What are you considering upset? Just going in to do an inspection or more then that?
Hi Adam, just bees that get upset because of robbing or checking on the brood, we all end up with hives like that. I remember asking that bloke (the one responsible for 10 out of the 12 tips plus the ones I added) how long bees stay cranky for, he said 3 days. I canāt honestly say I put it to the test. Another thing he told me to do while working the bees is to work the crankiest hive last. If you work the cranky hive first, youāll have cranky bees around you the whole time plus itāll make the other hives bees cranky. My wife Wilma likes using his quote āyou canāt win a boxing match with a beeā, she used it the other day with the homeowners while we were removing a hive from their wall.
I consider myself chastised. My wife just analyzed my ātipsā, she reckons 2 are tips & one is trivia. Iāve always been a big fan of British comedy, & this is no exception. laughing out loud.
Train the bee to fly dawn his throat and you will win yuor boxing match without building up a sweat???
From the Captain ?
Tip #12 A virgin queen outruns the drones from her own colony.
If it were true I donāt understand what the tip is forā¦ but anyway, she doesnāt outrun them. She just has a tendency to fly higher on her mating flight than drones do and tends to go to a more distant DCA (drone congregation area) than the drones do. This makes the ODDS better that she is likely (but no guaranteed) to mate with drones from outside her hive (and probably her apiary).
Tip #11 A shakened queen is a dead queen
I donāt get it. A shaken QUEEN CELL may result in damaged wing buds which will eventually lead to a dead queenā¦ but Iāve seen many a hive shaken out entirely through an excluder to find the queen. Iāve never seen a queen die from it.
Tip #10 Use a frame of brood when catching swarms
Well, if you mean to lure them down out of a tall tree by tying it on a pole, it works pretty well. If you mean to anchor them in a box you just shook them into, it works pretty well. If you mean as bait, it doesnāt make them want to move in.
. Tip #9 Dark honey from an old frame is higher in nutrition
Itās higher in antioxidants. (good) Itās also higher in HMF (hydroxymethyl furfural). (bad). Darker honey has been shown to lessen the incidence of Nosema apis overwinter. (good)
Tip #8 If you canāt see light through an old frame, itās time to cut it out
I never cut it out. I keep them until the wax moths eat them. I changed all my comb out to go to small cell but before that I had combs that were 26 years old Iām sure and until Varroa came along they were doing great on them. Bees winter better on comb with cocoons.
Tip #7 A good honey flow can burn a hives population out.
Not sure I follow that. They usually raise brood all through the flow so there are plenty of young bees coming up.
Tip #6 How to make a bee escape
Not sure what the tip isā¦
. Tip #5 Use a vinyl mat on top of honey frames.
Never tried it. I have used canvas and plastic feed bags. I donāt usually use anythingā¦
Tip #4 How to process beeswax.
Not sure why we are now counting downā¦ Iām never sure how much info to give on processing beeswax. You kind of have to learn some of it for yourself. Advice is more useful to someone who has tried it and is focused on resolving a particular issue.
Tip #3 A beekeepers work is never finished.
Mine is finished every year at the first hard freeze. I donāt even think about them again until spring.
Tip #2 A new swarm will always outperform an existing hive of the same size.
No doubt.
& #1 A sting on the face can ruin your day.
Well, I donāt think I ever had a sting on my face that ruined my day. I have seen other people who got stung on the face and it ruined their dayā¦ Not fun if your eye is swollen shutā¦ The worst swelling I ever got was on my ankle. But usually it doesnāt swell at all.
Another tip comes to mind. I was told if you upset a bee colony, it takes 3 days for the bees to settle down.
Not a bad generalization, but sometimes they settle right down. Sometimes they are still mad two weeks later.
Another tip comes to mind. The bees wont let foreign bees into their hives unless theyāre bringing in honey.
āThe percentage of foragers originating from different colonies within the apiary ranged from 32 to 63 percentāāfrom a paper, published in 1991 by Walter Boylan-Pett and Roger Hoopingarner in Acta Horticulturae 288, 6th Pollination Symposium (see Jan 2010 edition of Bee Culture, 36)
These are probably mostly the bees that fit your ātipā. They arrived at the wrong door with a load of honey and went right in. But any homeless bees seem welcome if they come in with the right attitude.
My wife reminded me of another one of those blokes sayings yesterday. āyou canāt win a boxing match with a beeā
Best tip yet.
It is thought that new queens are far too valuable to be left to their own devices, that scout bees know where the drone congregation areas are and will escort their new queen there.
First time Iāve heard that. I would say itās doubtful.
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Well done Michael, those tips came from 2 old beekeepers that were full time beekeepers since the war. It was when I was new to beekeeping & I was asking lots of questions. One of the blokes was a queen breeder & the other one sold a bit of beekeeping equipment. Thatās how come I got to talk to them & ask questions. I might be guilty of being a bit naive at the time & one of the blokes was having a bit of a lend of me. The bloke who told me that a beekeepers work is never finished, at the time he was referring to boxes needing repairs & paint etc. Personally I have boxes that need repair right now. One day Iāll get a round tuit.
