CALIFORNIA FLOW keepers

Dawn,

Thankz so much ! I’m so happy n pleased to share what I am blessed with. God is good to Vera n I … We never want to horde these highlights in life. Even though I’m a furnace tech by trade I have been able to share so many thing with others. My dear Vera had walked this journey with me n supported me as well. We are still a team !!

Sorry your bees are yet delayed some. Keep us posted. I’ll try to do my best to Friday’s joy n tomorrow’s event ! I’m bubbling over up here in Western Washington. I will pick up my son Steve on way out to Bees in the Burbs, my supplier. He is equally excited for dad. He has muscular dystrophy like Vera so his help will be limited to my cameras.

Blessing n happiness up here,

Gerald

. A toast to beekeeping ! :+1:

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Wow, you have a full plate of hurdles in your life, Gerald! Your family is very lucky to have you. I toast you too with my cup of English breakfast tea (PG Tips!). :smile:

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First get letters from your neighbors if they would like some honey, then explain that you will be installing a hive if they agree. Then move forward with your plans, if then it is no to hive. Look for a place near you that you can place a hive. Make sure your name tele # and address is on hive. Good Luck. I have mine on the side of the house our lot is 75 feet wide and hive is placed just off property line block wall. A row of overhanging orange tree branches help in the division line for flight up and away not low take off for bees. Good luck with many lbs. of honey.Be sure to keep water sourse near hive.

Looking for fellow bee keeper in Bakersfield. I am very new to bee keeping and would really like to have some type of local community in Kern County. Please reach out to me so we can meet and great one evening. I am not aware of any club here, when I called the Kern Ag Dept, they were clueless to a local club :frowning:
-ty

Hello,

We are in Sonoma County as well. This will be our first hive. Wondering how things are going with your FLOW HIVE.

Thanks!

Hi All,

San Francisco East Bay here and new to Bee Keeping, I’m using a friend experience to help me, I have two boxes with the third one being the HF, my bees still not going up there, I placed the HF up in September after the other two boxes where at 80% , I was worried they might swarm, unfortunately they still did not move to the penthouse yet. I’ll wait for early spring and see if they are using the HF, maybe bee wax is in order as I read elsewhere here.

Ciao

Sammy

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Hi Sammy, I presume HF refers to the Flow super? I am surprised that you put it on in September - most beekeepers are shutting down for the winter by then, even in California. Unless you have a really good nectar flow during the winter, the bees will not use that super, and they may actually appreciate you removing it at some point, so that they don’t have such a big home to keep warm during the colder months. The other thought is that there is a risk of them sealing the Flow cells with propolis during the winter - bees love to stick up any drafty gaps. That can make it hard to harvest later, as the propolis seals are quite tough to break.

My hive scale shows that there wasn’t much of a nectar flow in early November, as the hive got lighter from bees eating existing stores. However, around the 15th November, a modest flow started, probably from Eucalyptus and Pepper trees which are flowering in San Diego at the moment. I certainly won’t be putting a super on the hive though, they have enough space for storage after eating reserves during the fall.

Anyhow, welcome to the Forum. I agree with your thought about rubbing or brushing some wax onto the frames before the next nectar flow.

My bees at the apartments are still bringing in nectar and pollen, where they are getting it is beyond me, but they already filled my double deep 8 boxes that I moved them into last month. Going to check on them later today, I added the Flow super last week to see if they would start working it without adding wax. With the recent rains and cooler temps, I’ll probably remove the super, if there isn’t any activity and add a medium just in case…

Wow, your bees sound amazing! As you can see from my weight graph, mine are finding more than they are eating at the moment, but that wasn’t true in October or early November. I guess our microclimates are slightly different. :blush:

When they were in the double deep NUC, it was almost honey bound, and was forced to move them into a bigger hive. All the frames are nearly full as of yesterday, but no activity in the flow super, so it came off. Also, since requeening, the bees have finally calmed down. No signs of beetles or mites unlike the hives at my house.

Hi folks! We’re transitioning to all mediums so we have three deeps to give away, two of which are set up with plexiglass observation panels on either side. Each deep has 8 frames (mostly no foundation.) Anyone interested in picking them up? We’re in San Francisco city, in Bernal Heights.

After using the Flow system along side my traditional hives I am now quite impressed with how they save me a lot of time and effort. I started with two from the startup campaign and I found that harvesting to be much better then the old methods. I just purchased three more supers for my bees. Thanks Flow!

Hi - I am wondering how you’ve done since you’ve had your flowhive a few years now. We are just getting started. I’m also in San Jose.

Tina

Hello Marky - I found you by searching on folks nearby. I’m in Saratoga. Wondering if your hive is still doing fine? We are just getting started.

Tina

Hi Tina,
Unfortunately, we lost our hive that was in the flow hive, so we have to start over this year. :frowning:

Oh no!
What happened?

It didn’t seem disease or pest related, I think something may have happened to the queen. The bees left the hive before I knew there was even a problem.

Hi Mark, we hope to get bees in late March, early April. I’d like to know what you end up doing and when you’ll get new bees. I’d like to stay in touch to learn from you!

Sure, let’s keep in touch!

Oh, I am wondering, when and where did you get your bees? Will you have to get a new colony? I found this site in Nor Cal https://www.beekeepermike.com/. I just contact them for info.