive tool

youtube must pay well for you to make such video's, i assume you DO own a smoker and have all your faculties.

Just be sure to keep your dog run far enough away if you are thinking on more colonies. If you can use some kind of solid obstetrical to elevate flight level that can help a lot with flight activity, I have seen people plant quick growing shrubs. Thanks for sharing, You and your Husband have a Great Day.

What I use for my fume board to drive them down to harvest honey I use to spray around my ankles on my triple layer socks and neck zipper to keep them off. I was shaking some frames to help a weaker hive to increase the population angered them so they found my one layer socks and hit me 6x. With spraying now no problem. Go in between 10-2 as the foragers are out so only the nurse bees are there whom usually are Less aggressive. Smoker always, slow and steady. I carry a old credit card to scrap immediately the stinger off to stop the venom as it will keep pumping even did the bee is gone. I put a baking soda mud on the sting with a bandaid to hold it on at it reduces the swelling, pain and reaction. Do what you love and take care of the girls, we need them all. Beekeeping for 9 years at age 74.

My bees were flying around today here in Southern Maine, we had a high of 56. I'm going to be selling some of my honey at a craft fair tomorrow. (10 12oz bottles and some comb.)

I've used sugar water spray, usually if I am saving a wild hive (see episode 24) as it is a good thing to have when things get out of control. 1:1 works good, haven't see any drown. Bees have a very specific sensitivity to motion. Too slow and they don't react. Too fast and they don't react. The second one was surprising as I had to use a pneumatic stapler inside a hive full of bees and I was expecting big problems. Apparently, the speed of the stapler was so fast, that they didn't understand it and didn't react! (episode 209)

I'm in Michigan, I check twice in the spring and once in the fall to make sure my hives are queen right. Any other times I crack the lid just to look to see if they need more room for honey.

Well. You are desensitized. A bee sting will act like a mild mosquito bite from now on. Have fun.

Those are pretty aggressive, you need to throw down some smoke! And watch if you have on any perfume/scent that they are curious about. Smoke yourself and the hive. Couple of puffs every few minutes.

You should have an epi pen before going back out. I am a beekeeper who developed anaphylaxis on year 2 of keeping bees from 2 stings. I am seeing an allergist and going thru treatment to desensitize to stings. Be careful because even 1 sting after what you have been thru can bring on anaphylactic shock. Always carry epi!

what part of Florida do you live in?

Im In Australia on the south coast NSW, during spring, summer and autumn I will typically inspect the brood box every 1/5 to 2 weeks for queen presence, swarm prevention, disease and pests especially now with Varroa approaching our area rapidly. Don't inspect at all through winter but may give them a feed. Investing in a triple layer suit is well worth it and you don't have to wear all those extra layers. Hope this helps

New beekeeper… (just released a couple videos on my channel.) But I check once a week. Mine are next to my house which makes it easy. I check for pests. Make sure there’s new brood for signs the queen is doing her job. And I have observation window on the top so I can open the top without a suit to check the honey supers. In QLD Australia.

We are southeast of Dallas Tx. and not as often as I would like. Typically only inspect the broad chamber in the spring unless I think something is going on I need to verify. Pine needles are my fuel of choice, they are plentiful in are area if I need it to last for an extended period of time I'll through a cone in preferably closed.

🥰🥰

I’m just North of Green Bay, Wisconsin. I use Broodminder sensors and scales, which greatly helps limiting my time in the hives. I live on White Pine Rd, so yes pine needles are the best 😄

Use what PPE and safety measures you feel you need to take to get your confidence back. It's all good you learnt a tough lesson and are doing well, I am Glad that you decided to stick with honey bees. I am in Washington State so I can not really give you advice on inspections for this time of year, about all I do is look in the top and see what I can see and check food levels. In fact my girls Winter feed is getting put on them and I'll not check for a month or two after that.😁Keep at it you and your husband are doing great, Blessed Days...

Dang that got my heart racing listening to you!

Oh I've had this happen, but i kept my suit on, even though i was having an anxiety attack with the bees that were inside my suit!! Its so easy to set them off though. So moody!!