Hi Michael, the last one you commented on was from @dangerousās post. However, it was the first time I heard that also, but I wouldnāt dismiss the theory. ā¦Bees just donāt arrive at the wrong door with a load of honey unless the hive has been removed & another hive moved into that spot. Even with an entrance 12 or 14 inches wide, a bee will return to the same part of the entrance she leftā¦ Tip#1. I got a sting on my forehead today, I canāt say it ruined my day. We both must be tough. I covered the work bit in my previous postā¦ Tip#4 The tip/advice about beeswax was how to clean it & turn it into beautiful clean blocks of wax. Tip#5. The vinyl mat must be similar to your canvas of plastic feed bags. I use the same lids that the flow team use. The vinyl mat stops the bees from building comb from the top of the frames to the underside of the lid. Plus a few other advantages. Tip#6. The bee escape tip is what is commonly called a ātrap-outā. Tip#7. I was told that a good honey flow CAN have an effect on a hives population. āBurn outā is probably overstating it. Tip#8. Keep frames until wax moth eats them?. Why would you do that? My mentors kept bees in a sub-tropical climate, as I do. However Iām sure the bees need a lot more than cocoons to survive the winter. Surely your not talking about 26 years worth of cocoon buildup. Tip #10 He was talking about using a frame of brood in a swarm capture box. It works well for me. Tip #11. Only 2 tips came from this bloke. He must have had a thing about shaking bees. His tip never stopped me from shaking bees. Iām always a bit more gentle while shaking bees if I know the queen is on that frame. Tip#12 That tip/saying came from the same bloke. I hope he was close to right because I told a lot of people that over the years. Michael, you must have had a few mentors when you started out. Does any of the things they told you ring true today? Surely one or two of them do.
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I know beekeepers report mating nuclei to be suddenly depleted of bees only to be back to normal the next day
The following is from The Buzz aboutBees: Biology of a Superorganism by JĆ¼rgen Tautz
Interestingly, the loss of queens seldom occurs in local mating stations, and virtually every queen returns fertilised and healthy to the hive from her nuptial flight. On the other hand, about one of every three queens that have been transported to a different area, and that fly out from mini colonies, is lostā¦ā¦ā¦ā¦ā¦ā¦ā¦ā¦ā¦
What causes this difference in survival of queens? Perhaps the size and abilities of the group accompanying the queen on her flight? A queen flight led by forager bees would make a lot of sense. The queens have either no knowledge at all of the area outside the hive, or at most a poor impression gained from a few orientation flights. Experienced forager bees have the geography of their habitat in their heads, and can provide a guide, especially for the return to a hive they have recently left. For the security of the queen, this return needs to be rapid and direct. Young queens are the most valuable commodity that a honeybee colony produces, and great care must be taken for their safety.
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Hi Dangerous, when I said I wouldnāt dismiss the theory, I should have said āI like the theoryā, it sounds very feasible to me. I know a lot of research has been done on bees since the days of the late, great Karl von Frisch & work by the Moody Institute of Science. Iām off to the bees before breakfast. Iāll talk to you later, bye
Hi Danger, I think I read somewhere that you live in Wales. Do you live far from Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch? You must get asked that question quite often, I guess:)
Iāve been there Jeff and I can tell you Buderim has a better climate and better soil to boot.
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Everyone ask how to say it !!!
Here is a link how to say it and what it actually means!!
http://llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch.co.uk/say.php
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Strangely enoughā¦I never have 
Iām watching the rugby World Cup and in less time than you can say Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch Uruguay are 3 points up on Wales.
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Did you know how to spell it? or did you have to spend about 10 minutes, like me copying it from Wikipedia. Iām guessing itās a must for every Welsh school student to know how to spell Llanfairpwllgywyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch before he/she graduates. I thought I was doing well knowing how to spell ornithorhynchus. My mother taught me that one. Iām getting ready for a huge extracting honey day today, Iāll ttyl, bye.
Hi & thank you Valli, Iāll check it out, I watched one last night. It might be the same one. PS, no itās not, it looks 1000% more helpful than the one I watched.
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@JeffH
On my travels when I first got here went to the station - you can buy a platform ticket (donāt know if you still can) and the name is printed on it
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I did a bit of reading about it yāday. Apparently they have the shortened name on the platform signs. This all started because a young girl (8 yrs. old) got on the local radio & knew how to spell it.
Bees just donāt arrive at the wrong door with a load of honey unless the hive has been removed & another hive moved into that spot.
Apparently they do fairly often:
āThe percentage of foragers originating from different colonies within the apiary ranged from 32 to 63 percentāāfrom a paper, published in 1991 by Walter Boylan-Pett and Roger Hoopingarner in Acta Horticulturae 288, 6th Pollination Symposium (see Jan 2010 edition of Bee Culture, 36)
Even with an entrance 12 or 14 inches wide, a bee will return to the same part of the entrance she leftā¦
Usually.
Tip#8. Keep frames until wax moth eats them?. Why would you do that?
Why would you waste good comb?
My mentors kept bees in a sub-tropical climate, as I do. However Iām sure the bees need a lot more than cocoons to survive the winter. Surely your not talking about 26 years worth of cocoon buildup.
or 30 yearsā¦ or 40 yearsā¦
Tip#12 That tip/saying came from the same bloke. I hope he was close to right because I told a lot of people that over the years.
It is āsort ofā right. The queen does not outrun them though, but bee biology favors her finding drones that are not from her yard.
Michael, you must have had a few mentors when you started out.
None. It was several years before I knew even one beekeeper. The nearest bee club meeting in our state was 500 miles (800 km) away.
Does any of the things they told you ring true today?
I read all the bee books that were in the local library (most of them 100 years old) and yes a lot of it was true. Some of it was definitely not true.
That made me laugh,Michaelā¦thanks.
I should show your comment to the chap that runs our association teaching apiary who tells all beginners to change their comb regularly otherwise as the years go by you get smaller and smaller bees