WVBA APRIL 28 2025
7:00 PM Rich called the meeting to order and passed out attendance
Rich announced that dewey could not be with us tonight but there are a couple more days to fill out the survey. Only 19 of our club members have responded.
There may be a new miticide, 1-allyloxy-4-propoxybenzene in the works. Not much is know about it at this time.
There is a method of queen frame trapping to use when it is too late in the season to use drone brood trapping.
7:20 Time for Member Spotlight—Debbie Blando!!!!!!!!
Debbie Blando AKA Sugar Lady. Born in Oregon, lives in Dallas where she keeps bees and hosts open hive day for the club.
About 9 years ago she started going on swarm calls with a beekeeper neighbor. Debbie uses 8 frame Langstroth hives and AZ Hives, which are in a building and you enter from the back. She started those because it is easier on the back, and she has a sun allergy. Her favorite aspect of beekeeping is watching people evolve from fearing to loving bees. Her mentor was her neighbor, but he was treatment free, then she started working with Terry Adams. She mentors people when she has time. She says the hardest thing about beekeeping is lifting the heavy boxes with various health problems. She has learned to work smarter, not harder. She says she has learned a lot from WVBA and learns something new each time. She suggests that we be more welcoming to new members because they are the future of our club. Debbie’s husband use to work for Meduri farm where they dealt with ton bags of sugar, and the club greatly benefitted from that because Jim got permission to take the sacks for the club. Debbie is also the club librarian. Beekeeping for Dummies is her favorite beekeeping book.
One club member asked if smart watches bother bees.
Elaine Gave a presentation on Resource nucs, then it was breaktime.
8:00 PM Rich called the meeting back to order and announced the next speaker, Todd Bartlem
Todd announced that out of 150 pounds of sugar he has a scant bit left. The sugar boards were a great insurance colony against starvation.
Todd’s presentation: An ounce of prevention: Strategies for varroa control.
Factors in swarming— drone production, spring buildup, genetics, space available for brood, nectar and pollen, building of queen cups, Distribution of queen substance, environmental conditions, and good and bad luck.
Swarming is well planned. Bees prepare far in advance to swarm. They reduce brood production, workers engorge in honey, rear a new queen, decrease feeding of queen and rapidly increase their population.
In spring, look for swarm cells! On bottoms of top frames is where they start.
Two types of swarm control strategies—proactive to get ahead of bees and reactive, bees are already ready to go or have already left. Easier to stop swarming before it begins.
Proactive control strategies—
Long term—environmental—too much heat—genetic selection
Short term/immediate—
Option one Forced swarm split. Quick and easy, can recombine later. Need equipment and drawn Comb. Need to monitor.
Proactive option two—intensive hive management. Goal is to knock back bee population, give queen room to lay, enough room to store nectar and pollen, keep bees busy. Inspect every seven to eight days during swarm season. If you see a crowded hive with queen cups you must take action or swarming is inevitable.
Hive manipulations—swap strong and weak locations. Open up screened bottom boards to increase ventilation. Add supers reverse boxes repeatedly. Keep the bees busy.
Every seven to eight days check and scrape uncapped swarm cells,checkerboard brood nest with open comb. When nectar flow starts add foundation and retire old comb.
Drone brood removal also helps.
Brood relocation—equalize colonies being extra careful to not accidentally move a queen.
You can remove queen/replace/ or clip wings. Wing clipping can cause a swarm on the ground.
Pros of intensive hive manegement—keeps hives together for honey production, no hive proliferation.
Cons very labor intensive and must adhere to strict schedule.
Demaree method—separate queen from brood.
Open brood in the bottom, 5 to seven days destroy emergency cells in top box.
Reactive swarm controls—
Don’t scrape capped queen cells, determine if hive has swarmed. If not swarmed, separate one of the elements from the “swarming trio.” Standing eggs, good chance you still have queen.
Remove Queen, Brood, or Adult Bees
Full box artificial swarm—you must find the queen.
Nucleus hive artificial swarm—Remove queen, brood, food—place into nuc. Remove all queen cells
Pros simple, produce a new queen
Cons must find the queen Doesn’t always work parent hive might swarm anyways.
Snelgrove II modified for artificial swarm—create parent colony on new hive stand.
See bigwooly.com/docs for Wally Shaws guide to swarm control