I buy a new bottle of benadryl and drop it in my bee tool bucket every spring and toss the old one. Never needed it yet, but benadryl is cheap and very useful to have on hand for emergencies. If my bees are aggressive before I even touch the hive the queen gets squished right then and there. I do not tolerate hot hives and you should not either. We have a responsibility to keep good bees, I have to consider that people could stop by my place to buy honey, eggs, drop of the mail, etc. All that said, let me offer you some friendly advice. First, use smoke, smoke the entrance, wait 30 second or more, pop the lid, smoke throught the inner cover, wait 30 seconds, now pop the inner cover off, check for queen on cover and set it off to the side. If you must use gloves consider some tight fitting latex gloves so you can feel bees before you squish bees. Each squashed bee lets off a pheromone that triggers a defence response, too many squished bees and the whole hive will go into defense mode. If I squish a bee under my fingers I smoke my fingers to cover the smell. The only time I wear a jacket and gloves is during harvest, otherwise I am in a tshirt and a vail. Vail always, I aint crazy, I have good bees and try really hard not to squish bees. Additionally watch the weather if rain is on the way, I do not go in. If it is after about 4pm I do not go in, If it is too early(bees not flying) I do not go in. Also, take out a frame closest to one side, inspect for queen just in case, then lean it up against the hive. Now the next frame can be moved over then out so you do not "roll" the bees between the two frames when you lift one out of the middle. If they were cool before you got there, this rolling of many bees is likely what set them off. Pulling a frame out of the boord area, inspecting and sticking back in that narrow spot is very risky for your queen as well, she is a big girl, you do not want to roll the queen. I was a beginner once too, there is a learning curve, I am just trying to give you a little help, I hope you do not take it the wrong way. Good luck with the rest of your season.

If they can’t sting through silicone, I have seen others using the long gloves used by veterinarians. And if you are still worried, perhaps figure out a way to fasten something like parts of therapy/exercise bands on points of your suit which would be pressure points or tension points as you shift. Just a thought. Glad you are ok.

Love your openness!

Yup know the feeling just went out to inspect one of my hives it’s pretty cold out 45 F so I figured they would be a little sluggish but nope no suit but only got one on my finger because it was under my index finger when I went to put the top back on. My bad!

I'm deathly terrified of anything that flies and stings, hence the name of my channel, but I'm obsessed with beekeeping and always will bee. I had 1 colony a few years ago that went ballistic on my in early April, leading to me splitting it 3 ways, which calmed all 3 colony down nicely. Like anyone I am never thrilled to get stung or see overly aggressive behavior from my bees, but as long as I'm not taking stings to the face or head, I can usually deal with it.

If you soften the wax a bit with heat it goes on easier. My bees hate plastic foundation. I had to go with wax foundation so they don't make wonky comb.

It's always rough getting back into it after getting a good hammering!

I Hope not. You shouldn't be scared of your bees, now a healthy respect for the pointy ends is 100% understandable😊and smart even.😂It takes time and patients to learn beekeeping and to learn their behavior ques, there is nothing wrong with taking extra precautions. I think it is awesome that you and your husband have taken on this new journey together, Blessed Days to your Two...

@3:55 - "I" wouldn't mind seeing the rest of y'r body!!

Get those genetics out of the yard. My dumb bee lesson was removing honey supers 2 days after my father-in-law put in the bee escape upside down. I was only pulling honey off 1 hive so why bother to suit up right?. Tee shirt and shorts in the middle of a hot day and I lifted the lid off 2 boxes of hot, angry bees. They lit me up. I learnt an awful lot about my pain (and sting) threshold in 1 minute flat.

The allergist community is trying to move away from Benadryl in favor of Zyrtec.

Here is a good bee story from this spring. Late swarm (aug 3) into my "ornamental" bee hive. I was gonna take a year off. But the bees had other ideas. So since they had swarmed into the top above the queen excluder and not into the main deep entrance, I figured I would go out at night, clean out the bottom board and entrance and then leave. BUT, it was just NOT quit dark enough and ONE single bee came for me. So like any normal person with an angry bee buzzing in my hair, I got up to run the distance you need to placate the biatch. Had to duck under my cloths line, when I did, I stumbled, wearing rubber sandals, started to fall forward, so I did a partial left sided front roll, heard a CRACK, continued to get up and run laughing all the way to the house. Got inside heard another crack. Took some ibu. Long story short, 3 xrays and an MSK ultra sound, events later, BROKEN rib #5 and a CRACKED lower sternum!!! Doc says only sees trauma like that in a car wreck.....should have taken the sting lol Bee got the last laugh GEEZZZ

YES absolutely right, in the fall, even the nicest bees are nasty. They are VERY defensive of their honey stores, maybe it is the WINTER bees that are a holes? lol. Anyway, FULL suit, LOTS of smoke as needed and get in and get OUT! I wont be going back in now till they are cold enough to cluster and then give candy board and forget about them for winter.

Sorry that happened to you but I noted in the video, no smoker? That would have kept their heads down. Today I did a quickie inspection just to see if they were taking my sugar water and making nectar, they were. And twice the girls came heads up to swarm and twice I smoked them down. Even when they were airborne, they aborted with the twirl and smoke. I twirled around and smoked myself and the bees in the air and bobs ur uncle off they went. Ya the other day, my husband was with me and somehow got a bee in his bonnet (inside the veil) We were super surprised, he went running home smacking himself in the head all the way. She chased him home, he actually stopped like YOU did and I yelled, KEEP running go inside. THEN take off the suit, Never do that outside when they are swarming you!!! I never go inside with the suit on. I have had bees in the house from hitching a ride on the suit. So now I stand in front of the window and check all around as best I can and when I see NO bees near me or on me. I take the suit off and again inspect the suit. Then I go in. Also I checked MY veil and noted MANY holes or cuts in the veil, so they ALL got taped up and I am now in the market to get a new one, after seeing ur vid, Im gonna make sure it is better quality. Glad ur ok!!!

Learn and experiment as much as possible, more than half of all advice in bee keeping, I have found, is preferencial. Do what works for you and your bees, best of luck!

I learned the most from my worst beekeeping mistakes so I’d say keep doing it, it makes you better. The more you understand where the girls are at on the day, the better decisions you make. Sometimes it doesn’t work and you have disasters but you’ll learn from each one.

It is a good idea to move slowly but if you ever watch a professional beekeeper that has to inspect dozens of hives, they have to move very quickly or they would take forever to make it through the entire apiary.

Invest in a frame holder. Take one frame out, set on the holder and you'll find it easier to move the frames from side to side without taking the whole frame from the box. This is easier on the bees and makes inspection much easier. When your done...slide all the frames together and replace the one you removed... And do smoke those bees!!! Pine needles work really well and practice lighting your smoker so you can be efficient at it every time!! I use pine shavings and then smoker pellets on top. If it gets to hot, i'll add green grass to the smoker to cool it... Good luck in your beekeeping and carry that epipen with you... It doesn't do you any good to leave it in the house!!!

one step at time dont worry about them dump people say anything bad bad things

Tip - If you haven't figured it out already, when you open your hive, pull the outside frame first, and set it alongside the hive. Then you have room to move the rest of the frames into the space the first frame occupied so you don't have to pry them up. Prying them up as you did is an easy way to roll you queen. Also, at this stage, you probably could have started inserting the foundation in between the drawn nuc frames. This encourages the bees to drawn the foundation faster.

As a new beekeeper, there are some things you should not do. One is to listen to anyone who tells you not to go into your bees too often. That's rubbish advice. The only way you are going to learn what the bees are doing is to see it first hand and compare it on a daily basis. So go into your hives as often as you want. Every day is not too often. Seriously, it's not going to hurt the bees, and it's not going to set them back. Your goal is not to make a bunch of honey in your first year (second, third...). Your goal is to keep them alive and learn how to manage them. You can't do either if you don't understand them. Go through that hive every day if you want to. Use your smoker. Every time! Until you learn to read a hive, you need all the help you can get. Smoke is your friend. Yes pine needles are good. So are wood shavings, wood pellets, straw, burlap, etc. All of it will make smoke. Learn how to light a smoker so it stays lit and burns for a long time. Nothing more frustrating than to have a dead smoker just when you need it. Throughout the course of a year you will learn how to read the colony. It will tell you when smoke is necessary, and when it's optional. During a nectar flow, smoke may not be necessary. Spring and fall dearth, it's a requirement! You might want to consider getting one or two more hives for next year. As a new beekeeper it's better to have at least two hives so you can compare and contrast between the two. If don't have enough experience to determine if a hive is having problems, let alone how to diagnose the cause and fix it. Update: I went back and watched a couple of your early videos and see that you did have two hives, and for all the right reasons.

Very harrowing! I'm glad you're okay.

Glad you survived, and respect that you got back to it. Questions: How long are you in the protection suit? If not too long, I'd be inclined to get a battery powered fan on a backpack to put some air pressure into the sealed suit. (only downside would be looking like Stay Puft the marshmallow man from Ghost Busters) I assume there would be some air passing thru the material or mask/hood. The idea being it might cool you off. And keep the fabric from resting on your skin where a bee could find a place to sting. Also, any unsealed gap might blow a bee away. Just sayin'

I had to requeen 3 of my hives because of defensive bees. It took 7 weeks for them to get the old genetics out but they bees are calm now and I'm not scared. I also have a 3 layer bee suit so I am well protected when I need to be. A good suit is worth the investment.

I wear a pair of flip-flops, a shirt, and shorts to check my bees. I can get from 0 to 20 stings doing 3 hives that are 3 full tall. Not sure if on the bottom of my foot, nose or around the eye is worst for a sting. Just do it on a clam sunny day or you are a gonner, be suit or not

A wild experience for certain! I wouldn't keep bees if mine were mean like that. Are your bees a bit Africanized? Good that you aren't a quitter. All the best!